Malicious Compliance

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Angie_Reiden on 2024-11-07 23:58:26+00:00.

I work at a mid-sized company where most of us have small desks in an open-plan office. Our workspace was never fancy, but it was our own. Many of us had personalized our desks over time with small things that made us feel comfortable like family photos, little potted plants, motivational quotes, even those cheesy stress balls from random company events.

Enter our new manager, Sheila. Fresh from a more "formal" corporate environment, she came in with big ideas about "professionalism" and “efficiency.” Her first big change? An immediate “no personal items” policy. Sheila sent out an email announcing that desks must remain “professional and distraction-free” and warned that any personal items found after a certain date would be removed by her.

People were frustrated, but we complied. We packed up our things, took home our photos, plants, and every little touch that made our desks feel like ours. But Sheila wasn’t satisfied. She started walking around the office, critiquing anything she deemed “unprofessional,” including practical items like sticky notes or even labeled drawers. She wanted a uniform look, free from “clutter.”

At this point, we were fed up. We decided to take “impersonal” to a whole new level.

We spent the next few days systematically removing anything that added personality or function to the space. First, we took down the labels on drawers and cabinets that marked where supplies were kept, after all, they could be considered “personalized.” Then, we stripped the whiteboards bare, removing all schedules, task lists, and helpful reminders. My coworker Sam, the office organizer, removed all the color-coded tabs and replaced everything with blank, unlabeled folders.

Our workstations became soulless. But we didn’t stop there.

We noticed that even the company provided items, like the ergonomic mouse pads and wrist rests, weren’t uniform, so we tucked them away in drawers. Some of us even swapped out our ergonomic chairs with the plain guest chairs, as the ergonomic ones seemed a bit too “individualized.”

Soon, our workspace looked like a cross between a sterile hospital room and a call center with zero personality. It was, in Sheila’s words, “totally professional.”

Sheila was pleased at first, but then the consequences of our “impersonal” compliance started to show. Without labels or visible reminders, no one knew where anything was stored, leading to endless back-and-forth and wasted time hunting for supplies. Simple tasks took twice as long, with people digging through unlabeled files or searching for the right folder in the sea of plain, identical folders.

Clients visiting the office remarked that the space felt "cold" and “uninviting,” noting that they missed the usual welcoming touch. Morale in the office dropped, and everyone was noticeably disengaged.

After a particularly rough day where Sheila herself got frustrated searching for a stapler, she called an emergency meeting. She admitted that maybe we’d gone a bit too far, and that we could “reintroduce a few labeled drawers and some plants.” One by one, employees brought back their family photos, potted plants, and other small touches that made the office feel alive again.

By the end of the day, our workspace was back to normal, with a clear message sent: sometimes a little personality and comfort go a long way.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/veybi on 2024-11-07 07:00:47+00:00.

Right after dinner, my 3 year old asked to play video games. We started introducing him to some games, and he loves Sonic already. Since he behaved very well during the whole day, it was fair to let him play a bit, however we told him that first he should brush his teeth.

He, as a good toddler, immediately protested and asked to brush his teeth while playing. We kept telling him no, that he first need to brush and after he gets to play. After a quick back and forth, the following dialogue happened:

Lovey wife: - Bud, how would that work? You don't have enough hands to hold the controller and the toothbrush at the same time.

Him, with the logic and confidence of a 3 year old: - Yes I do!

Her: - No, you don't. You have two hands. You need two hands just for the controller and another one for the toothbrush.

Him: - I have three hands!

Her: - No, you don't.

Him: - Yes, I do.

Her: - You know what, if you show me you have three hands, I will let you play and brush your teeth at the same time.

Him: - OK.

Immediately leaves the couch and goes towards the dinning table. Grabs a sticky hand toy that he got for Halloween and brings it back.

• See, now I have three hands!

It was almost impossible not to lose it laughing, especially seeing the proud smirk in his face... He got to play the game while we brushed his teeth, as a reward for creative problem-solving.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/ResultDowntown3065 on 2024-11-06 23:14:18+00:00.

Another post reminded me of this story.

My mother was a nurse. She worked in the same medical/surgical unit for almost 30 years. Every year a new set of Medical Residents would come through. They were mostly nice and eager to learn from everyone, including the nurses. However there is always an outlier.

One afternoon, one of the patients on the floor had an issue. I am not sure what it was, but it had to do with some treatment that a Resident ordered that was not agreeing with the patient. No problem, because this is not the first time this has happened in the history of this said treatment and there is a written protocol on how to make adjustments. The seasoned nurses have seen this before and have made changes to this order hundreds of times. T

The nurse in charge did the adjustment and all was well. However, when the prescribing Resident found out, she went batsh*t crazy, yelling at everyone about usurping her authority. Then she said that any changes to care for her patients had to be approved by her first.

Ok, game on.

For the next week, this Resident was paged for Every! Single! Solitary! Thing! especially when the Resident went on nap break during 36-hour shifts.

This went on for two weeks because the Resident complained to everyone thinking that people would side with her. When she saw that the Sr. doctors or her fellow Residents wouldn't back her up, she gave up and let the nurses use their judgment.

Never mess with the nurses/

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/FlopShanoobie on 2024-11-06 22:38:02+00:00.

At the end of every year we have to do this ridiculous self appraisal as part of our performance review. Normally it's 3 or 4 questions based on your goals for the past year: did you accomplish your goals, what roadblocks did you overcome, how did you become a better employee, etc.

This year I got a new boss who, instead of the usual 5 goals, assigned me 25. Yes, a total of 25 highly specific goals for me to accomplish throughout the year. Since January I've been knocking them down and moving to the next one, or working on long-range projects that included multiple goals. I did really well, all things considered, and even got a promotion. Nice!

That brings us to the annual performance evaluation. I had a lot of goals–25 of them, if you recall. My plan was to write a short essay that broke down the year by quarter and outlined all of the goals I met and a short description of how meeting that goal helped the team make progress. Clean, simple, and complete.

Except my boss has this form. This form includes six sections with 4 to 7 questions per section, for a total of 33 separate questions ... per goal. That's 825 questions. Each question requires at least 150 words to be considered complete.

He handed me the evaluation packet last week and said I needed to turn it in my Thanksgiving. After getting a couple of questions into the thing I realized it wasn't just asking for narrative, but data and analysis, sometimes multiple data points per question. I spent two entire days just completing one goal, which comprised 12 written pages, two spreadsheets, and 14 separate graphics. Doing the math I realized it was going to take me 48 business days to complete the remainder. I asked my boss if this is really what he intended and he said Just do it like I said.

Sure thing.

I cleared my calendar through Thanksgiving. Not one meeting. Declined all project requests in Asana. Turned on Busy in Teams. Turned on auto-replies in Outlook. For a full month.

When my boss' boss - our VP - came by and asked why I wasn't responding to any requests or responding to email I explained the situation. What's funny is he said, "Yeah, he's a real stickler for detail. I guess he needs to learn how to deal with reality. Carry on!"

I'm up to about 130-odd written pages. This thing is going to be bigger than my dissertation! And he STILL hasn't come by to ask why I'm not coming to meetings anymore. Maybe this really is what he wants - a team lead doing useless paperwork for 6 weeks. Whatever. They're paying me.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Cryptid-Fan on 2024-11-06 19:57:55+00:00.

In my early 30's, I (now 40F) worked for a university as a Project Manager. We were state funded, and therefore every nickle of spending had to be run through our department Accountant, who was not terribly well liked. She was very nit picky, would demand documentation on some expenses but not others, and would be very condescending when she "had" to send stuff back for correction (aka done to her liking, it had nothing to do with being incorrect). Rumor had it that she only got and stayed in her position because she was related to a board member. That being said, I got used to her shenanigans pretty early and just did my best to get my purchases through her as quickly as possible so that I could continue my projects.

About a year into my employment, I was handed a project that had been initiated by our Director. It was a 5 year training program that was described to me as "The Director's Baby." My Manager got it off the ground and then passed it to me to maintain for the remainder of the program. I threw myself into this program not only because I enjoyed what I did, but also the Director was cool as hell (I'm still friends with him on socal media) and I wanted the program to succeed for him.

I had a Project Coordinator that worked with me for detail stuff like ordering supplies and working with facilities (my focus was on budget, content, and working with the clients). After she and I had run several successful training sessions under this new program, we needed to order more supplies of standard training stuff like pens, note pads, name tags, etc. Something else we regularly used, per the Director's request, was boxes of tissues, which for some unknown reason was not something we could get from our office supply vendor. My Coordinator had been buying them in bulk at a warehouse store with her purchase card and then storing them in the basement, only taking what we needed for each training session.

When she went to submit the receipt for the new container of tissue boxes, the accountant lit into her about how tissues were not an approved purchase. Even when she showed the accountant an email from the beginning of the program showing that the director has requested tissues be provided to the participants, she stated that the Director didn't make or enforce the purchasing policy (which is technically true). When my Coordinator, who was normally a very bold and brassy lady, came into my office looking defeated and told me she was going to have to take the tissues back unless the accountant received "sufficient written justification", I got pissed.

I could have pushed the issue up the chain, but I didn't want to bother my Manager or the Director with this nonsense. Instead, I decided to do what I do best, be annoying. One thing I am good at is writing extremely detailed bullshit. I can elaborate on any detail, no matter how small. I'm especially good at it when I'm mad. So I popped myself down in front my computer and, in one go, wrote a five and a half page email (we did a print preview to see exactly how long it was) on why we needed boxes of tissues for this program. I never put in there "because the Director said so", but I listed off every other possible justification and then wrote a mini essay on each of those points. My Coordinator was sitting in the corner of my office giggling as she watched my hands fly over the keyboard.

I sent the email around noon. Just before quitting time, my Coordinator stuck her head back into my office to let me know that the tissue purchase had been approved in our system. I never got a reply to my email, the Accountant never said anything to me or my Coordinator, but my Coordinator never again got pushback on buying boxes of tissues.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/El_Baramallo on 2024-11-06 19:16:38+00:00.

I am staying at Japan. I don't speak Japanese.

I went down to the front desk at the hotel I'm staying at, and as I often did throughout this trip, pulled out my phone and asked Google Translate what time did breakfast start.

Clerk reaches for his phone that was charging in a nearby table, but his hand pauses midair. He glances at another clerk, returns to his seat at the front desk, types something in the computer and picks up at the printer.

He then hands me a printout from Google Translate's webpage saying "it starts at 6am"

Now that's an employee who has been scolded for using his personal phone during work if I've ever seen one!

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/melentop on 2024-11-06 18:40:56+00:00.

Long Story. I've worked aviation EMS as a pilot for many years after retiring from the military. Great, stable job and still serving the local communities, so a sense of pride and community service is maintained. In the last few years, corporate decided that our flight volume was such that a second helicopter be stationed, co-located, with us as we we're consistently one of the top performing bases in the company. Long story short, a different type of helicopter with different capabilities was to be co-located with us. Said new aircraft had a mix of a sister company ownership and our company nurses and medics. Odd setup. Different companies under one umbrella, but different rules for the crews. Crew=Nurse and Medic.

As a top performer, in the mean time, our base was given a newer, much faster aircraft with the hopes of increasing our already stellar productivity. We were always first call as the other base/aircraft was on reserve. Massive animosity ensued as our base would get 3-5 flights a day while the reserve, more capable aircraft was on hold for possible turndowns. Nurses and Medics all employed by the same company. Regardless of WX, our base was first call and often did back to back to back calls while the other, newer, more capable base/aircraft sat on reserve even on sever clear days. More animosity.

Fast forward to one of the nurses on the sh*t end of the stick being promoted to boss of both bases as far as base operations and facilities are concerned. Changes made and equitable flight volume distribution changes in effect and now the workload is much more even and honestly, fair.

But quick changes come with a reality check. Dope deals were made behind the scenes between and the two air bosses agreed who would take what flight and when. This information didn't trickle down to my me or my other pilot who work the opposite shift. That's important since we pilots generally show up 30mins or so early to help avoid late flights where we can't bring the crew back. We have strict flight time regs we have to follow per the FAA or certificate action can happen. Read, we stop flying forever.

Background set for non-aviation folks, I walk in one day, 30 minutes early as usual and hear the tones go off. Flight request. I take it and we complete the flight with no issues...except the flurry of phone calls I get asking why I took it. Reminder that the new "rules" on which base takes which flight when are beyond me. I'm confused by the question and politely tell them to F off because I literally just did my job.

As the new base boss was still on the flight schedule for the day, I was elated to have a face-to-face about it. I was reemed about taking crews on overtime. HUH?, WHAT?, EXSCUSE YOU? That has NEVER been a thing in almost the decade I've worked here. We get the patient were they need to go, overtime be damned. THAT'S OUR FUCKING JOB.

Cue malicious compliance: Ok, if paying overtime is now a thing, I'll comply. If we get a flight request that even remotely looks close to having overtime being payed, I'll call her for approval before accepting. Don't want to piss off the mythical bean counters in lieu of potentially saving a life.

This is not, by the way, a normal process to take a flight and I will not decline one over it, but I've enjoyed waking the boss up at all hours of the night over it. I didn't start this, just complying. I've asked for written guidance on new policies, but until then, the 3am call will just keep coming.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Lickawall483 on 2024-11-06 16:20:19+00:00.

About 10 years ago I have applied to work at a retail store selling different tech. It is a rather large chain in the UK and can get pretty busy, especially after 5pm or during holidays/sales. When I applied for a job I wanted to go to computing department as I was very passionate about different builds and had some experience in building my own PC, instead I was temporarily placed on white goods (fridges, washing machines etc) for training even after I have admitted I know absolutely nothing about them. But no, apparently this knowledge should have been inherited through my genes since I am a girl, so I must know about them and be very good. So I bit my tongue and waited as I needed money and was fresh out of uni.

About a few months in I have realised I am not going to be transferred to the computing department, no matter how much I wanted to. My sales were good but the managers wouldn't budge as they were scared I might advice something wrong.

It was a start of a school term and the store was getting petty busy. A couple came in wanting to buy a PC for their teenage kid to game on, I wanted to help them as a fellow gamer myself, but got rudely pulled back by my manager and was told unless we are assigned to a specific department, we are not allowed to help customers or advice them. So he fetched another colleague who carried on assisting the parents. As it was quiet in my department I was doing some tidying up around the store and heard the colleague trying to sell the parents one of the apple PCs saying they will be great for gaming and all professionals use them (at the time we had a bigger commission from apple brand). Let me tell you they are not the best machines for gaming and if you are into heavier games they are likely not going to run that well or be incompatible with the OS.

I don't know what else the colleague said, but the parents believed him and got an iMac for the kid. The manager was very proud of the colleague and told me to use him as an example of a good sale for the store. I have told him I could have topped it and the customer will come back with a return, but was told again not to go to computing department. Cue malicious compliance.

A few days later it was a busy day in the store, especially PCs due to back to school sale. A few people were off sick due to being overworked so the computing department had like 2 people on the floor, including the work colleague who sold the iMac. The parents came through the door with the pc they got, which usually means something broke down or they want to return it. They saw the guy who sold them the PC and started heading his way. He saw them too and decided it is time to go on lunch, leaving one colleague on the floor in the department.

The parents are visibly getting angry and try to go to the till, but after being in the queue are told to catch another colleague from the tech department as we can't process refunds at the till for large items.

The parents approach me as I don't have much to do and ask for help. I would be happy to do so, but remembering what the manager said I had to tell them I can't as I am not allowed to do anything with the pc department as it is a store policy. The parents approach more colleagues and keep hearing the same excuse. Obviously they are getting more and more angry so are other customers who want to buy something but can't since only people in computing department are allowed to sell stuff for computers. They try to grab the only person on the floor, but he is already busy with other customers and can't assist them while the other colleague responsible for the sale signed out for the day and the other is late. In about 20 minutes there's a massive queue by the tills of angry customers demanding to speak to the manager. The poor person at the till has no choice but to fetch the store manager and floor managers due to the amount of angry customers.

They are trying to shift the blame on us, other store colleagues, but I mention about what the other manager said about not touching anything in tech department or help customers as we are not authorised and since it is a company policy and we haven't received the training we have to comply. Of course it makes customers even more angry and feel like their time is wasted, resulting in a commotion by the tills and further delays for other customers.

I am unsure how the entire situation ended, as I was grabbed by an older lady to help her, but that day we had a lot of complaints on different websites about the policy and "store staff refusing to help as it is not their department" and we had a few "brainstorming" sessions after how to reduce complaints with none of the ideas taken on board.

You would hope they would learn something and change the policy, but no. They gave extra training to the people already in computing department and allowed other colleague to sell smaller items like mice, keyboards, consoles, games, printers but not the laptops or pc or vr, resulting in more complaints. Last time I have been there to buy my mum a new laptop (had a voucher) the situation seemed to have stayed the same, as we ended up waiting around 45 minutes for someone to push the sale through. At least I got a chance to complain to the store manager as well telling him everything I think about that store policy.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/My_Brain_Is_A_Rental on 2024-11-06 09:40:01+00:00.

When I was in high school I wasn’t very good at writing essays in English. I knew all the concepts but flushing out a few pages of BS wasn’t something I could do in 45 minutes of class time.

For a few weeks we had a student teacher completing her Prac block. Knowing that kids circle substitute and student teachers like sharks she didn’t take any shit but overcompensated and more than a few of the kids in my class checked out or outright antagonised her. This just made her more hostile to the smart ass teenagers we were.

For me, check out was when I tried to answer a question about the use of a very specific term in a poem about WW1 soldiers. The author used “wheeled chair” instead of “wheelchair”. I put my hand up and gave some interpretation that made sense and I was always told there’s no wrong answers in these sorts of discussions. As a reward for participating I was treated to a fairly harsh “No. You’re wrong”… noted.

So we have to complete an essay on what we’ve learnt the last few weeks and the question is along the lines of “How did the author make you feel when reading (text)?”. Me, having mentally checked out of English class, not being good at that sort of thing and being the shitty kid I was wrote out a couple paragraphs summarising the message of the text and saying that I didn’t feel anything when reading it.

The next Monday we get our essays back and I’ve got a 5/25. More than I thought so those two paragraphs must have been pretty good. The prac teacher takes me outside and goes on about how she’s disappointed and I could have done better and how everyone else wrote two or three pages but I didn’t get half a page done. It all seemed pretty disingenuous to me because she hadn’t shied away from telling me or anyone else when we were wrong. She asked why I wrote that and I replied that I genuinely didn’t have an emotional reaction to it. Why lie? She then says I have the choice to either take the fail or rewrite the essay next class. “Ok, I’ll take the grade. No point wasting time”.

Her face dropped a bit and she took a while to reply “Really? Are you sure?” “Yep, I’m no good at this sort of thing remember. I didn’t get it right in class so why would that change overnight?” Defeated, she sent me back to class and went next door for a few minutes. A little while later I was called out again to speak with my actual teacher. She asked me why I didn’t think I could do better and what didn’t I understand about the question. After talking for a while she said that I will HAVE to retake the essay with a new text and question. One that was worded so I couldn’t just say “I didn’t”.

In the end I wrote around two pages and passed, just. The prac teacher was there for another two weeks or so and I noticed a few things. First, she didn’t react with outright contempt when someone gave an answer that wasn’t what she wanted. Second, she didn’t try try to play a game of wits against any more self sabotaging teenagers.

Bonus story about my actual teacher. She was younger and really nice but now that I’m older I think she was a one of those sensitive but naive sorts of people. We had to come up with a tv pilot episode and read it out to the class. One kid read out the first episode of Burn Notice word for word. Top marks and a heap of praise

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/NewtonsFig on 2024-11-06 00:28:53+00:00.

My sibling is super awful sometimes. Said sibling not only sued me for control over my late parent’s estate, but they stole and sold off all kinds of belongings. They also did this while parent was alive. Stole, I mean. Sibling couldn’t be bothered to even bring parent a milkshake when they were dying. I had to relocate in order to care for parent. Sibling also tortures animals, mostly cats and did so to my own beloved fur baby who I had to send over the bridge shortly after parent died.

Anyways, moving on - just trying to pain the picture lest the reader think I’m an awful person for what happens next.

Sibling had agreed that I could have parents ashes and I let sibling have the flag that was presented for military service.

Suddenly many years after parent died sibling decided they wanted some ashes. I on the other hand feel strongly that the remains should remain intact. No pun intended. Also, it brings me peace and comforts me (as weird as that sounds) having remains nearby.

So, after much thought and discussion with a lot of awful words back and forth I relented. Sibling even got family involved who don’t understand our dynamics and sided with sibling.

Anyways….sibling may or may not now have my late kitty’s ashes on their mantle and may or may not believe they are my parents.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/FapDonkey on 2024-11-05 21:55:15+00:00.

recently told this story in another thread, and was told it would do well here? Please feel free to delete if it doesn;t meet the sub rules/subject.

I was raised in a devout Roman Catholic family, who sent myself my siblings to Catholic-run schools from Kindergarten through high school. For this to make sense, some basic understanding of Catholic religious doctrine is needed (I'll keep it brief). Catholics practice something called the sacrament of Holy Confession. The belief is that if you confess your sins to a priest, and truly repent for what you've done, the priest has the power to forgive your sins in the eyes of God. Most churches will have things called "confessionals" for this purpose, while some newer ones are small rooms with chairs, teh classic confessional is like a small closet, with the presit sitting in a closet next to you, separated by a privacy screen. Usually confession will be held after a morning daily mass service; one or more priests will set up in the conrfessional, congregants will go in one by one and say their confession, etc.

Now, the bond of the confessional is aboslutely sacrosanct within the church. Think of it like lawyer/client privilege. A priest is NEVER EVER supposed to share anything they learn int he confessional, nor act on any information they learn. Priests have been executed by their government for refusing to testify in a trial about something they hear in a confessional. If a priest is found to have broken this bond, he will be defrocked (basically kicked out of the priesthood), and could possibly even be excommunicated (kicked out of the entire church, shunned, rejected by any devout catholic etc). Its a BIG DEAL. So much so that the policy for priests is that even if they later learn something through "normal" means that they originally first learned in teh confessional, they are not allowed to act on that information (lest it even give the impression to the person who confessed that the priest was breaking the bond of the confessional). This last part is important.

Well sophomore year my Catholic high school had its administration taken over by the Salesians, a religious order (brothers/monks) who are dedicated to educating chidlren. Our new principal was a Salesian priest, and started holding daily mass in our campus chapel every morning ebfore classes. He really encouraged folks to go. Despite his efforts, never realy took off. Would just be the usual 1-2 super devout teachers, maybe a particularly religious student or so. Then one Monday morning, right after homeroom, we hear the not-uncommon announcement over the PA "Will the following students report to the principal's office immediately....". Most of the time this happened when those students were getting disciplined for some weekend shenanigans (at a private school, so we could be punsihed for that sort of thing). Someone threw a raging kegger, someone's aprents found out, called the school, and now everyone involved was getting punished. This is when I had my epiphany.

Next Monday morning I was at morning mass, bright an early. Right at the front of the line to go into the confessional afterwards. Sat down with Father Jim, and confessed to him in GREAT detail all the toruble I and my friends had gotten up to over the weekend. Where we went, who did what, and to whom. EVERY THING. The first time I think he was kinda surprised, gave me some acts of contrition to perform, said the absolution, and sent me on my way. I think the first few times he was actually pleased with hismelf "I'm really starting to each these kids". But I'm pretty sure that by midway through the semester he'd caught on to what I was doing. every now and then he'd make a sly reference or crack a smile. But he coudln;t stop me lol!

You see, by going and confessing EVERYTHING we did over the weekend to our principal first thing Monday, I was putting ALL that info into the bonds of the confessional. Anything I told him there, Father would never be able to act on, without risking serious consequences. If he got to his office, and his first message was from my friends' mom explaining how she'd caught us all drunk as skunks smoking cigarettes in the alley behind her house. He could thank her for hte info. But he couldn't punish us for it. Becuase I'd already told him 20 minutes earlier alllll about it in the confessional.

This tradition lasted all the way through senior year/graduation. Served me and my friends well. Some other folks must have figured things out as time went on, by the time i graduated the monday mass sessions were always well attended, and father had to start doing them earlier to save time for all the confessions he was hearing before classes.

I don't know if it was me or Father that was guilty of the "malicious compliance" here. Did we play him, by going to confession like he insisted, but for our own selfish reasons? Or did he play us, doing some 4d-chess shit? I mean, after all, in jsut 2 years, he somehow managed to get dozens and dozens of high school students to start regularly attening mass before class, and going to confession weekly... Win win? lol

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/bkwormtricia on 2024-11-05 01:44:41+00:00.

Back in the dark ages my town public schools required females to always wear a dress or a skirt and blouse, even in the snowy New England winters. Froze my tush walking 1/3 mile to the bus stop and standing there waiting! Boys were supposed to wear dress pants and collared shirts.

In high school, Student Lockers were in the school corridor, and the rules said we needed to remove coats, boots and other outdoors/weather gear there before entering the other rooms. So I and some other female students hatched a plan. When it got cold we wore pants to school under our skirts - and removed them while standing or sitting in the public corridor.

Teachers and Principle got upset, but warm pants (corduroy, lined, wool etc., were specifically listed in the manual - they were of course thinking of the boys!) qualified as weather gear. When they said to go to a bathroom to change, I pointed to the student rulebook saying weather gear had to be removed before entering the other rooms. More and more girls copied us, and they hated girls maybe accidentally flashing underwear while changing (it could even accidentally happen pulling down pants worn over skirts, and pants crushed the required neat appearance of the skirts), so we won the battle - pants instead of skirts were allowed all day in winter.

Which we then stretched to rainy days in spring (half the days, in MA) and finally they gave up. We could choose to wear pants any day. Which soon devolved to jeans and such for everyone.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/rosepriestess26 on 2024-11-05 00:33:53+00:00.

It's something I say all the time. I've got the goody-two shoes reputation, which is mostly true, but I also tend to be creative.

One of my favorite instances was from my senior year of high school. Take into account, I'm already a legal adult at this point, and am going to be moving out in a few months anyway as soon as college starts. But as long as you're still in high school, you're still a kid, at least as far as the teachers are concerned. Hell, they even had us getting our parents permission for slips and stuff like that. Not exactly a great way to prepare us for the world, but I digress.

I had started a job at a local vet clinic over the summer. I mainly acted as the go-for, grabbing things from the back, folding laundry, filing, and what have-you. I've always been a bit of a compulsive savor, and many of my paychecks went straight into being able to afford senior trip when it finally came around.

There are a few things you have to understand about my hometown before I continue on with this story. One, it was incredibly small (less than 2000 people) and also very religious. This meant that, even though we went to a public school, there were still a lot of strange rules to follow, and you best believe that dress code was sexist. Two, there were only a few people in my grade that actually cared, and thus we were the only ones who actually WANTED to go on the senior trip. The rest of the class was pretty annoyed at having to take their finals a week early, but it's really their loss for being boring.

Anyway, we were going to be in California for this senior trip, which meant the ocean and a hotel with a pool (that also turned out to be salt water). One of the rules was that we weren't allowed to wear two piece bathing suits.

Now, I don't really agree with sexualizing oneself too much, but if you want to look good and you feel comfortable in it, go for it. I quite like my crop tops and bikinis very much, thank you, so I was pretty annoyed with this rule, as you can imagine.

Fortunately, my mother has always been a little bit of a rebel, so when I came to her complaining of my problem, she had the perfect solution: a one-piece with a cutout. That way no one could get mad at me, because I was still following the rules.

We went shopping a few days later, where I found a gorgeous red suit that hugged my body nicely. There was a small stitch on the side connecting the two ends together, but other than that it was about as close as you could get to a bikini without it ACTUALLY being a bikini. I still have this bathing suit, and it's become one of my favorites.

In the end, it didn't matter, as a friend of mine ending up just wearing a sports bra and shorts to swim, and the only two chaperones left us alone at the hotel to go shopping or whatever it is that chaperones have to do. Still, it was the thought behind it. I don't tend to be rebellious, but little things like that make me feel some sort of weird pride when I do them. So of course I often go out looking for rules that I can find new ways around. There's no fun in being a goody-two shoes ALL the time now, is there?

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Imherebecausebored on 2024-11-04 19:12:28+00:00.

Update as promised.

Bit if an anticlimax really. I was prepared to drive around finding somewhere until the van van out of juice and needed rescue, potentially wasting the whole day and prompting a change of policy.

What actually happened was my line manager saying “try to find one and see how it goes.” Sadly the 2nd one I tried worked with the fuel card and I only managed to waste about 40 min filling up including the time it took to find it. I guess the network is improving.

This would only be about 48 hours a year on charging if thats a consistent time. Which is an insignificant amount of money to the company.

It did however cost about £20 which only gave me 100 miles range so it’s now just about more expensive to run than the diesel vans.

Original text below;

“So, background, I drive an Electric van for work, which is one of the few in the fleet of give or take 400 that are ICE cars/vans. I charge it at home using a smart plug to calculate usage then submit mileage via the tracker along with a photo of the plug and my most recent electric bill to calculate what l'm owed back. I do have a company fuel card but its not accepted at probably 99% of fast chargers near me, and none of the local slow chargers, and maybe 0.05% chance my job site will have one I can use. Last Friday head office sent out an updated policy for milage/travel/expense etc. claims that states electric vehicles can now only be charged using the provided fuel cards I messaged my line manager on Friday telling him that on Monday he can find me driving around trying to find somewhere to charge the van then sitting there waiting for it to fill up which will leave me good to go for the next two days, before having to repeat the charging dance. Still no reply. I start work in 12 hours. I have jobs scheduled that are not movable without big complaints. I will be sat in my van trying to find a charger before my ~ 20 miles i had left in Friday run out. My travel time is contractually paid. Im gonna be paid for at least half a day just charging a van at somewhere that costs far more than my driveway. If I can find one the fuel card works at.”

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/simo289 on 2024-11-04 10:50:11+00:00.

A couple of years ago I worked customer support for an investment and pensions dept of a larger company. Basically, answer the phone and help customers who don't understand something about their account or need to access features usually reserved for their accountant.

I had only been with the company about 3 months, had finished my training, and recently been cleared to take calls unmonitored. But a supervisor was still listening back to 3 or 4 of my calls each day, just to check.

It was coming to the end of the tax year, so the lines were super busy open to close, but a lot of the calls I was taking were for pension or ISA withdrawals or deposits, so all I had to do was check a few details then drop the customer in the call queue for the relevant dept. Due to the high volume and relative simplicity of these calls, I was answering 20-30 a day. After a week or so I got a message from my team leader telling me I was taking too many calls, so the number he was checking wasn't a high enough percentage to be indicative of my performance. Ok, fine. Starting the next day I would take a call, pass the customer on, then sit and twiddle my thumbs for ~an hour, all while the queue is getting longer and longer (we're talking 2-3 hours on hold), then take another call and repeat.

Fast forward another couple of weeks and I have a perforated review with my team leader. He says that my verification of customer identities isn't up to scratch with company standards. I explain that 1. I am meeting the standards that were laid out in our training and that all further advice and guidance had been completely contradictory, or so vague as to be meaningless. He tells me that when I come in tomorrow I need to log in, mark myself as 'in training' (so I won't receive any calls), and wait to hear from him about next steps. So the next morning I log in to my work laptop and wait to hear from him. For 5 days, I sat in my spare bedroom/office playing video games, all while logged in, marked as 'in training', and waiting till hear from my team leader.

The next week, I get a message from a manager 2 or 3 steps above my team leader asking why I haven't taken a single call in 5 days. I explain what my team leader told me, sent screenshots of emails etc, and said that I was waiting to hear back. She said she would look into the situation and get back to me. Cue another week of video games and naps on company time.

I ended up getting made redundant and taking the balance of my annual leave before anything got resolved because the company outsourced 90% of the call handling to India, but those 2 weeks were great!

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/JoWhee on 2024-11-02 10:42:52+00:00.

Another post reminded me of this gem.

My old company manager would always ask for a sick note from your doctor.

It’s about $50 from my GP. I was at his office when my boss “Mary” called me to make absolutely sure I had a sick note. I had a two company credit cards one for internal use (tools etc.) and one for external use (billed to clients). Neither would work at my doctors office. I called Mary back:

Me: my company credit cards aren’t working

Mary: use your own and file an expense report

Me: no I’m not here to lend money to a multi million dollar company.

Mary: fine use mine.

Medical secretary: we can’t take credit cards over the phone.

Mary: them you won’t be paid for today.

Me: send that by email right away please.

Mary: sends it.

Me: replies to email I’ll need a union day to file a grievance as you refusing to pay me is against our collective agreement. There is NOTHING in our collective agreement stating that I need a note for one day, it's for three consecutive days. I’ll also need a second union rep as I can’t represent myself.

Union days for grievance can’t be refused for any reason unless there’s a catastrophic event.

Mary: (calls me back) fine I’ll pay you.

Me: no, the violation has already occurred and the grievance demand filed, we are proceeding with this.

Mary: but

Me: my union rep will be in touch.

For 8 hours pay, and want of a sick note

Me plus other union rep 4 hours to prepare plus 2 hours travel each. 12 hours unpaid. 4 hours each to present the grievance. Grievance was won at the first stage. So I got paid my 8 hours, but they company had to pay 20 man hours out of pocket (unbillable to client) because Mary was enforcing her own rules outside the collective agreement, as a "management right".

I was maliciously complying with our grievance process which I brought up during the presentation.

Bonus content: Mary stated that what was written in the collective agreement was open to interpretation and she was correct and I was wrong. I asked her to flip to the last page of the PDF, she did.

Me: who had signed the contract?

Mary: VP of HR, National Union Rep, VP operations, Matthew, and... YOU the VP of your union accreditation

Me: so what you're saying is you, who wasn't at all present during the negotiations knows more about the contract I've negotiated for the last three renewals?

Mary: this meeting is over I'll have my answer emailed to you within 7 days.

Me: you have 3 business days as per our collective agreement which you know so well, I'd hate to file yet another grievance for non compliance.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/I_SawTheSine on 2024-11-02 04:07:47+00:00.

A few months ago I booked a return ticket to a nearby town over a busy holiday weekend. I wanted to do a little cycling over the weekend so I phoned the bus company before the day of departure to check if I could take a bicycle with me. They confirmed that I could so long as I arrived at the bus station half an hour early.

On the trip down they loaded my bicycle into the baggage hold, even opening up a special side hatch to make it easier to get it in. So I enjoyed a few bike rides while I was down there.

Come the day of my return and it's belting rain. I get to the bus station half an hour early but sopping wet. Considerate as I am, I purchase some paper towels to wipe down my bike so it won't dampen anyone else's luggage.

Then the bus arrives. I go straight over to the baggage loading area and ask the guy if I can put my bike in. He replies, "No." Do I need to wait? No, he's just not going to let my bike on. At all.

So I spend a quarter of an hour arguing with the guy, as the clock ticks towards departure time. I tell him the bus company has already confirmed I could bring my bike, but that does not move him. He keeps telling me there's no space in the hold, even though I can see there's space in the hold.

Now this is a Sunday and I have work the next day. And it's the end of a holiday weekend so I might not be able to get a seat on another bus, even if they refund me my money. And nobody's talking about a refund.

Finally, departure time has arrived. I yell out, "Well, head office said I could take it on the bus, so I'm taking it on the bus."

And I hoick my bicycle in the air and step up into the passenger section of the bus and start making my way to my seat. Now, my seat was booked for the upper deck, so I also have to hoick my bike up the narrow spiral staircase to the upper deck, which I do.

My bicycle is XL size so, all things considered, I'm astonished how limited and shallow the scratches were that I left on the plastic finishes of the spiral staircase as I went up.

Amazingly, no-one made any move to stop me, and the passengers on the upper deck all came onto my side, helping me to secure the bicycle and making no complaint about having to squeeze past it, even though it almost entirely blocked the corridor.

Every now and then the conductor would come up to check our tickets, see the bicycle blocking the way, and turn away defeated. Every time he did so, I made sure to say loudly to my fellow passengers, "I dunno, to me it would have made more sense to put it in the hold, but it's their bus, they make the rules." And the other passengers would agree with me.

The bike and I got home safely.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/happyscatteredreader on 2024-11-01 16:22:23+00:00.

This is one going back a few years but it's one that made me chuckle when I remembered it.

As we live in a busy estate, we are in a prime position for door to door callers. Usually they were fine, polite and if I was happy to listen to their pitch then great and if not, they were pretty good about hearing "no" and leaving me be.

In our house, all the utility bills are in my name because I am the financial person in the house hold and by mutual agreement, the one who knows how many beans make five when it comes to deals and offers. Therefore, I decide our provider each year and negotiate the best offers. I know the exact date we come out if contract and am generally organised in swapping suppliers. Sometimes I do this with the D2D salesperson and other times online or via phone.

It just so happened one year that we had a D2D salesperson knock in for a utility that was pretty close to its contract end date. He immediately started his pitch with "Good afternoon, is the Man of the House there?" Now, straight away that rubbed me up the wrong way. I answered no and he proceeded to ask me when he would be home. I mentioned that he was at work but he was welcome to call back after 5pm when "The Man of the House" would be home. The salesperson wrote this down in his book nodded at me and left.

Sure enough, he called back after 5pm and spoke to the very irritated Man of the House who asked the salesperson why he didn't speak to me about all this. The salesperson back pedaled so quickly and asked if I was there. Sadly, I was out and wouldn't be back until late but he was welcome to call over again tomorrow and see if I would speak to him.

As it so happens, I did speak to him the next morning. With a beaming smile and a smug of tea in my hand, I thanked him for reminding me to check my offers and I haf switched online to his company a couple of hours before he arrived. Then I waved him a cheery goodbye.

I believe that would have cost him two sales, as I switched gas and electricity.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/MorvonJellyBean on 2024-11-02 13:44:11+00:00.

On mobile so standard apologies for formatting and English being my first language.

Tdlr; New boss insists I follow every company policy to the letter, so I do—and bring the entire office to a grinding halt.

A few years back, I worked in a corporate office where things ran pretty smoothly… until our new boss, Mr. Micromanage (Mr. M), arrived. Mr. M was obsessed with one thing: following company policies. He didn’t care if policies were outdated, inefficient, or outright absurd—if the rule existed, you had to follow it perfectly. And he loved catching people not complying.

One Monday morning, he called a meeting to lecture us on “policy adherence.” He ended his speech with, “If it’s in the manual, you follow it. No exceptions.” I’m not a fan of being micromanaged, but hey, rules are rules, right?

I knew that our company’s policy manual hadn’t been updated in years, and some policies were… questionable. So, I decided to have a little fun.

One of the most outdated rules was about how to handle printed documents. According to this gem, any printed company document—no matter how minor—needed to be reviewed and stamped by our “Document Compliance Officer” before being distributed. Oh, and guess what? That position had been eliminated in a round of budget cuts two years ago. But hey, Mr. M said no exceptions.

The next day, I printed out a standard quarterly report that everyone in the office needed. When people asked for it, I told them, “Sorry, I can’t distribute it until it’s been reviewed and stamped.” I sent an email to Mr. M asking where I could find the nonexistent Document Compliance Officer. He came storming over to my desk, confused.

Mr. M: “Just send out the report!” Me: “I’d love to, but as per company policy, it needs to be reviewed and stamped first. Where should I send it?” Mr. M: Pauses and glares “Just… follow the policy.”

I nodded enthusiastically and let it be. Word spread quickly, and soon everyone in the office was “complying” with every arcane policy in the manual.

Karen from HR? She started enforcing the dress code policy that required all employees to wear “business formal attire” at all times. Suddenly, everyone was showing up in suits and ties, and people in accounting were running spreadsheets in cocktail dresses.

Jake from Marketing? He made sure to send a request to Mr. Micromanage every time he needed to make a 10-cent photocopy, as per the ancient policy that “all expenditures, no matter how minor, must be approved by management.”

By the end of the week, the entire office was a disaster. People were wasting time and resources, projects were delayed, and everyone was cranky from wearing stiff, formal clothes. Mr. M tried to reprimand us, but we just kept saying, “Sorry, sir. Just following the policies, like you said!”

It only took one week of chaos for Mr. M to call another meeting, where he begrudgingly told us to “use common sense” instead of following every single policy. He even promised to update the manual.

And that, my friends, is how our office turned into a temporary circus of hilarious compliance—until our boss finally learned that some rules are meant to be bent.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Bored_Eastly on 2024-10-31 22:24:55+00:00.

This was a few years back. After over a decade of doing a complex job, above average - getting many compliments/letters of thanks. My new boss was irritated at me interrupting.

My role was everything the technical people didn't do (trash duty/phones/conference room/ calendars/contracts/finance/training/facilities/purchasing/equipment .... ETC). It was realistic to say that a couple times a day some wildfires (often technical work stoppages) needed the boss' input. This, even after I headed off many problems before they reached his attention.

About a couple weeks in, he told me that under no circumstance was I to interrupt any conversations he was in and like a good little boot licker, the second in charge added that he too was tired of my interruptions too and needed to stop.

As karma would have it, not even a day later, both of them were deep into a conversation about baseball (absolutely nothing to do with work and normally I would have interrupted). They both saw me multiple times and didn't ask what I needed. I waited patiently with pleading eyes, while they stretched out their conversation. After a few minutes, I started shifting foot to foot (probably looked like I needed to use the bathroom) and yet they didn't stop.

FINALLY, when they soaked up all the fun they could and ran out of baseballs things to say - the boss in a very snarky tone asks if there is something I needed him for.

"Yes, sir! Your boss's boss (Mr. Nameless Here) is waiting on the phone (I could see the blinking phone line from where I was standing, and he was indeed still waiting) and he needs to speak to you right now".

Not one smirk or iota of disrespect from me but I did leave to use the bathroom even though I didn't need it. *Policy cancelled right after that call*. LOL

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/GalwayGuy24 on 2024-10-31 20:18:17+00:00.

Years ago, I moved into a new apartment while studying abroad. The landlord was... well, let’s just say he was a real shark. The guy had a dozen properties rented out to students and a reputation for squeezing every last penny out of his tenants. By coincidence I ended up dating a fellow student who happened to rent from him in the next building over, and who moved out six months in, so I had advance warning of what to expect on move-out day.

When she moved out, she had broken a single plate and lost a fork, so somehow got charged for an entire new matching set of plates and cutlery. She even replaced the plate and fork herself, but that wasn’t good enough for Mr. Sharklord. No, he insisted on billing her for a full “brand new set”. Of course, she learned later from her ex-flatmate that he only replaced the missing items and pocketed the difference! Imagine the profit accumulating over the years over a dozen apartments, when for every student you charge the price of a new set, but actually only buy one replacement set for one fork here, one glass there, pocketing the difference. Not just shady, but utterly petty.

Now, when myself and my best friend had moved in, Landlord proudly tells us about the “brand new mattresses” in our rooms. A year later, when my friend was moving out, we did a massive deep clean, left the place sparkling, and made sure to replace anything missing. But of course, during the inspection, the landlord “found” issues. Surprise, surprise: he deducted and withheld my friend's entire deposit, mostly on the basis of the mattress being (slightly) stained and needing replacement.

My friend was understandably fuming. But then we had a thought. If he was charging us for a “new” mattress, then my friend had technically just paid for this one... so, technically, it was his! And, equally technically, it just wouldn't be considerate to leave personal belongings cluttering up the Landlord's apartment after he moved out, would it? Moving out means moving out...

He couldn’t take the mattress on the plane, obviously, so we hauled it down to a nearby park, where some local homeless people hung out, and “donated” it. Fast forward a few days: I’m still in the apartment and about to move out shortly, my friend’s already gone, and I hear the landlord arrive to show the room to a new tenant. I hear the bedroom door and then... Rage! “Where the f*** is the mattress? I have to F****** buy a new one!?!”

I almost lost it right there. But I held my composure, played dumb, and listening to him fume.

And a few days later, when it was my turn to leave? Oh, I knew I was getting nothing back from my deposit. And I too was going to take ALL of my personal belongings with me. So I took everything I had “paid” for - the mattress, plates, cutlery, glasses, even the lightbulbs. The friendly neighborhood hobos made out like kings.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/PureHeart7915 on 2024-10-31 11:47:57+00:00.

Just read a post about sick leave policy backfiring and wanted to post my own story about it.

Old work friend, we will call him “Jessie” is a retired US marine. Guamanian, chill as hell, and unfuckwithable. He was the coolest guys you’d ever meet, personable and worked hard. Can’t say enough good things about him.

Our supervisor was brand new, and one of these perpetual “yes men”. Anything the middle and upper management mentioned even in passing was holy gospel for this guy. I tell you his lips were brown, he did everything in his power to kiss the starfish. Regardless of the impact on everyone’s personal life, or work environment, it didn’t even register with this guy. Zero foxes given for his people, just whoever was above him.

Jessie, being older, was looking at retirement. Between the Corp and his civvie job he was done doin a 9-5. He was beginning to have health issues, and had frequent doctors appointments. Right around the holidays, everyone wants to take leave, and we have a 50% staffing policy pretty much across the board at work. No more than half of our shop can be off at the same time. So it gets pretty cutthroat around thanksgiving and xmas. Everyone wants to flounce out for the holidays.

New boss, wants to be the personal savior of everything company. Tells everyone that we are gonna do a 75% staff instead, and proceeds to shut down all of our leave slips.

Que everyone getting “sick”

Boss gets mad and demands doctors notes for all sick days, appointments, anything outside of work.

Well, we all have pretty good insurance, so a 25$ copay is now a “day off bounty” and there is pretty much a mutiny in the shop over this asshats continuous stream of stupid policy.

This hits Jessie especially hard. He’s got a host of shit breaking down in his old body. After about the sixth or seventh time the new boss verbally dresses down Jessie for taking excessive sick time, he snaps. You want notes? You got em. He went through the union contract and discovered that documentation doesn’t have to be from an actual doctor. Need a day because you felt sick? All you need per the union contract is a receipt for a bottle of Tylenol. Dentist appointment? The reminder note for your next appointment. The crown jewel of the shenanigans was his colonoscopy. Jessie got the proctologist to screen shot a picture of the inside of his colon, and used it as his “note”. He retired a champion. Place isn’t the same without him.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Sigbac on 2024-10-31 11:29:35+00:00.

Ok here's a small but extremely satisfying one.

I needed some tee shirts screenprinted for a little horsey summer camp I ran. Logo, summer Camp, and campers name or for staff- their role; Lunger, Coach, etc.

Went to a big chain store that offers this, I've used them multiple times before and they are great and usually about 10€ per shirt, with logo name etc. and get it done while I browse the store.

For some reason I went to get the ticket/estimate and it's quoted at 32€ per shirt (just for screenprint, I'd bought the shirts already) so I ask for a price breakdown.

10e for the logo 10e for one line text (name or role) 10e for another line of text ( ______Summer Camp 2024) 2e to do it right away (no other orders are in attente/queue)

I say woah woah, pull up the company site and say I would like this service, where we 'design' the shirts and then one logo is printed that includes names and Camp name and line logo (this is all one color, minimalist line logo) and its this listed price (like we usually do) and the employee wasn't having it. I can absolutely respect that, let's go by the book, to the letter.

So I said no thank you, went onto Instagram, pulled up like I was making a story and put the logo, name/role and the Summer Camp Name and then saved it like an image. Vectorized it on my phones little photo editing and saved

Did that for each camper plus the Coach and the Lunger. Sent all the images to the Store's workshop email

So one logo (which includes text as part of the logo but the file is technically a vector picture/image) for each person, and what do you know, it's actually only 8€ for a "picture only" and non urgent print! And all this time I'd been paying 10. My satisfaction was palpable, as I stated "ok I want THIS logo on this size shirt, this logo for that shirt" etc etc.

And no I don't want it rushed. Oh I'm the next order in the queue? Perfect. Compliance (or being a stickler?) saved me money and felt really good

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/glimmerfox on 2024-10-31 01:10:38+00:00.

So I was trying to be festive at work near Halloween, and was wearing little accessories. First day I had cat ears and everyone thought it was cute. The next day I put on little devil horns.

I was told to take them off as I offended someone in my department (was not told who), and it was written as a dress code violation

The thing is no one really complies fully to dress code. So I went up to the next level and complained that if I get a dress code violation that they need to look at everyone as no one fully complies.

I still don't know who complained about me, but I know they are gonna get a lot of hell from everyone else.

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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Antihateaccount_ on 2024-10-30 15:23:47+00:00.

I (22M) am the primary caretaker of one of my family members. Among other chronic illnesses, she is a diagnosed narcissist with early dementia.

As per my family's request, I moved with her and took an online job as a trilingual translator to ensure I would be there 24/7 should she have an emergency. Somehow, she has interpreted my constant presence as me not having a job, despite me explaining several times that I did, in fact, work. She went to the point of stealing my ID and debit card, saying she would not be giving them back to me unless I gave out resumes where she told me to. I have searched the whole house and couldn't find them so I was forced to comply.

I have a huge amount of respect for people who work in these fields, but I am not taking a job as a cleaner or a cashier when I work in my field of choice. That's when I noticed all the places she was forcing me to send out resumes to were requesting a cover letter.

This is where the malicious compliance takes place. I took an already written cover letter and changed some details so it'd be like I wrote it myself. I made her read it and approve it as per her request, then added the following sentences in my second paragraph:

"If this letter arrives on your desk, please know that this application has been sent without my consent. Already having an online full-time job, please do not take it into consideration."

As you can imagine, I didn't get called back much. Only one place sent me an email, and once I explained the situation their HR team wished me luck with my situation and told me this motivated them to read cover letters more carefully.

At the same time, I contacted my boss. I knew they sometimes open in-office positions and my boss is one of the nicest people I know, so I contacted her and asked if there was any way I could get the next in-office position, telling her why exactly I was asking that. I've been working there for 6 months and she never had any complaints about me, so she sent me a permanent contract starting in January 2025 for their office. It's overseas, in a country where I'm legally allowed to work without a work visa.

I won't specify which country, since I have the intention of disappearing there. My flight is already booked, and only my best friend knows what is going on. I have a letter already written out where I tell my family to not warn the authorities. As soon as I land my bank account will be closed and my phone subscription cancelled, and after 5 years, I will ask to become a citizen in that country and won't renew the paperwork necessary to prove my citizenship in my birth country.

I have 3 younger siblings, all of them are still in middle school. They have their own email addresses that our parents don't know about, so I will send them an email telling them this is not their fault and that they're the only ones in the family who are allowed to contact me. I'll also add that I will answer to any questions they have once they turn 18.

I'm excited. I'm excited to start a new life, I'm excited to get out of this family who has been the source of most of my problems for my whole life. I'm excited to finally escape toxic people in a toxic environment that was destroying my mental health. Only two months left and after 22 long years of waiting I'll finally be free. All of this because my last straw was forcing me to send out job applications.