Internet Praises Worker Admitting Earning $80K for 'Absolutely No Work'
An alleged telecoms worker has gone viral on Reddit after confessing that they earn $80,000 annually for what they described as "absolutely no work."
Posting to popular Subreddit "Anti Work," where users share their issues and discrepancies with the working world, the anonymous account manager for a telecom company explained that for the last five years, they've earned a full salary for almost no work. In just two days, the post gained over 100,000 interactions.
The worker explained that the company provides VOIP phones to other companies and that they, along with 20 other workers, spend their working day answering questions from hundreds of clients about the phones and service.
"What the boss does is assign clients to each of us based on a rating of how challenging and difficult they believe the end users are. Each client gets a score of one to 10. One meaning these are employees at Microsoft who are all very techy and will never have to call us asking where they should plug in the ethernet port, and 10 because the client is an old age home and we will get five calls a day from each resident asking how to get a dial tone," they shared.
"So one account manager may be assigned a client who has 5,000 employees, but they are rated a one, so it provides them just enough work for 40 hours a week, while another account manager may get a client who only has 100 employees, but they are all tech idiots and call in constantly."
The account manager claimed that when they started, they were assigned a client with a "few hundred" employees who were rated a 10 on their scale. This meant they would get just enough work to keep them busy all day every day. It turned out, however, that the client was scaled wrong, and as a tech company that writes the phones' software, should be a one.
According to the worker, they receive just one or two calls a week "and literally nothing else," but notified their manager when they first realized. "I was told that their rating system is near perfect and I should not stir the pot," they claimed.
"So I have not stirred the pot for five years. My last call for support was nine days ago and I literally browse the web all day and attend the occasional meeting. I get my five percent annual raise and full benefits. I will continue until I get caught or something better comes along. Oh, I am working from home full time."
With so many reactions online, the worker's confession sparked discussion over whether or not work ethic always directly correlates with pay.
"This is just another one of those stories that goes to show you that wages can have a massive disconnect from productivity. I am constantly amazed at both the people who work their a** off for nothing and the people who don't seem to do s*** but get rewarded handsomely," commented one user.
Another worker shared their similar experience, writing: "I quit a job that was slowly killing me last year and lucked into a similar role (different industry though). I've offered to help my colleagues on other teams and even asked for cross training so I can do more, but my boss told me there was no need and my performance has been exemplary. I'm not going to raise it again."
One manager shared their view on the poster's situation, surprisingly backing their stance and confessing that they would have no issue with this. "This cracks me up because I am a manager of account managers in almost the exact same industry. We have a very different method for identifying account load per account manager but it's similar in the sense that it's impossible to predict with a high degree of accuracy and each customer is just different," they wrote.
"I know for sure there are people in our org (and even on my direct team) in your exact same position. They come in, get their work done, don't make waves, and just keep their heads down. Bonus is our teams are all remote so they're chilling at home.
"Here's the thing—as long as their customers don't complain, keep renewing each year, and give us good surveys... I don't give a s**t," they admitted. "Good for them, they're happy, the customer is happy... So that means I'm happy. Congrats on winning the work lotto, hope you are able to keep it up for as long as you're happy! Unless you're one of my account managers, in that case I need to see you in my office."
Despite the worker claiming in an update to have received negative messages on Reddit, the results were unanimous—their luck was not only envy-inducing, but also entirely not an issue.
