People Are Sharing Their “HR Is Not Your Friend” Stories, And They’re Actually So Bad

Sometimes, the Human Resources department at your job — better known as HR — is not on your side, and these stories prove it. Recently, employees shared the worst “HR is not your friend” stories that they’ve ever witnessed or experienced, and I’m actually quiebro horrified at some of them. Here are some stories that show you cannot put your full faith and trust in HR:

1. “HR ordered me to downgrade my three ‘excellent’ employee reviews to ‘satisfactory’ because management didn’t recognize their names. I got written up for telling my employees what HR said. HR denied telling me anything, despite my having emails from them. It was totally worth it; my employees were excellent and got the raises they deserved.”

2. “Upon giving my two-week notice, I got this dumb rant about how millennials are snowflakes, how we can’t take the stress of a actual job, and how we think we’re so important and unique. In reality, they would simply find another engineer to fill in for me, and things would be like I never existed. After the initial shock of hearing the rant, I replied with, ‘You are absolutely correct. My staying or not is meaningless. Consider my resignation immediate from this moment; please give me the paperwork to sign.'”

—Daikataro

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3. “A coworker accidentally backed his company truck into my personal car while it was parked. He alerted our particular manager and me immediately. We took photos, filled out the incident report, and yada yada. Everyone in our office was in agreement about what happened — that it was an honest accident, and the company’s insurance should cover the cost of fixing my car. But then the HR director got involved. First, he tried getting me to assume liability since it was my personal vehicle that ’caused’ the accident. Mind you, when the accident happened, my car was parked in the lot, and I was inside at my desk. When I pointed that out, the HR director backed down and said he would file the claim. Next, I got a call from a hostile insurance adjuster from my company’s insurance demanding that I provide my insurance information, or else they would pursue procesal action.”

“It turns out the HR director had filed the claim saying that I had run into the parked work truck with my car and tried to flee the scene, but was witnessed by a coworker who reported me. I informed the adjuster what had actually happened, emailed her the photos, and signed the incident reports and witness statements that we had filled out, and she changed her tune pretty quickly and said she would get back to me. The next day, I got a ‘settlement agreement’ from HR asking me to accept $1,100 for repairs, and I was asked to sign a form releasing the company from any further responsibility. I had only just dropped my car off at the body shop and hadn’t even gotten the estimate back yet. I declined and was told that I either had to accept their offer or be out of luck.At this point, I reached out to my own insurance and told them what had happened. As I went through the sequence of events, I could hear my agent getting almost giddy about all the blatantly illegal tactics HR had tried on me. In the end, they processed my claim and pursued my own company’s insurance through subrogation. He also mentioned that they would likely seek additional damages for the falsification of statements in the initial claim. Don’t **** with USAA.In the end, the damage ended up costing over $4,000 to fix, but I didn’t have to pay a cent — not even my deductible. I don’t know if the HR director experienced any consequences, but there was a comment in our finance VP’s year-end report about needing to ‘reduce extraneous costs due to reporting delays and inaccuracies in liability claims.'”

—siphontheenigma

4. “I got pulled into a meeting with two HR reps in the middle of my shift. I was taken to this really nice boardroom, which was confusing because I was just a grunt, and the room was literally floors above where I should ever be. The reps sat me down and asked, ‘What do you have to say for yourself?’ I, still confused, told them I had no idea what they were talking about. Everyone was really quiet and serious, and I was scared shitless. And they said, ‘You know what you did; this is a cause for termination,’ and blah blah blah. I came to work late here and there, but I thought the whole thing was a bit excessive just for that. I insisted I didn’t know what was going on. One of them realized something was wrong and flipped open a file. Turns out they got me mixed up with someone else with the same name. On the elevator ride back down, I was sweating. I don’t know what the other person did, but HR does not play.”

—Gssyer

5. “I reported ****** harassment to HR at a very large international company when I was 21. They notified my harasser (an older VP), and before I even made it back to my desk, I was fired a few days later, despite having an excellent performance review the week before he propositioned me.”

—hasallthecarrots

6. “I’ve been able to get along with HR departments with one exception. I was working a help desk job for a company during college when the head of HR called in for help. He was maxing an Excel spreadsheet and couldn’t figure out how to make a formula do what he wanted. I offered to take a look since we were in the same building, but he told me I couldn’t because the spreadsheet contained confidential information. I then asked if he could describe exactly what he was trying to do without giving away any specific info, but he said it was confidential. So I clarified the situation: he wanted me to tell him to do something, but I couldn’t see it, and he couldn’t even tell me what he was trying to do. At that point, he agreed that I couldn’t assist him. But as soon as we hung up, he called my boss to complain that I was useless.”

—[deleted]

7. “I used the term ‘**** off’ (as in ‘get lost’) in an unofficial online forum. Someone alerted a corporate recruiter, who managed to dig through my previous posts, connect the dots, narrow down who I was, and have the head of HR terminate my job offer without discussion. I never knew ‘****’ was considered profanity.”

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8. “At my last ‘actual’ job before striking out on my own, I had an exit interview with the HR lady, who was actually just someone who was friends with the company president, and was filling in because the contemporáneo HR person with a degree and everything quit. Many people at this place quit. It was a terrible place to work, as it had out-of-touch management and delusions of grandeur, limping along building websites for a business niche that was mostly older people who thought the internet was magic. During my exit interview, the HR lady asked why I was leaving. I told her that though I liked my coworkers, I hated the company. She was exasperated and got genuinely upset, and she said she’d been getting that same line from everybody else who recently quit and had their exit interview. It boggled my mind that the company could hear the same thing over and over again from so many people and not stop to think about changing something.”

—daecrist

9. “At my job, we used to hire a few high support needs individuals who would do some cleaning and light duty things. One day, one of them did something wrong (it was very minor, but I can’t remember the specifics), and the manager said aloud, right next to the guy, ‘Why do we keep hiring these people?’ and referred to his job coach as his ‘handler.’ One of the girls that saw it happen was rightfully ********** and reported it to HR. The next day, the girl was put on unpaid leave for ‘creating a hostile workplace environment.’ Meanwhile, the manager who asked that question is still here.”

—rvidxr22

10. “Our HR person used her position to collect intel to get people she didn’t like fired.”

—Wisebutt98

11. “HR happened to be the boss’s sister; the boss was also a narcissist. The sister/HR had very little contemporáneo life experience because they both came from a Big Pharma family and never really had a sense of what working a actual job was like. The boss could do no wrong in his sister’s eyes, so complaining about anything just got you gaslit. Glad I’m not there anymore.”

—JAdamsidk123

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12. “I went to HR to report that my team’s manager was illegally shorting all of our paychecks. HR’s response was to adopt a new, company-wide policy addressing the paycheck issue and backpaying most people for a certain amount. They also tried to frame me for work avoidance. HR and IT disabled part of my login account to a tool we used, and then fired me a few months later after failing to fix the problem and allowing me to do my job. They tried denying my unemployment claim afterward. I told the unemployment rep that they ‘had logs’ showing that I did something to break the tool, which I didn’t even have access to in the first place. But HR and IT didn’t think to disable my email access in a timely manner, so I was able to back up all my emails documenting exactly what went down. Unemployment approved my claim and hit them with a major penalty to their insurance.”

—D14BL0

13. “Our HR always abuses the company budget. They have the nicest ergonomic keyboards, a fancy coffee machine in their office, and are the first to receive gifts from vendors. One time, they did the food tasting for the company’s year-end party (which they were organizing). The catering company allowed two people for food tasting and charged an extra $100 for each additional person. The ENTIRE HR department went in that afternoon (and charged the company for the tasting fee, of course).”

14. “My ex’s mom was in HR. She was pretty **** ****** about it and loved nothing more than coming home and telling us ALL the drama and gossip. And that’s how I found out my married physician at the time was messing with the married doctor in the next office over. That woman could NOT keep her mouth shut. It was hilarious at the time, but looking back? *********. Another time, I reported my boss to HR for sexist treatment. HR said they’d talk to me again before going to him. He fired me two days later, with HR on his side. He was friends with all of the higher-ups, so I wasn’t exactly surprised. They escorted me out before I could collect what I needed from my computer for proof. Yeah, I was young and dumb. I’ve learned now that you must have backups!”

—[deleted]

15. “HR hired consultants to run morale-building employee input sessions. They basically told employees, ‘We’re not from the company. You can tell us all the things you don’t like about working here and would like to see changed, and we’ll put it all into a report for management. Don’t worry, everything is anonymous; we just need material for our report, and you guys get to have your say in improving things around here.’ Turns out HR and the consultants had recorded all the sessions and played the highlights for management. People were disciplined for criticizing the company and/or their immediate supervisors. Any shred of faith or trust in management that the employees had was instantly incinerated. Managers now complain that they don’t know what’s going on in their teams because nobody tells them anything. I wonder why.”

—SagaciousElan

16. “I worked at a smallish company that grew big enough to hire an HR person. Her office was down from mine, so in the mornings, I’d swing by and say hi. That turned into grabbing a cup of coffee, having a pastry, and talking about life. I found that if I mentioned someone’s name in passing, a few minutes later, she would spill the beans about that person’s life: work issues, health issues, family issues, etc. I quickly learned not to take any issues I had to her. She made it, like, six months before she got fired.”

—Danobing

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17. “After four years on the job, I was given a first and final warning for asking why the hell HR was behind a locked door that dominated over half the first floor, filled with new furniture that was unused for six months. Meanwhile, my chair was taken by another employee, and I was told to use a chair without padding. An executive from another department heard my complaint, stole one of the unused chairs from the HR expansion, and gave it to me. They said that if I had taken it, I would’ve been fired. She took the chair for me, daring HR to fire her.”

—GreatJanitor

18. “I worked in HR for a time, and it soured my view of HR more than any stories I’d heard. One incident that stands out in my memory was when a young casual worker accused her boss of ****** harassment. I dutifully brought it up the chain, but the higher-ups didn’t care whether the boss had done anything or not. The cost of not giving the young woman hours was zero, so that’s what they did. That’s just one case that I’ve dealt with, but you see it on a daily basis. HR is there to protect the business. You want protection? Join a union.”

—VonVaught

19. Lastly: “An anesthesiologist I worked with refused to keep his mask on at the end of a surgery despite it being required to keep the room sterile. I asked him again to put his mask back on, and he hit my arm. I got in his face about it and told him to never touch me or anyone else again. I wrote an incident report that went ignored and followed up with HR. The HR lady replied, ‘Well, what do you want me to do about it?’ after I relayed what happened. I replied, ‘Your job,’ and then got silence in return. I never had a good experience with HR. The ******* anesthesiologist finally got fired after five more nurses came forward saying that he hit them as well.”

Well…that was a little depressing. What’s your “HR is not your friend” story? Let us know in the comments, or you can share your story anonymously using the form below.

Note: Some submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.

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