A worker on TikTok called out her former employer and shared why she quit after just five days on the job in a viral video.
TikToker Abigail (@fab.sheldon) blasted the former Canadian company she worked for because they offered her 15 to 18 days of fewer annual vacation time, forced her to log her daily work activities down to bathroom and coffee breaks, and proverbially threw her into the fire with work projects that didn’t have clearly defined leadership.
She called management at the business a bunch of “losers” and said that the practices there ultimately made her quit her job after just five days of working there.
“I quit my job after like five days and I just want to say like why I quit and what the red flags were that stood out,” Abigail explains at the beginning of the video. “Because there were red flags from the beginning.”
Despite noticing red flags throughout the interview process, she says she ignored them because it was her “dream job.”
Her first red flag involved the job’s vacation policy.
“The first one came from the vacation days and this is a big one for me. I’m from England where the minimum amount is like 25 or 28 days. Canada is 10,” Abigail says. “Which I just…that’s a whole other issue of how unacceptable I think that is, but the problem came really from the way this company was marketing themselves to me.”
The TikToker says the company promoted “great work-life balance” to her, but only offered “the minimum amount they’re legally allowed to give me for vacation days.”
The TikToker thought that this approach was a bit hypocritical, in that the company was saying that they wanted to promote one way of life for their workers in speech, but in action, it was entirely different.
“Like don’t lie to me and say you value my time and you want me to have a good work-life balance,” she elaborates, “and then give me the minimum amount you can give me.”
Abigail went on to say that she even brought it up with the company in her exit interview with management. “I raised this in my exit interview as well, and he was like, ‘well um, most of our employees don’t even manage to take the 10 days off.’” She didn’t believe that this counterpoint was “something to brag about.”
“If you as a boss have made it so your employees don’t feel comfortable or supported enough to take 10 vacation days off, you’re a fucking joke and a loser,” she shares.
She adds that this exchange in her exit interview made her feel all the more confident in her decision to leave the company. “I was like yeah I’ve definitely done the right thing here,” she says.
Abigail’s second red flag was the pedantic dynamic she says management had implemented.
“I had to log every second of my day,” she claims. “If I was checking emails, I had to log it. If I stepped away from my desk for any moment, I had to log it in at that time to say where I was going. Was I going on a bathroom break? Was I going to make coffee?”
She also argues that the constant logging of her activity was a waste of time. “At the end of every day, you want me to spend more time telling you what I’ve been doing all day than just trusting I’m doing what I need to do,” she says.
The TikToker also compares the job to that of her friend who works in a similar role.
“They don’t care if you’re sitting at your desk every day which is just the way to do it,” Abigail says of her friend’s company. “Why do you care what I’m doing if the work is done? That’s just an old mentality that’s slowly but surely getting out.”
Abigail also notes that the company forced its employees to work until the very last minute of each day, holding mandatory Friday afternoon meetings at 4pm.
“You will work every second of the day, there’s no option to be like hey I’m going away for the weekend can I leave an hour early?” she says, perplexed.
A few other red flags Abigail noted were poor leadership on projects and a lack of flexibility and understanding. She notes that she had a doctor’s appointment booked that she’s been waiting to attend for months, but the company asked her to cancel it because she was technically in her “probationary period” as a new employee.
She says this situation, along with the company’s general ethos, were the “big things” that led her to quit after less than a week.
In the comments section, one user said that they wouldn’t have continued working for the business either after hearing of the logging practices they had Abigail participate in. “The minute they’d have told me to log every minute I would have spun on my heel and left,” they wrote.
Another agreed that the company’s practices were red flags. “Wow! Those are huge red [flags], good for you to not only recognize that, but to get out. Others may have stayed for soul crushing years in abject misery,” they shared.
A further TikToker revealed their shock at the number of vacation days the company offered Abigail. “10 days? Ridiculous. We have 4 weeks (standard) here in Australia and sometimes more,” they claimed. “I accrue flex leave as well. So all up I have about 7 weeks.”
The Daily Dot has reached out to Abigail via email for further comment.
