What could you do and get away with before computers?

[croy]

I'm not that old

 

[WebSnyper]

Before computers, I used to have to talk to people in person about guns...

 

[Spear Dane]

I knew a guy who made fat easy cash selling pizzas at Pizza Hut that weren't ever accounted for.

I saw the same thing from a guy at a Dominos I was a driver at. He was day manager and made the mistake of selling two mediums under the counter to two friends of mine on the same day. I happened to see both boxes, which had no receipts. Long story short, he got fired, the owner tossed me the keys and told me I was the new day manager.

 

[MCgrease08]

Before the internet one could do stupid stuff with friends, make dirty jokes and get drunk in the woods together without it ending up online.

 

[RobbyMaQ]

You could blow a captain crunch cereal box toy prize whistle into a payphone and make a free phone call.
just sayin'

 

[Bigtanker]

Way back in the day I worked (2nd job) as a field manager at a local drive in movie. The cars would line up well before the box office would open. The staff (kids mainly) that took the admission would often pocket a bit of it by head count in the cars. They were pretty slick at it.
Then we started a flat rate per car. That brought out a new level of scam. A car count exposed the problem but it was tough to catch the people doing it.

 

[RobbyMaQ]

yeah lol...
Like they even had cars back then...
nice try...

 

[jgressley2003]

I saw the same thing from a guy at a Dominos I was a driver at. He was day manager and made the mistake of selling two mediums under the counter to two friends of mine on the same day. I happened to see both boxes, which had no receipts. Long story short, he got fired, the owner tossed me the keys and told me I was the new day manager.

Sounds like you set him up if he sold them to your friends lol

 

[BugI02]

What could you do and get away with before computers ... you could get a speeding ticket in another state and if you went and paid the fine in person ASAP it usually never appeared on your homestate record ... err, at least that's what I heard

 

[churchmouse]

What could you do and get away with before computers ... you could get a speeding ticket in another state and if you went and paid the fine in person ASAP it usually never appeared on your homestate record ... err, at least that's what I heard

Heard the same thing........Kicks rocks.

 

[TB1999]

You could blow a captain crunch cereal box toy prize whistle into a payphone and make a free phone call.
just sayin'

Phones have lots of vulnerabilities. Not sure computers have changed that..at least not what I used to do with land lines.

 

[KittySlayer]

Look at porn without having to clear your browser history.

When I was 16 I worked at a large supermarket. The manager had a friend that delivered newspapers. Every Sunday the two of them would sit in the office cutting, ripping and tearing out coupons. Then the manager would place the coupons in the registrar and take the cash out.

You could do this as there was no inventory control via computer scanners. Over his 40 year career he made serious money doing this.

I know a guy that nearly lost his pharmacy license doing this.

 

[Joe G]

I had this friend at work that was always finding an angle to take advantage of the expense report system they had -- and we're only talking about risking your career for maybe $75-100 per trip.

In sales for some BIG companies over the years and have seen it all. Co-workers losing $100k+/year jobs over small expenses. A few good ones I remember:
- District Mgr was known to spend his Saturday mornings looking at every expense receipt turned in by the sales guys. One guy had a McDonalds receipt for a meal while on the road - an approved expense. Unfortunately it also had a Happy Meal on the receipt. Mgr called up the guy, asked him to revise the voucher and not get reimbursed for a kids meal. Dumbass sales guy lied. And lied. And lied. Said it was what his customer ordered so it should have been approved. Mgr calls the customer, who said he never ate with the salesman. Monday morning guy is fired.
- Same Mgr going through expenses sees an expense that looks legit, but it's for a meal on a weekend. Again, he calls the sales guy and is lied to. Found it guy took his wife out and expensed the personal meal. Fired that Monday.
- Biggest was probably when a guy used his customer's "marketing funds" to not only buy the large flat screen TV for the promo they were running (which was approved) back when HDTV's were $10k+, but ordered 2 more for his house and vacation house. Even had them delivered to there so there was an easy trail for the Corp Audit staff to follow when they caught on.

First boss I had gave me a few good pieces of advice that I still follow. One was to NEVER lie on your expenses. Not worth losing your job and getting that reputation over a relatively small amount of $$.

 

[Leo]

I ran a gas station when the attendants still pumped gas, cleaned the windows and checked the oil.

I had a guy that was actually very good at the service part of the job. Always smiling, treated the customers really well, and had a great sense of humor. The customers loved him. He had several tricks. The sales tax was not already calculated on the pump, so he would cheat there, always claiming an honest math mistake if caught. He found a way to rehang the nozzle without resetting the dials from the last guy that need just 1 or 2 dollars, so the man pulling in for a fill up ended up paying and extra dollar or two. Of course there was always the "short stick" on the oil and he would sell an empty can of oil. The cash register always counted out correctly after his shift, so I thought he was a good guy. After I fired him, the other workers fessed up that they knew he was doing that but didn't want to be snitches. That same year I fired a girl pump attendant. She was nothing special in her work, but the till was short $10-$30 every time she worked. Since it was even amounts, it was unlikely to be math errors.

Now with no pump island service, and most people using credit cards in computerized pumps, those methods are gone.

 

[GodFearinGunTotin]

In sales for some BIG companies over the years and have seen it all. Co-workers losing $100k+/year jobs over small expenses. A few good ones I remember:
- District Mgr was known to spend his Saturday mornings looking at every expense receipt turned in by the sales guys. One guy had a McDonalds receipt for a meal while on the road - an approved expense. Unfortunately it also had a Happy Meal on the receipt. Mgr called up the guy, asked him to revise the voucher and not get reimbursed for a kids meal. Dumbass sales guy lied. And lied. And lied. Said it was what his customer ordered so it should have been approved. Mgr calls the customer, who said he never ate with the salesman. Monday morning guy is fired.
- Same Mgr going through expenses sees an expense that looks legit, but it's for a meal on a weekend. Again, he calls the sales guy and is lied to. Found it guy took his wife out and expensed the personal meal. Fired that Monday.
- Biggest was probably when a guy used his customer's "marketing funds" to not only buy the large flat screen TV for the promo they were running (which was approved) back when HDTV's were $10k+, but ordered 2 more for his house and vacation house. Even had them delivered to there so there was an easy trail for the Corp Audit staff to follow when they caught on.

First boss I had gave me a few good pieces of advice that I still follow. One was to NEVER lie on your expenses. Not worth losing your job and getting that reputation over a relatively small amount of $$.

I had this one manager that considered traveling to be akin to being on vacation on company expense. Now, in that time, nearly 99% of travel for our plant involved southeastern Michigan, northern Ohio, and areas such as that. Very, very few, involved international travel, much less something involving a "vacation destination". One day, he called me in his office over an expense report one of my guys had turned in. This guy had the audacity (in manager's opinion) to spend virtually the entire per diem on one of his days on meals. He couldn't believe the guy spent the entire $35 in one day. (I think that was what it was back then). He really did ask me if this employee thought he was on vacation.

 

[Trigger Time]

Math

 

[femurphy77]

Look at porn without having to clear your browser history.

I know a guy that nearly lost his pharmacy license doing this.

Shift, Control, P.

Of course I've never been the subject of a search warrant so don't know how effective this is.

 

[WebSnyper]

I had this one manager that considered traveling to be akin to being on vacation on company expense. Now, in that time, nearly 99% of travel for our plant involved southeastern Michigan, northern Ohio, and areas such as that. Very, very few, involved international travel, much less something involving a "vacation destination". One day, he called me in his office over an expense report one of my guys had turned in. This guy had the audacity (in manager's opinion) to spend virtually the entire per diem on one of his days on meals. He couldn't believe the guy spent the entire $35 in one day. (I think that was what it was back then). He really did ask me if this employee thought he was on vacation.

Yep, I look at it as "I have to travel for work occasionally" ... not "I get to travel for work occasionally".