‘What’s the funniest thing you’ve heard at work?’ – 21 comical tales to get you through another week in the office

The endless drudgery of work can get us all down now and again, but at least there is always the opportunity to enjoy the outrageous ridiculousness of other people.

They’ve been discussing this on the AskUK subreddit after user situatzi6410 posted this:

‘What’s the funniest thing you’ve heard at work?’

And they started with a little tale of their own.

‘Here’s mine: ‘Don’t tell Diane that AI exists, or she’ll be like a kid in a sweet shop!’

‘The lady in question had come off something like 15 years of maternity leave, and had the IT skills of a iguana. Her job was almost completely automatable, but only if she knew… The boss – who said that quote – was soon to retire, so preferred to keep the status quo, safe in their exclusive knowledge of the biggest technological advance of the 21st century.’

And lots of people were more than happy to chip in with the unintended comedy provided by their colleagues…

1.

‘I worked for a well known online only supermarket, an elderly lady called one day asking where her shopping was since she’d been waiting at home all morning for it.

‘I checked her account and realised she’d not finalised the checkout process, I apologised and explained everything was still sat there in the trolley. She replied, ‘Oh dear, my ice cream will have melted’. Tt still cracks me up imagining this lonely trolley sat in the warehouse with ice cream dripping out of it.’
–broadarrow39

2.

‘There was a guy I worked with, Simon, who had a habit of dropping what he was doing, and rushing off to sort out a help desk call. He often left half drunk cups of tea he’d have to throw away when he got back.

‘One time he does this again while I’m sat there working alongside another colleague Kerry. He comes back to the office and forgetting how long he’d left the cup, took a long gulp of ice cold tea. He’s now sat there with bulging cheeks, not knowing what to do…

‘Kerry looks at him, and says: ‘Come on Simon, spit or swallow. Us girls have to.’

‘I have never seen anyone turn that particular shade of green before or since.’
–Ecstatic_Effective42

3.

‘My CEO, 50ish male accidentally, showed me, mid 20s female, a huge vagina meme while swiping through some vacation pictures. He then reported himself to my manager and my manager asked if I’m ok or offended. I told him it was hilarious and of course I’m not, it’s just a meme.’
–Majestic-Airport-471

4.

‘We were discussing Botox at work and one of ladies said she would never get it, which is obviously fair enough.

‘However, the reason she didn’t want to get it is because they haven’t found a cure to cancer yet so how could we trust Botox to work. I asked her if she felt the same about other medications and she said yes, she doesn’t trust anything works because if it did no one would have cancer.

‘She was medical admin staff at a GP practice.’
–Dry_Extension_9850

5.

‘My first day in a care home…

“Have you met Joyce then, the assistant manager?”

‘Yes I’ve met Joyce, she interviewed me.’

“Dogs dinner ain’t she!! With the blue eyeshadow and bleached blonde hair, fucking bitch, I swear. Can’t stand her”.

‘Laughs uncomfortably’

(Joyce comes in)

“You alright sis?!”‘
–TickTackTonia

6.

‘I used to be a PE teacher, and had a student who when encountering the pommel horse for the first time, assumed it was stuffed with horse-meat and was absolutely furious. I was very perplexed how she reached that conclusion so quickly.’
–ShockingHair_63

7.

‘I am a USA ex-pat. I moved to the UK in 2006. My role was at a company that had a very open plan work space. Low wall cubicles across the space of about 1/2 to 3/4 the size of a football pitch. Kind of dystopian.

‘In any case, in my first few weeks in the office, someone far across the floor slammed down his phone and yelled at the top of his lungs ‘F**king c**t!’. In this States, this would have been grounds for immediate dismissal, and likely company provided counselling for those effected. Here, it was Tuesday.

‘Dude was still employed there some years, and many more outbursts, after I left the company. As I recall, he was in some kind of customer support role.’
–shiny_director

8.

‘I used to work in Edinburgh City centre and on more than one occasion I was asked by a tourist what time the one o’clock gun went off.’
–Far-Initiative-3303

9.

‘I worked one summer in the old tourist information centre in Edinburgh. ‘Where’s the castle?’

‘Look behind you…”
–Objectively_bad_idea

10.

‘I used to work in a bank and fielded so many calls asking if the bank was open on Bank Holiday Monday.’
–lodav22

11.

‘Years ago I was a home carer. Myself and my colleague arrived at our regular call and the whole extended family were there, all stood around in the the kitchen.

‘My colleague, a loud and brash woman from the Valleys (I say this with love, I adored her) walked in, looked around, rubbed her hands together and loudly asked ‘Who’s died by ‘ere ‘en?!’

‘Turns out our service user’s husband had passed away that morning.’
–Any_Preference_4147

12.

‘Worked at a nightclub. Had a new starter, just finished up the tour so we get him on the bar because he has bar experience so he’ll be fine, gets an order for a pint, nice and simple. The beer pumps were round the other side of the bar so off he goes…

‘Didn’t see him again for maybe 10 minutes – it was a busy bar so I wasn’t really paying attention – the customer he’s serving asks what’s happening, so I wander over to the pumps and he’s just standing there pressing the glass against different parts of beer pump.

‘Pull the pint for him and he goes ‘Ohh! I thought it was automatic! Like a coffee machine!”
–hunsnet457