Aviva Mistakenly Fires Entire 1300 Employee Work Force

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
Joined
May 9, 2000
Messages
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Have you ever made the horrible mistake of hitting send all or reply all email button and having to play cleanup with the mess you made? How about firing your entire global staff of 1300 in one fell swoop? Cleanup in aisle 4, please. :D

However, a Daily Telegraph report said there was a “stunned silence” throughout at least one of the company’s offices as staff read the email.
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haha

oh man who ever sent that email by mistake, now i wonder how they feel haha
 
The really disturbing part of this is that Aviva intended to fire anyone BY EMAIL at all. Who the hell fires someone by email? How tasteless and cowardly can you be?
 
...unless of course the person was already fired, and the email was just a reminder of procedure. I shouldn't jump to conclusions, I guess.
 
Mini-Me said:
The really disturbing part of this is that Aviva intended to fire anyone BY EMAIL at all. Who the hell fires someone by email? How tasteless and cowardly can you be?
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It could have been someone off-site, though even then a phone call might work better.
 
I occasionally see sensitive emails that should go to one person be sent to "all". Bosses should be more careful. But, in this case, everyone should have known it's a mistake, because their names weren't mentioned in the body of the email and the email was addressed to everyone.
 
This is the most hilarious work place incident I've heard about this year. Thank you.
 
Mass firing by email? I smell one hell of a denial of service attack in the future!
 
I'm not sure what the problem is...just send out a follow up email saying it was a mistake
 
article said:
So the last thing you want to see in your work inbox is an email giving you your marching orders — especially if the email has been sent in error
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the article author was kinda dumb with that sentence. I'd think I'd be happy it was in error. not especially unhappy.
 
Mr34727 said:
I'm not sure what the problem is...just send out a follow up email saying it was a mistake
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An email with leaving instructions meant for one employee was accidentally sent to the company’s entire global workforce of 1300 people. It told staff to hand over all property belonging to the company, together with security passes, as they left the building.

It was almost half an hour before the human resources department realized its mistake, though presumably by that time employees were already halfway through clearing their desks.
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I'm sure that many now ex-employees wouldn't even read another company email after that amount of time.
 
Every global corporation has the exact same letter ready to go.
Who do you work for?
Hmmmm?
 
Once the human resources department realized its error, it sent out another email — presumably to 1299 people — explaining its error.
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I'd assume it would be to 1298 of them, the 1300 minus the guy the email was supposed to be sent to and the idiot that sent it to everyone.
 
Mini-Me said:
...unless of course the person was already fired, and the email was just a reminder of procedure. I shouldn't jump to conclusions, I guess.
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Who the hell needs an email reminder that they are fired?

Do people say, "Ah, I forgot about that whole no more paycheck thing anymore! Oh well, might as well go in and finish out the day."?
 
Having worked there, I bet morale hit an all time high that morning.

Dancing on the desks.
 
Man, how much would it suck to be the person who was actually fired.

"You're fired."

"Oops, our mistake, we didn't mean to sent that to everyone. Bob, you're still fired, though."
 
canna said:
Who the hell needs an email reminder that they are fired?

Do people say, "Ah, I forgot about that whole no more paycheck thing anymore! Oh well, might as well go in and finish out the day."?
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Like he said, reminder of procedure. Getting fired is very emotional and it cant hurt to remind the guy to drop security badges etc.

Now how much would it suck if that one guy didnt know and when they announced it was an accident they still fired him.
 
RazorWind said:
Man, how much would it suck to be the person who was actually fired.

"You're fired."

"Oops, our mistake, we didn't mean to sent that to everyone. Bob, you're still fired, though."
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Lol! Poor guy. I wonder if he was in the "To:" area and everyone else was copied? Lawsuit in his future?

Also, he has the small solace of taking the idiot HR person with him.
 
Mini-Me said:
The really disturbing part of this is that Aviva intended to fire anyone BY EMAIL at all. Who the hell fires someone by email? How tasteless and cowardly can you be?
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canna said:
Who the hell needs an email reminder that they are fired?

Do people say, "Ah, I forgot about that whole no more paycheck thing anymore! Oh well, might as well go in and finish out the day."?
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They weren't firing the person by email according to the article. It was normal procedure to remind the person of leaving instructions such as turning in company equipment and confidential rules.

The email was a standard message sent to people leaving the company, covering things such as handing back company equipment and confidentiality rules, and did not tell recipients they were fired, Lockstone said.
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Mr34727 said:
I'm not sure what the problem is...just send out a follow up email saying it was a mistake
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The article said they did send out another email about 25 minutes later apologizing for their mistake.
 
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