Store greeter FIRED for putting out fire in customer’s car because bosses say his actions were ‘against company policy.’ Most businesses would love to have an employee that has a brain, takes responsibility and can deal with an emergency. We hope Meijer customers cause this stupidity to be reversed.
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"Most businesses would love to have an employee that has a brain, takes responsibility and can deal with an emergency."
Such a course of action is frowned upon in some societies.
Interesting story for me because I had a similar situation when I was in high school. I was monitoring a parking garage for a downtown bank on Saturday mornings when a man reported that a car had smoke inside it. I checked it our and discovered a backseat on fire. Someone left a cigarette burning and it got into the cushioning somehow. I pulled this big ass fire extinguisher off the garage wall, quickly read the instructions, pulled the trigger, and just about blew my thumb off. To this day my right thumb is still weak because of the damage I did on that damn wildly-outdated and never-inspected fire extinguisher. Then I started pouring water into the fire. Notice: no mention of calling the fire department like a smart person. I kept hauling water to that car and pouring water into that back seat and I NEVER DID PUT OUT THE DAMN FIRE. Once that foam starts burning it doesn't give a hoot about water. It's like trying to put out a grease fire on your stove with water - doesn't work. Finally, the seat was consumed and the fire went out. Final tally: no back seat, smoke stains everywhere including the roof of the garage, God knows how many carcinogens in my lungs, and a flood of water inside the car thanks to me that probably did more damage than the fire. I drowned the living shit out of that car.
What an idiot. I'd like to think I'm smarter now, but who knows.
Welcome to the United States of Litigation. The fear of being sued has changed our culture to "no good deed goes unpunished".
Wow. Not the story, that was bad enough. The vid down at the bottom. Don't watch it if you've had breakfast or are thinking about eating anytime soon. Like in the next 24 hours. If however you've been meaning to diet or want to get a jump on the Holiday bulge, go for it.
IMO the lawyerification of ever facet of life is the reason why this guy got fired. Much safer to play the odds, wait and let some "system" handle every issue. That way an organization can always use some abberation to avoid responsibility, not pay a claim as PD suggests, or fire someone they don't like, or whatever. People, especially ones that have a kind heart, are not wired this way. Wanting people not to think for themselves and only do what your told - or else - is akin to a communist operating system. How can that be so good? If I ever have need of help I hope it is not around a group of lawyered-up robot employees that have to consult a rule book before they can offer assistance, or not, as in this case.
While what you're saying is true, don't overlook the fact that the possible scenarios I portray all involve MORE damage/harm from his actions than if he had done things properly. That helps no-one, overly-litigious society or not.
I agree it is possible to make it worse instead of better. No doubt this happens too. But in this case he was able to extinguish the fire. Your points on a ship or a submarine, with dedicated crews only likely require the more disciplined actions and responses you propose. In a parking lot with regular people about, likely not as much, IMO. Here common sense/natural law should suffice.
I don't always do the right thing, far from it. But I try my best.
When I worked for the census bureau 3 years ago we had some very severe restrictions about what we could do in situations we might encounter. We were not allowed to report anything we might see or hear to the police. I finally got our instructor (who was a former IBM manager) to admit that natural law is a trump card and it would probably be ok to report a dead body if we found one. We were subject to a $250,000 fine for leaking any information to anyone except another census employee.
Your attorney is coming out.
LOL, yes, I'm afraid so.
Well, I hate to do it again, but I'll stick my neck out here and offer a couple of thoughts in defence of the company. Although I do agree it's stupid he should lose his job, I can understand why they would not want store personnel doing something like this.
Obviously, fires are dangerous. The story does state that the store has specific procedures and trained personnel to deal with this kind of thing. This event played out well. But what if he had gotten out there, the fire was well advanced, and the gas tank blew, injuring or killing him? Or damaging other vehicles? What if he was out there, couldn't contain the fire by himself, and it jumped to another vehicle? I'm assuming that a burning car is probably going to end up totaled for insurance purposes anyway, but what if that wound up litigated? From the picture, it looks like he used dry chem, which is hell on wiring and electronics. I think CO2 would have been the proper stuff to use. So now you have the insurance company possibly refusing to cover damages, since putting out the fire caused more damage than it ought to have. I know, a lot of speculation. Any pro firefighters hereabouts with an opinion on this? I only know what I learned in the merchant marine --which DID involve a few trips to firefighting school, btw. As one of my cadet officers once told us, "A ship either sinks, or it burns and then it sinks."
Finally, the story may be incomplete in some details, but it sounds like he broke Absolute Rule #1 About Fires, at least per shipboard procedure: before you do ANYTHING, you spread the alarm to the rest of the crew. It doesn't matter if you dropped a hot match in your steel trashcan and a paper caught fire and you can drop the whole thing out your porthole in 5 seconds -- before you do that, you pass the alarm. Because what if you slip and knock yourself out on the steel bulkhead before you can open the porthole? What if the wind is blowing just right, and it blows the flaming paper back up on deck where there's other flammable material? The classic scenario they give is that you're passing an open storage locker, and you see fire and your best buddy stretched out cold on the deck, about to be stretched out hot. PASS THE WORD FIRST before you try to go in and grab him. You DO NOT take chances with fire. We did one amusing little exercise, see how far you can run holding your breath.
So -- to me, this is what I would fault him most for, if that's what happened. Yeah, I hope he gets his job back, but I also hope that next time he rings the alarm first.
My thoughts would be to give him a verbal warning, then written warning if he makes such a mistake again, then fire him for a 3rd offense.
They need to be a little bit looser on their regulations when it is something that is done to help someone, and doesn't involve a person wielding a weapon or a crazed animal.
Would it be acceptable, under store policies, to immediately put out the fire if there were a small child trapped in the car? Would yelling at someone else to put out the alarm while I put out the fire be acceptable?
Sorry, when I see a dangerous situation, I jump in the middle of it, without checking regulations first. I guess I'd get fired from this company, but it's always worked well for me in heavy construction.
Yeah but it doesn't seem like this guy was right out there where it may have been an obvious thing to do. He had to leave the store and go out into the parking lot, without letting anyone else know what was going on. At the very least he should have pulled a fire alarm switch or something. Yes, ESPECIALLY if he was told there was a kid in the car.
I got yelled at once by my boss when I was a truck driver, because I stopped on the interstate and used the fire extinguisher in my truck to put out a car fire. I didn't get fired, but he was mad I cost him money to replace the extinguisher.
Meant to hit the TU and hit the TD- sorry pj. That was a good gesture on your part sir. The cost of the extinguisher doesn't hold a candle to the cost of a car- or life.
UH-HUH, so YOU'RE my mystery stalker/TD'er!
LOL!
No problem buddy.
I did the same thing when I was a truck driver back in the 80's. Didn't seem right to let the Audi just burn to the ground right there on the four-level in Los Angeles. And my boss didn't even give me a bad time about it. I would have paid for the recharging if he had.
Good comment. I have to remind my inner six year old every day that good Samaritans don't get medals - they get shot.