There is always a bad penny, but for a man from Georgia, there were 91,515 of them.
Andreas Flaten left his job at A OK Walker Autoworks in Peachtree City in November, but getting his last paycheck was not easy, Flaten told local media, and even called the Georgia Department of Labor.
Finally, on March 12, his $ 915 salary reached his home in Fayetteville – more specifically, his garage, in the form of tens of thousands of cents.
To make the already toxic environment worse, the nearly 500 pounds of pennies were also smeared with engine oil, a toxic contaminant in groundwater.
The eviction also came with a written note, simply, “f – – k you.”
The situation drew attention when Flaten’s girlfriend, Olivia Oxley, shared a video of the pile of coins in an Instagram post describing the circumstances of her partner’s departure, including the detail that he reportedly gave a “letter of resignation. in writing ”two weeks in advance.
“Those 2 weeks turned into 5 days,” she claimed, due to Walker’s harassment. “Miles Walker from OK Walker Autoworks continued to be the ass he is and made a normal working day a living hell, making unnecessary comments about my boyfriend’s daughter and just being a complete d – – k.”
Oxley was also dismayed by his dedication to the prank, which required him to carry a quarter of a ton of coins. “I mean … couldn’t he have pissed on the check or something?” she wrote.
In an interview with CBS46 in Atlanta, Flaten said that his former “toxic” workplace manager was known to harass his workers, including a former employee who claims that the boss once took him out of his pants in front of his colleagues .
When reporter Jamie Kennedy tracked down the maniacal mechanic, he ignored it.
“Get the hell out of my property. And know that if someone gets to the point of doing this type of business, there is a motivating factor ”, said the bitter boss.
“It doesn’t matter – he was paid, that’s all that matters. He’s af – – kin weenie for even bringing it up, “he added.
“This is a childish thing to do,” Flaten later told Fox5. “I think it will be a lot of work for the money I already worked for.”
According to a Times investigation into the bizarre feud, Flaten decided to leave his position at A OK because he and his manager were in a dispute over his schedule, which required an abrupt stop to pick up his son from day care. After continually ignoring that promise, as well as a series of other heated discussions in between, he told the Times, he submitted his resignation.
Despite the negative publicity, including a recent flurry of Yelp star ratings, an auto shop receptionist told a Times reporter that business was booming.
Meanwhile, Flaten and Oxley are still passing through a wheelbarrow full of copper coins, cleaning each 1-cent piece with an old cloth. It takes about two hours to improve the value of $ 5.
And there is nothing they can do, according to United States Department of Labor spokesman Eric R. Lucero, who told the Times: “There is nothing in the regulations that dictates what currency the employee should be paid in. ”.