Employee was scolded for buying pizza for a homeless man. So, customer found a perfect loophole

Editor's note: This article was originally published on July 21, 2023. It has since been updated.

Working in a toxic work environment often leaves an employee bitter and frustrated. However, the poor work culture did not affect the goodwill of this man working at a restaurant. He was kind enough to feed a homeless fella, even though it meant more risk of him getting fired. The employee was also scolded by his boss for giving away free pizzas but that's when one of the customers got involved and helped the worker find a brilliant loophole to feed the beggar. The employee, u/Huge_Buddy_2216, shared that he was working at a well-known US pizza delivery chain store in the early 2000s. He wrote, “For anyone who has ever worked in the US food service industry, you're probably familiar with what a failing dumpster fire of a restaurant looks like. On many nights it was literally just me and one driver taking care of the whole restaurant.”

He couldn’t even take breaks at the restaurant as the place would become unattended. He shared, “The recent franchise buyers were complete and total idiots who would show up unannounced to yell at me, and the overwhelming majority of our customers ordered once and then never again. We had pizza deliveries taking 90+ minutes, people bringing them back to the store ... it was a nightmare.”

The employee was being paid about $8.50/ hour to run shifts. He went on to talk about what happened one night when the restaurant was pretty empty. He wrote, “Well, 11 pm rolls around as I'm kind of standing by the phones watching the clock tick down, and a clearly homeless man walks in. He introduces himself as Ricky and asks if we had any leftover pizzas that nobody picked up.”

He informed him that they didn’t have any but later asked what he wanted. The Reddit user recalled, “He says he likes the meat lovers' pizza. Since he isn't a sociopath like some of our customers, I say I'll be happy to make him one. Ricky at this point is so thankful that he sits down in one of our chairs and starts bouncing up and down like a little kid.”

The employee put in the order and paid for it himself. “Ricky watches me and applauds my dough slapping/spinning skills. As the pizza comes out of the oven, in comes the area manager - the brother of the franchise owner. He begins shouting as usual and accuses me of stealing from the store,” he wrote.

That’s when one of their regular customers, Henry walked in. He heard what happened and became uncomfortable. “I finally tell the area manager that I paid for the pizza out of my own pocket. The area manager shouts a bit more, calls me a liar, says the count better be right that night, and leaves. I apologize to Henry and Ricky, who both tell me, an 18-year-old kid, 'Yeah work sucks doesn't it'," narrated the user.

The next night, Henry called in for another order. “This was unusual because he was generally a once-a-week guy. I also found it unusual that he ordered a meal lovers' pizza instead of his usual supreme. I took it, made it, and 20 minutes later Henry calls again apologetically to cancel it. I say OK. In a bizarre coincidence, Ricky rolled in right around that time asking for a pizza. I just so had one that was going to go uneaten sitting under the heater," the man wrote. 

And this began to happen every night from then on. He continued, “Henry would call, order a meat lovers' pizza, and I'd make it. Henry would then call again, cancel, and Ricky would coincidentally roll in. Every night, same time. You could time it to the second. This went on for months.”

Unfortunately, one of his co-workers informed the manager about what was happening. He shared, “But I responded that I was just doing my job as instructed. They then stopped putting me into the schedule rotation in a quiet-firing sort of way, but I really didn't care.” 

Eventually, he mentioned that the restaurant was shut within a year. The post has about 8k upvotes on Reddit and is captioned, "Can't buy a homeless man a pizza? Fine by me." u/Ashshaun commented, “Good people doing good for the sake of being good. I love it. Besides, if a business can't cover the loss of 1 pizza a day (when most pizza places will give their employees free food anyway) they don't deserve to be in business.” u/Able_Cat2893 expressed, “Thank you for doing that! I work at a homeless shelter and it is what I love! Our clients are so grateful for anything we do for them, or, help them do things for themselves!”