It was my first real job, and I helped the company install a new computer system to replace the punch cards and ribbons monster they had used before. The new sexy system used state of the art floppy discs!

So, I had been there for 50 weeks when they fired me (Unfair Dismissal laws apply from 52 weeks on). I had seen it coming and had another job lined up, but I was determined that I would leave everything in such good order that whoever came after me could see how good I was at my job and didn’t believe any slander about me.

My handwriting is pretty terrible, which didn’t matter when I was the only one reading it, but for the sake of my successor, I took all the floppy disks and relabeled them with clear, colour coded labels and legible handwriting.

Then I left and started a much better job the following week.

Later, I heard that the boss’s wife got suspicious of my new labels - AND TOOK THEM ALL OFF ALL THE DISCS. All the payroll discs, ledgers, creditors and bank accounts, end of month totals, and master discs, all sitting in a pile with no labels and no one in the company with enough computer knowledge to know which was which.

The got onto their computer support company in Dublin, but since they had screwed them over they last time they had worked, the IT people were in no hurry to sort them out.

They didn’t ask me.

By the time they found someone, the company had gone bust.

And the thing was, I had no intention of getting revenge, it was the company’s own practices which had resulted in it.