AITA because my dirty co-worker got fired after I stopped giving him a ride to work?

A Reddit user shares the story of how they stopped giving a co-worker a ride to work after repeated incidents of food messes and disregard for cleanliness in their car.

Despite giving the co-worker, “John,” multiple reminders, his behavior continued, and after one final incident involving crumbs and ants, the Redditor decided to end the arrangement.

Not long after, John was fired from his job for tardiness, which some colleagues now attribute to the Redditor’s refusal to give him a ride. This has led to some co-workers labeling them as selfish. Read the full story below to see how this situation unfolded.

‘ AITA because my dirty co-worker got fired after I stopped giving him a ride to work?’

So, I’ve been getting some flak at work because a well-liked co-worker of ours got fired for repeated absences after I stopped giving him a ride to work. As background, I’m an Active Duty Military mid-level healthcare provider and he was an entry level civilian contractor. We both worked at a large Military Hospital.

Earlier this year, “John [20m],” who recently started working at the hospital, was asking around our department for people he could carpool with. Everyone gave various reasons why they couldn’t help, and eventually I volunteered because he lived nearby and it wouldn’t be out of my way to pick him up.

(I will preface this by noting John was very well liked in our department with most of the older ladies adopting him as their “work son” etc. He’s also the youngest employee by almost a decade.)

This issues started about one month in when I noticed every morning after I picked him up, he would bring various food products to eat on the drive to work. This didn’t bother me at first, but as time went on he was leaving food trash and crumbs in my vehicle.

I’m an extremely clean individual, so this bothered me and I said something. He continued eating, and kept forgetting to clean after himself. I was getting tired of constantly reminding him to take his trash with him, and I started just throwing the trash away myself.

After doing this a few times, I decided to just leave the trash, and see if he would notice. He didn’t. For weeks the empty water bottles, redbull cans, candy wrappers and empty containers started to pile up in by passenger door and floorboard, and stayed until I asked him politely “could you take that trash with you?”

His response of “yeah of course, I don’t mind” made me feel like he thought it was MINE and I was asking for a favor. There’s more examples, but to keep things short, I gave him an ultimatum, he needed to clean up after himself and respect my car, or he would need to find another ride to work.

Not even a week later, he was eating some type of meal with flaky crackers and it was spilling on his lap the entire ride to work. When we pulled into the parking garage, he dusted all the food crumbs from his lap onto my carpet. We left the car and went to work.

After work, when I returned to my car, there were ants inside of my vehicle. I had enough. So I made up an excuse, and told him I couldn’t give him rides. He took it well, and the rides stopped. But over the next few weeks, his tardiness started to pile up. His agency fired him in September.

We are not privy to contractors personnel issues, but everyone assumes he was fired for being chronically late. Fast forward to today, while on break, I overheard some folks saying he was fired because I stopped giving him a ride to work and that was s**fish of me etc.

I never told anyone except him why I stopped, and I’m assuming he told them some half baked truth and because he was well liked, I know they believe him.. Am I the a**hole?

See what others had to share with OP:

DevilsAdvocate7391 −  NTA. Firstly, you aren’t obligated to give him lifts anyway, and he’s a grown ass man. Either he’s responsible and gets to work on time, or he gets fired. Secondly, he’s being disrespectful. Plain and simple. Is it his car? No.

So he can listen to you and pick up the damn litter he leaves everywhere. Thirdly. Everyone’s giving you s**t for not giving him lifts, but did they step in and help? No! They didn’t! The hypocrites can be quiet! NTA.

itsmissyxo −  NTA
Being blatantly disrespectful even after you confronted him is not cool. He was disrespecting your personal space and I don’t think its s**fish to want to make the issue stop by refusing rides. Was there a reason why he couldn’t drive himself or use public transportation?

Not that it matters, but if he really wanted the job he could’ve found other ways to get to work. It’s not your fault he got fired, its his fault for screwing up and disrespecting you and your space then not being an adult and finding the resources he needed to get to work.

Mediocre_Ant_437 −  Your mistake was allowing food at all. After that initial talk you should have told them that eating in your car was not allowed. The next time he shows up with food you should have told him that he couldn’t get in the car unless he ditched it. That could have solved this issue.

DA-2003 −  NTA – You’re not entitled to give him a ride and for a dude that is so well liked it’s ridiculous no one else was willing to offer. But you said yourself he was well liked and will have to understand that there are probably quite a few people who will/have taken his side over yours.

I don’t know what that means to you but it’s just the truth. Either you have to say you don’t care or tell the truth. He wasn’t respecting your property and you don’t feel like it was your responsibility to be giving a favor to someone who couldn’t respect your property.

Not to mention calling them out for the blatant hypocrisy of talking behind your back while neither of them offered him rides either.

StopSpinningLikeThat −  So if he is 20 and everyone at work is at least a decade older than him, that means you are at a minimum 30 years old. You have to learn how to set healthy boundaries.

This kid walked all over you and when you finally stood up for yourself, you still say you “made up an excuse and told him I couldn’t give him rides.” You’re not doing him or yourself a favor here.

Having said all that, I’ll vote NTA because the kid is old enough to have consequences for his s**fish behavior. I just wish you’d been a good enough friend to be honest with him.

PikesPique −  INFO: Before you gave “John” the ultimatum, had you told him no more eating in the car?

Is-this-rabbit −  You should have said no food or drink to be consumed in the car as soon as he started leaving a mess. You were too soft with him. He was inconsiderate. NTA

scrapples000 −  NTA – it’s not your responsibility to drive him, you were doing him a favor. You gave him an ultimatum for a minimum level of respect for your space, which he didn’t follow through on. Too bad for him.

Only small, tiny niggle is that you lied and made an excuse for not driving him instead of just telling him you can’t drive him because he makes a mess in your car every day and doesn’t clean up after himself.

Effigy4urcruelty −  NTA, but i’d have said “no eating in my car” instead of “clean up after yourself.” Also, it’s his job to manage his commute(bus, uber, biking/walking) Tell them the truth.

SomeoneYouDontKnow70 −  NTA. If they felt so strongly about that, why didn’t they step up and give him a ride to work? He had a perfectly good ride, and he ruined it by continuing to trash your car.

Do you think the Redditor was justified in stopping the carpool arrangement due to the repeated messes, or should they have continued helping despite the inconvenience? How would you handle a similar situation with a messy carpool companion? Share your thoughts below!