A worker mistakenly receives 330 times his salary and leaves the company without returning it
When checking his payroll the employee realized that he had received around $180,000. He promised to pay it back, but instead he quit his job.
Payday is always eagerly anticipated but one worker in Chile got quite the shock when checking his monthly payslip.
The Chilean citizen discovered that he had been paid 330 times his normal salary in what appears to have been a monumental accounting mix-up. At time of writing it does not appear that any of the money, which he received through no fault of his own, has been returned. Moreover, he has reportedly stopped coming to work and the company does not know his current whereabouts.
The lucky individual worked at the Industrial Food Consortium (Cial) of Chile, an important meat products company with more than 50 years of history in the sector. Simple human error seems to be the reason for his remarkable good fortune.
His salary as an office assistant was 500,000 pesos ($545) per month. However last month he received an astonishing 165,398,851 pesos, or roughly $180,300.
According to local newspaper Diario Financiero, the worker immediately told his deputy managerof the payroll error. After reporting it to his superiors they informed him that he had to return the amount of money that had been deposited in error. The worker agreed to go to his bank the next day to repay the difference, but he appears to have had a change of heart.
Lucky recipient accused of misappropriation
The next morning the company noted that the amount had not been reimbursed, so they tried to contact their worker. He showed no signs of life until a few hours later, when he claimed that he had fallen asleep and had not been able to go to the bank to correct the mistake and had not gone to work either.
That, local reports suggest, was the last contact between the company and the worker until 2 June when the company was contacted by a law firm, notifying them that the employee wished to communicate his resignation.
In the month that has passed since then the man has disappeared and nothing more is known of his whereabouts. In response, the company has taken legal action against him for an alleged crime of misappropriation.
“He was informed and clarified that this money did not correspond to the payment of any service,” claims the legal action.