He was told he would lose 10% of his bonus for using personal phone during work hours. Three weeks later, he had the last laugh: ‘I simply stopped….’

An X user recently shared how an attempt by HR to chastise him backfired spectacularly. Taking to X, a physical therapist named Mario revealed how he was called out by HR for using his personal phone during work hours. Then she informed him that this bad habit caused him to lose 10% of his monthly bonus.

Mario accepted the warning and agreed to follow the company’s rules regarding personal phone usage.

Several weeks later, however, the office faced an unexpected internet outage. The company’s Wi-Fi stopped functioning, and the manager informed Mario that IT expected the disruption to continue for several hours. With an important client presentation approaching, the manager asked him to activate his personal mobile hotspot for the conference room.


Mario agreed to help.


The request quickly expanded beyond the meeting room. The manager asked him to keep the hotspot running because employees from the finance and sales departments also needed internet access. Mario continued providing his mobile connection until the company’s network was restored.

For several hours, his personal phone effectively became an unofficial backup internet system for a large part of the workplace.

The following morning, HR contacted him after noticing that he had spent an unusually long period using his personal phone during office hours. Mario explained that he had followed his manager’s instructions and used the device as a hotspot because the company’s internet connection had failed.

HR acknowledged that the phone had been used for business purposes and therefore said there was no violation.

Mario then raised another issue. Since he had consumed additional mobile data while helping the company maintain its operations, he asked whether those expenses could be claimed as a business cost.

HR informed him that employees were not reimbursed for personal phone or mobile data expenses.

The answer made Mario point out that if his phone remained his own when it came to expenses, would the organisation expect him to use it for professional purposes? He then stated he would now reserve the phone for private use only if personal usage could affect his bonus. If the company expected him to use his device for business purposes, they should document such requests.

“I simply stopped volunteering my personal phone whenever the office Wi-Fi went down..” he finished.