The Branch Office

Talking through their car windows, they finished up the conversation, and Hal rolled up his window and punched the gas pedal too hard, which made the car react violently out of his control. He pitched the vehicle left, skidded through the gravel parking lot, and nearly hit Davis’s car, which was moving right toward him. Davis was leaving the bar’s parking lot too and, naturally, was drunk also. Hal made a drunken right turn to avoid hitting Davis, exceeding forty miles an hour, and suddenly, a tree appeared out of nowhere. Hal had no choice but to hit it head-on because his reactions were too slow, and there was no other place to go. Davis stopped his car, and they both exited their vehicles to inspect the damage. “This wreck is going to be tough to explain to upper management,” Davis said to Hal. “Let’s get our minds to work, and we will come up with a great story by tomorrow or at least until a tow truck gets here.” The men began to formulate a report on how the damage could have happened. The best they could come up with was a hit-and-run situation, but they were both drunk and figured more sober minds could come up with a plausible story tomorrow. The car was in bad shape, but Hal coaxed it into starting again, so both men left the bar parking lot to go home and formulate a new game plan for tomorrow. Hal obtained a rental vehicle while his company car was in the shop under repair, but the car wreck had been so violent that the repair shop reported to him the next day that the accident had bent the vehicle’s frame. The car was a total loss, which would be difficult to explain to upper management since it had been a one-person accident. No police had shown up to the scene, so Hal decided to have the car repaired himself and pay the bill out of his pocket. No harm, no foul. Unfortunately, moving a frame back into place was impossible to accomplish and expensive too. Hal paid the repair shop extra to repair the vehicle the best they possibly could because he had to turn in the car within a few short months. Once the mileage reached around fifty-five thousand miles, an employee would fill out the paperwork to order a new company vehicle. The maximum mileage time frame was fast approaching with Hal’s company car. He could not let upper management discover that the frame had been damaged beyond repair, because totaling a company vehicle was unheard of, especially since it hadn’t been reported to anyone. The fact that he hadn’t reported the incident to the branch office personnel would be a firing offense, so Hal had to come up with a great story soon. The truth would be a big problem if it came to light. The shop repaired the car as best as they could, but the bent frame was impossible to repair and a total loss. As the date for his car return came closer, Hal decided to check into a rehab clinic to buy more time and hopefully find another job because he knew he would be fired once the car failed an inspection by an auction house, where most company cars went after being turned in to the home office. Hal was in rehab for only a few weeks, even though he tried to tell the rehab counselor he would relapse in no time to buy more time. Unfortunately, the target date to turn in his company car loomed closer. Hal finally found a new job with a larger CIC agent located in the Houston area right after he turned the damaged vehicle in. The report to upper management, which came within a few short weeks after Hal left the company, said the vehicle had a bent frame. The frame damage was evident, and the resale or auction value was much lower than anticipated, so the problem existed without an answer. The home office questioned Davis regarding the details of what had happened to the vehicle and what had happened to Hal during the accident. Davis laughed to himself and knew it was hard to call the wreck an accident, but given the drunken details, he played dumb and said he did not have an answer for home office. The debacle put Davis in a bad light because his boss, Regional Vice President Tom Staben, was now calling for an answer. Davis knew it had to be a perfect story. When Tom Staben called, it was always a serious issue, so the story had to be believable, or Davis risked retaliation or censure. Due to his Wharton days, Davis already had formulated an excuse for how the company car had been destroyed and why it had not been reported, so he was ready for his call from Tom Staben. Since Hal was no longer with the company, he could postulate something wild and unbelievable, because the wilder the story was, the more believable it became. The story couldn’t be that Hal had been abducted by aliens or that a meteor had fallen from the sky and hit his car. He needed something a little more down to earth to submit to Tom. The story he gave to Tom Staben was a great story with a cast of characters. Davis said, “A few months back, Hal was at a gas station, when two derelict men approached his car and asked for money and a ride. Hal indicated it wasn’t his car to give anyone a ride in and said, ‘Damn it, get a freaking job, you lazy bastards!’ This approach didn’t meet with the approval from the two derelict men, and they became angry. While Hal was filling up with gas, one of the derelicts decided to jump into his car and drive off, laughing wildly. Hal fought the other derelict off and had time to open the vehicle’s door and grab the driver out of his car. When he accomplished that feat, the derelict hit the gas, and the car careened out of control and slammed into a pole. Both men ran off into the night, again laughing wildly. “Given the fact it was a gas station, it could have been so much worse, with a possible explosion and possible loss of life if the gas pump would have ignited. All in all, it was wrong for Hal not to report it to you or the branch office personnel, but Hal felt no one would believe his story because the witnesses left the scene never to be seen or heard from again. He had the vehicle repaired out of pocket, and again, Hal recently resigned from the company, so we don't have him here to discipline him appropriately.” Davis had to put the phone on mute because he was laughing too hard, and he thought to himself, And most people think insurance people are dull and boring. “The problem, I realized in talking to Hal recently,” Davis said after he took the phone off mute, “is that he is currently employed with an agency that is one of our largest agents in the Houston area. We can’t complain too loudly about this incident because it might affect business writings from the agency.” Davis had thought up another good excuse, and he put the phone on mute again to laugh hysterically. Tom accepted his explanation and asked Davis to keep a better eye on the company cars and institute a semiannual inspection of all company vehicles by the loss-control department to control the situation better. Davis felt that was penance enough for one day and said he would write Tom a letter regarding a new procedure for the branch or a new check-and-balance. The idea was for that type of nonsense never to happen again.