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Gov’t Employee Paid For 4 MONTH Vacation Boss Didn’t Know He Was Taking

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A government employee was paid for what amounted to a four and a half month vacation and his supervisor didn’t even know he wasn’t working.

A government watchdog report revealed Friday that a federal patent examiner left for the bar, went golfing, and did plenty of other fun things that involved no work, all while being paid for the time. On top of that, his boss didn’t even know he was gone.

The inspector general found the employee received at least $25,500 during the fiscal year 2014 for 730 hours that he didn’t work. The employee was making more than $70,000 and resigned in exchange for keeping his personnel record clean of falsifying hours, the Washington Post reports.

The employee’s boss didn’t even notice he wasn’t working until an anonymous letter tipped them off and sparked the investigation. The letter said the employee never worked and when he did turn in something it was “garbage.”

A previous report showed that the office’s policy of allowing many employees to work from home has made it difficult to track productivity, or if they’re even working at all.

A Washington Post investigation last year found that thousands of patent workers lied about their hours and got bonuses for work they never actually did.

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