Dunder-Mifflin Strikes Again

At the beginning of the year, my retardo company decided to start offering tuition reimbursement. I'm guessing that they did this in order to try and convince job applicants that this was a progressive company that actually cared about their employees and wanted to encourage life-long learning. I'm also guessing that they never expected anyone to actually want to take them up on it.

I, however, began my PhD at the beginning of this year and thought that it was a wonderful thing that I could get a teeny portion of my expenses defrayed by the company. Cause the pitiful amount they're offering is a drop in the bucket to the overall cost per year, but hey, it's free money, right?

Well the yahoos running the company have found a way to make the free money not so free, I'll call it part of their Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA). Apparently it goes like this:

1. Give employee electronic copy of forms that must be filled out prior to enrollment in classes. Page total: 35
2. Ask employee to submit said tome to her manager, but refuse to tell her exactly who that might be.
3. Upon employee throwing a dart at the "org chart" and choosing someone to receive said tome, bury selected management level person in paperwork so that said tome gets lost.
4. Should manager-type actually review and sign tome, make the next step on the approval chain Amelia Bedelia - or failing that, someone whose desk looks like Melvin's office area prior to his relocation to the basement.
5. After several months pass and employee checks in with selected manager-type to see where her approved copy of the paperwork might be, have manager-type find out that Amelia/Melvin has lost it. Knowing that this is going to be an unpopular revelation, have manager-type keep mum for several more months.
6. When, after urging, manager-type fesses up that said tome is with Clementine (you know, lost and gone forever), have manager-type ask for a resubmittal of paperwork.
7. Repeat from step 4.
8. After several iterations, when employee submits grades from completed semester and asks for payment, reiterate that tome has been lost and ask for it to be resubmitted once again - never minding that this thing has been faxed so many times that a rather large apartment could be wallpapered in its entirety with the missing copies. If they could ever be found.
9. When faced with the irate employee, suggest she take some vacation to relax - but remind her that it needs to be taken in 4 hour increments.

At this point, I'm taking bets as to whether or not I ever see my reimbursement.