Japanese Company Issues Televised Public Apology After Worker Is "Caught" Taking 3-Minute Lunch Breaks

Daily Mail — A Japanese water company has apologised to customers and docked a worker’s pay after he was caught leaving his desk for a lunch break.

A 64-year-old male staff member at the Kobe City Waterworks Bureau on the outskirts of Osaka, Japan, took approximately 78 minutes of lunch break over the course of seven months.

But his employers took a dim view of his antics, arguing that he had frittered away company time in the pursuit of food.

The trips a nearby store, which took three minutes each time, took place a total of 26 times between September 2017 and March 2018.

The man was only caught when a senior office worker looked out the window and saw him crossing the street to get himself a bento – a popular Japanese lunchtime box.

A televised apology was staged by the Waterworks Bureau after the ‘scandal’ with company executives appearing on screens to bow in apology to its customers.

The company also docked him a half-day’s pay for good measure.

‘It’s immensely regrettable that such a scandal took place, and we wish to express our sincere apologies,’ a company official said in the TV appearance.

Three minute lunch breaks? What is this, France? Disgusting. I thought Japan was built on East Asian honor and integrity and discipline but then I find out Karl Marx here took 78 minutes of lunch breaks this year and now I don’t know what to think. I mean I appreciate the Waterworks Bureau delivering a nationally televised apology to help me recover from this tragic scandal but I feel like we’re just one bathroom break away from joining the European Union here. Sad.