For awhile at one job we had a fake rat that would be found in odd places but even though you knew it was circulating, it would still give you a little start.

At another, at the end of the shift there might be a (larger than normal) puddle of oil under someones Harley. Or a pile of rice under my Honda.
Nothing really remarkable.

We used to have a driver who collected all the recyclables in the building because his neighbor’s son was raising money for a bicycle by recycling. As a prank, I would find a different spot on his truck in which to hide a can or bottle each day.

I would joke around but no pranking. It's not like in the Navy when we did grease parties.

I was a buyer/planner and we had a coordinator who's Mexican. He would pass by my desk and I'd say out loud, "Hey, Gabe, get me a cup of coffee with cream and sugar." He'd yell out, "Coming right up, Rey." The other older planners were aghast. Then a second coordinator came on board. I would never joke with him like that. We were out to lunch one day and he said he was jealous that I don't kid with him like that like I do with Gabe. I didn't say anything but like I would say that to a black man???

In a hallway conversation with a male and female coworker, the female coworker was complaining how the Indian contractors would keep calling her at home at night and usually while she was in the shower. Now, she kept relating different times when this happened. On the third time, she mentioned she got another call while she was in the shower, I put up my hand to stop her. I then closed my eyes and turned my face up to the ceiling. They looked at me. I opened my eyes and said, "Okay, now I got a good mental picture. Do go on." They both burst out laughing.

One time, a female engineer came by my desk to talk and she was wearing something that looked nice. I did an Eddie Haskel line and said something like, "You're looking mighty nice today, Annie." Later that week, I was running a weekly meeting that she was a participant. She and another person came in a few minutes late. I said, "I don't appreciate you being late to my meetings." She knew my humor but some of the people in the meeting didn't. They were silent not knowing whether I was serious. She just came back with, "You're looking mighty nice today, Rey." I didn't expect that come back but we all broke out laughing.

I don't joke w. employees, but its a different dynamic. (Sorta, w. the ones who've been w. me for years, but its still iffy.)

Practical jokes would get one of my employees terminated.

We make food, and don't have time for people to screw around. Given that it would probably impact the bonus pool, I can't see anyone really feeling a need to prank people.

Never outside the locker room. We had one officer that couldn't remember his locker combination, so he put tiny white dots by the combination numbers. Someone noticed the dots. Yes, put put dots by all 70 numbers.

Officer LardAss always came into the locker room at the last second, right before Roll Call to get his stuff. One wire coat hanger wrapped tightly around the lock, then encased in one roll of duct tape.

I didn't keep much in my locker, spare boots, socks, etc, so kept it unlocked. Officer Dave laced my boots together I waited for months to pay him back. One very cold winter night, while he was out on patrol I was working the desk. Every 15 minutes I went out to the parking lot and sprayed water on his windshield and wipers, firmly icing up the windshield and wipers. He wasted a lot of gas thawing that windshield so he could go home.

It should depend on the details.
Place, time, circumstances and the relationship with the coworker.
Could be hilarious and could be disastrous.
Can't make any determination without the details.

Had a guy that was a huge Dale Earnhardt fan.
When he closed his locker he set the dial to #3.
Every time me and another guy would go in there
we would turn it to 24. Drove him crazy.
Of course we stopped after Dale died.

Someone got in my truck and reset all my radio stations to country music
because I mentioned I didn't care for country.

Nope. I've seen enough videos of workplace accidents caused by "pranks" to know better. And I'm glad that I work from home now.

Nope. Never participated in it nor did I tolerate it.

For example,
We had a guy that was pretty bad about coming up behind you and goosing you or yelling to startle you. He did this to me a couple times while I was in process of some tedious function. Then finally one time I finished my immediate task, turned slowly around to face him snickering, got in his face and advised him that if he EVER did that again I would not be responsible for the resulting reflex defensive reaction and he would end up on his ass on the floor.

Apparently he got the message.

Nope, I'm self-employed, but I miss those days working with others.

Not everybody is cut out to be a fireman.

46 years ago when I was a High school kid working at a grocery store, we went out and picked up a Volkswagen beetle and carried it to an inside corner of 2 brick walls. Funny shit when the dude got off work and could not drive away. And we all got payed back.

Rectal Grease complained to HR, so now we can’t even have nicknames anymore.

quote:

Originally posted by ss9961:
Rectal Grease complained to HR, so now we can’t even have nicknames anymore.

What an asshole.

We never messed with anybody in the office. Just drivers and plant.
To tell the truth, if nobody ever played a joke on me, I would have felt left out.
Probably would have hurt my feelings!!
We've known each other 20 to 35 years.

No

No, because if I swapped the hard drives between two coworkers, they would know who did it.

Some pranks are truly harmless and don't consume lots of time or effort to recover from, such as Schmelby's locker combination and radio presets examples. I think things like that are well within the boundaries.

In my opinion, sneaking up behind people or leaving oil/grease/goo on things are less acceptable, because they can lead to reflexive butt-whoopins or time-consuming cleanup operations. (That's not to say that I don't find CPD SIG's foam peanuts example pretty darned funny, mind you.)

At a previous job we had the rubber rat and rubber snake, and some wise guy had a ghoulish rubber halloween mask. Any of those items might show up at any time, and we all knew it. Nothing harmful, nothing dangerous.

Certainly, you have to know your "targets," their tolerance for pranking, and their tolerance for it. And don't do something that's going to end you up in HR.

That said... there's one fella at work who keeps finding a new rubber duckie in his office. So far he has blamed everyone but the actual duck-dropper.

Had a driver that somehow let his pickup truck roll into the pond in front of his house.
Another driver "found" a no parking sign, waded
out and planted it in his pond.