TIFU… or rather, my printer did. And it might’ve saved a life

So, I work in a small office and part of my job involves printing out legal notices—boring stuff like foreclosure warnings, court summons, and the like. Usually, it’s a pretty mindless process: click, print, file, mail.

One day, I was prepping a stack of default notices for a batch mailing. These things are cold and final—“Pay up or we seize your house” kind of tone. As I’m about to print the last batch, our old office printer decided to jam… hard. Not just a paper jam, but the kind that throws a tantrum and refuses to reset even after turning it off and back on.

I called IT, but they were busy and wouldn’t get to us until the next day. Whatever, I think. I’ll reprint the batch tomorrow.

But here’s the kicker: that night, I couldn’t sleep. Something about the name on one of the notices stuck with me. I looked it up on a whim (we’re allowed to do some light personal research, weirdly), and I noticed there were comments in her case file about a payment being received early—but the system had flagged it as invalid because it hadn’t matched the final paperwork. I dig deeper and realize we were about to foreclose on this woman’s home because of a glitch in our system, not hers.

If the printer hadn’t jammed, that letter would’ve gone out. The process would’ve steamrolled over her, and she would’ve had no clue until sheriffs came knocking.

The next morning, I escalated the issue to management. They reviewed the case, confirmed the mistake, and immediately halted the process. Her home was saved.

So yeah. My office printer threw a hissy fit at just the right time. First and only time I’ve ever wanted to hug a chunk of aging plastic.

TL;DR: Printer jammed while I was sending out legal notices. The delay gave me time to discover a system error that would’ve wrongly foreclosed on someone’s home. Printer saved the day.