The employee who didn't turn up for 6 years but... Still got paid

A worker failed to attend work for six years and no one noticed.

Joaquín García was a Civil Servant in Spain, and was given a €37,000 (£28,600)-a-year role at the public utilities provider for Agua de Cádiz in 1990, el Mundo reports. In 1996 he was posted to the municipal water board, where his job was to supervise a waste water treatment plant.

In 2010, García was due to receive an award for the longevity of his service, but Jorge Blas Fernández, Deputy Mayor of Cadiz City Council from 1995 and 2010 and the individual who hired him, did not know where he was.

Speaking to el Mundo, Fernández said: “We thought the water company was supervising him but that was not the case.