Taco Bell Employee Reveals Manager Told Him To Sell Expired Meat

A manager at Taco Bell lost their job after posting a video revealing their store was using month-old ingredients and requiring their employees to relabel the packages in the event of a health inspection. According to him, the company requires their stores to use expired ingredients and have for years.

An employee at Taco Bell reveals unsanitary practices and expired beef

“Our area coach,” he says in the video, “came in last night and told us we have use beef that expired on…February 27.” He then shows a few other ingredients with various expiration dates, all of them past due. He wonders aloud if any other Taco Bell locations are using a similar practice.

“Managers and employees are being forced to work at other locations,” he explains, saying the company is threatening people with their jobs if they don’t obey their practices. He then reveals that the location’s manager is never around and employees face the consequences while upper management keeps their jobs.

Under the original TikTok video, commenters urged the employee to call the health department as quickly as possible. “Contact the health department immediately,” the top comment read. “Invite them to inspect right away.”

Other commenters noted this might be a good time for the employee to get their bag. “Call the health department and when they fire you it’s called wrongful termination and collect your new car,” another commenter wrote. “I was fired for refusing to sell outdated food. Save EVERYTHING. I won my case,” someone else wrote.

A few current and former fast food employees chimed in with stories of their own, too. “The first thing my regional manager ever told me,” one person wrote, “he would rather toss an entire fridge of product [than] let his store be known for food poisoning.”

“Is this in Ohio by chance?” one commenter asked. “I used to work for a Taco Bell just like this!” What’s scary is, this employee posted their video about a Taco Bell in Wisconsin, which means this is most likely a widespread practice across the country.

Taco Bell responds by firing and threatening the employee

The employee, identified on TikTok as @keep_it_real4life, posted a follow-up video about what happened in the days since the original TikTok. He says the manager fired him over the phone and then hung up on him when he asked about the expired beef.

Soon after, Taco Bell HR reached out to threaten the former employee with a lawsuit if they did not take down the video.

“Get a lawyer. Alert the local news media and stand your ground. Do not take the other video down,” the top comment read. Everyone else in the thread seems to agree.

There are many food safety incidents at this popular fast-food chain

This is just the latest of many food safety incidents at various Taco Bell locations. Earlier this year, an investigation into an Aurora, Colorado Taco Bell revealed there was rat poison in a customer’s food. The 63-year-old customer ate a bean burrito and became extremely ill soon after, ultimately requiring hospitalization.

Initially, he accused the employees of putting the rat poison in there purposefully following a verbal altercation. However, investigators said that they did find poison in the food, but video evidence cleared the employees of any wrongdoing.

In late 2021, a post on the popular Reddit community /r/antiwork outed another Taco Bell manager. This one was also forcing an employee to relabel and serve expired food. When the employee refused to do so, the manager immediately fired him.

Here is yet another video of a former Taco Bell employee talking about how they had to sell expired meat:

You might want to think twice about eating Taco Bell until they start making some serious changes.