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21st August 2025
01:13pm BST
Burger King has responded after a viral worker who ran the restaurant on her own for 12 hours got fired.
One of the franchise's employees went viral when a video of her running an entire branch of the fast food chain by herself was shared on social media.
Nykia Hamilton went viral on TikTok after someone filmed her working alone in a Burger King in Columbia, South Carolina. Customers were left stunned and impressed as she was 'doing everything by herself'.
The woman was taking orders, cooking the food, manning the drive-thru, and cleaning up without any help from other employees.
The 25-year-old was praised for her efforts, however, it turned out she no longer works for Burger King as Nykia said she was sacked for being late 'because of my kids'.
"At the end of the day, I do it for them. I've got three kids to take care of, I'm a single mother. I still got to feed them, and I've got a child about to go to school. You got to do what you got to do," Nykia said.
A GoFundMe has been set up for Nykia, and it has raised over $90,000 to help support her and her family.
Now, Burger King has finally responded in a statement to the New York Post that the decision on hiring and firing employees was in the hands of the person running the franchise.
A spokesperson for Burger King said: "Terminations are the decision of the franchisees who own and operate the BK restaurant.
"In this situation, the franchisee confirmed that the individual involved is no longer employed due to repeated attendance issues."
The chain did express its disappointment that this particular franchise was in such a state that one person was running it completely by themselves.
The spokesperson went on to say: "No team member should ever be left to run a restaurant alone, even for a short period of time.
"That's not how we operate, and we're disappointed that our policy, which required more than one team member to work per shift, wasn't followed.
"While we can't share more on individual personnel matters, we're focused on making sure every restaurant, whether company or franchise-owned, has the staffing and support needed to take care of our team members and deliver the kind of experience our guests expect."
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