Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[learner1]

Hello,

'She was fired/canned because she was lazy and always late for work.'

Could we use 'can' instead of 'fire' here? If so, is 'can' a common expression like 'fire' here?

Thank you very much.

[Sirius]

Canned is much less formal but in this context it means she was fired.

You normally wouldn't use both words in the same sentence. You would use one or the other

[learner1]

Hello Sirius,

Thank you very much for your kind help.