(no subject)
Well dudes, that's it. I am officially leaving the House of Gas. I'm going back to the Rock tomorrow, emailing in my resignation, and getting signed off sick for my four-week notice period. And if they don't like it, they can fucking well fire me, except, OH WAIT, I will already have quit.
2011 has been a fucking nightmare for me where my job is concerned.
First of all, I had to change from a shift where I worked Monday to Thursday, 10 til 8, to a shift where I worked Monday to Friday, 11.30 til 8. And in case you're wondering how I managed to have any kind of social life during that time, the answer is that I didn't.
More annoying is the fact that I was forced to change shifts to provide support for a manager with a new team, despite the fact that I already had a team doing the same shift as me, because the only advocate who didn't have a team is shit at his job and can't be trusted to look after new starters. So he gets rewarded for being rubbish with a three-day weekend, and I get a piece-of-crap five-day shift with an 8pm finish as punishment for my ability to not suck.
Because all my holidays for this year had been booked on the assumption that I wouldn't be working Fridays, I didn't bother booking these off as holiday. When I told our call centre manager that, she told me, to my face, that it wouldn't be a problem to get those booked off for me. I even put it in writing and got the response back agreeing that she would sort it.
January rolls around, and oh wait, we're predicted to be busy on those Fridays, so suddenly I can't have them off. I point out that a) I changed shifts to be flexible and accomodate the needs of the business, b) she promised me at the end of 2010 that it wouldn't be an issue, and c) I arranged these holidays in early 2010 and all my plans are already in place, and suddenly it's my fault because I "shouldn't book holidays that far in advance." Yes, she really said that to me, and no, I did not give in to the urge to spit in her face.
February rolls around, and oh joy, Ear Thing pops up again. I spend Friday afternoon in agony, but still finish up my shift, and of course I can't get an appointment over the weekend and the walk-in clinic closes at 7pm on Friday so thanks to my shitty working pattern, I end up going three days without seeing a doctor and without getting more than twenty minutes of sleep at a time.
Monday morning, I call in sick, and get my managers ansaphone. I leave a message explaining that I won't be in, and call the duty manager phone, since we're supposed to make sure we talk to a real person rather than leaving voicemails. Two hours later and I'm getting a bollocking for calling in too early and rining the DMs phone as well as my managers.
I finally get to the doctor, he loads me up with antibiotics and ear drops and pain killers and writes me a note saying I won't be in for the rest of the week. I call my manager to explain this, and she tells me that the House of Gas doesn't accept doctors notes and that a doctor cannot advise me when I'm too sick to go to work. Incidentally, if any of you are studying medicine, you should just drop out of school right now, since apparently you don't need years of training to tell if people are ill, you just need to be a manager at the House of Gas.
In March, it emerges that we are to be honoured with a visit from King Gas Himself. He wants to see how our team is responding to a new billing system. Of course, He will only be present from 9 til 10 that morning, and we don't start til 11.30, so now we have to come in three hours early. It's not all bad though - we don't get to leave three hours early, so instead we get the unearthly delight of finishing at 8pm the day before, then coming to work at 8.30 the following day and working an eleven-and-a-half-hour shift. And for this treat, the call centre manager tells us, we will be paid time-and-a-quarter and given an extra fifteen minute break.
Wednesday dawns, and 8.30 finds us all at our desks, all dressed in bright blue House of Gas slave tunics specially handed out to us for the event, lest King Gas be confused into thinking of us as human beings rather than an anonymous mass of lowly peons who labour for His enrichment.
And King Gas doesn't even come over to us. Not a single one of us is blessed enough to hear a word that utters from His holy mouth. And for added glory, we don't get our extra fifteen minute break. When we challenge our call centre manager on this, she tells us dismissively that we will "get it next time". I don't know when "next time" is. Perhaps it is when King Gas will descend from on high and sweep us away in the Rapture, possibly sporting a new set of colour-co-ordinated manacles to go with our slave tunics. I can but dream.
Last Monday, our team has a supposedly-daily performance review, our first one in weeks. Our manager asks how we coped while she was on holiday for two days. A particularly slow-witted and rancid hag takes the opportunity to lambaste me, in front of our manager and the rest of the team, because I had the audacity to ask her to get the details of a newly-installed meter before she passed it to me to update said installation. The sheer nerve of me, asking her to tell me what it was the customer needed updating before I updated it!
And my manager says nothing. My team say nothing. I am alone with the shame of having asked someone to do her fucking job instead of doing it for her and perhaps wiping her arse at the same time.
So yes, I quit. Fuck you, 8pm finish. From now on, when 8pm rolls around, I'll already be at home watching Supernatural reruns or writing a script for a second Constantine movie.
Fuck you, shitty advocate. Enjoy your three-day weekend while you can, because someone is going to have to take my place.
Fuck you, predicted-to-be-busy Fridays. I hope the call queues stretch for hours and every customer who gets through spends twenty minutes bitching about the wait time. I'll be on my holidays that I selfishly booked over a year in advance.
Fuck you, managers-who-apparently-are-better-than-doctors. I will never again plague you by phoning in too early or ringing another number in order to comply with our sickness reporting policy. You will be so relieved to be rid of me and my moronic assumption that a trained health care professional knows more about what's wrong with my body than you do.
Fuck you, King Gas. Keep your fucking time-and-a-quarter and your shitty slave tunic. You can build the Great Pyramids of Gas without my help, you twat.
Fuck you, call centre manager. When the Rapture comes, I'll be taking my fifteen minute break on another fucking continent.
Fuck you, rancid hag. You will never again need to take a customers meter details, because there'll be nobody there to update them for you.
Fuck you all, House of Gas. I hope you fall into the fucking sea.
2011 has been a fucking nightmare for me where my job is concerned.
First of all, I had to change from a shift where I worked Monday to Thursday, 10 til 8, to a shift where I worked Monday to Friday, 11.30 til 8. And in case you're wondering how I managed to have any kind of social life during that time, the answer is that I didn't.
More annoying is the fact that I was forced to change shifts to provide support for a manager with a new team, despite the fact that I already had a team doing the same shift as me, because the only advocate who didn't have a team is shit at his job and can't be trusted to look after new starters. So he gets rewarded for being rubbish with a three-day weekend, and I get a piece-of-crap five-day shift with an 8pm finish as punishment for my ability to not suck.
Because all my holidays for this year had been booked on the assumption that I wouldn't be working Fridays, I didn't bother booking these off as holiday. When I told our call centre manager that, she told me, to my face, that it wouldn't be a problem to get those booked off for me. I even put it in writing and got the response back agreeing that she would sort it.
January rolls around, and oh wait, we're predicted to be busy on those Fridays, so suddenly I can't have them off. I point out that a) I changed shifts to be flexible and accomodate the needs of the business, b) she promised me at the end of 2010 that it wouldn't be an issue, and c) I arranged these holidays in early 2010 and all my plans are already in place, and suddenly it's my fault because I "shouldn't book holidays that far in advance." Yes, she really said that to me, and no, I did not give in to the urge to spit in her face.
February rolls around, and oh joy, Ear Thing pops up again. I spend Friday afternoon in agony, but still finish up my shift, and of course I can't get an appointment over the weekend and the walk-in clinic closes at 7pm on Friday so thanks to my shitty working pattern, I end up going three days without seeing a doctor and without getting more than twenty minutes of sleep at a time.
Monday morning, I call in sick, and get my managers ansaphone. I leave a message explaining that I won't be in, and call the duty manager phone, since we're supposed to make sure we talk to a real person rather than leaving voicemails. Two hours later and I'm getting a bollocking for calling in too early and rining the DMs phone as well as my managers.
I finally get to the doctor, he loads me up with antibiotics and ear drops and pain killers and writes me a note saying I won't be in for the rest of the week. I call my manager to explain this, and she tells me that the House of Gas doesn't accept doctors notes and that a doctor cannot advise me when I'm too sick to go to work. Incidentally, if any of you are studying medicine, you should just drop out of school right now, since apparently you don't need years of training to tell if people are ill, you just need to be a manager at the House of Gas.
In March, it emerges that we are to be honoured with a visit from King Gas Himself. He wants to see how our team is responding to a new billing system. Of course, He will only be present from 9 til 10 that morning, and we don't start til 11.30, so now we have to come in three hours early. It's not all bad though - we don't get to leave three hours early, so instead we get the unearthly delight of finishing at 8pm the day before, then coming to work at 8.30 the following day and working an eleven-and-a-half-hour shift. And for this treat, the call centre manager tells us, we will be paid time-and-a-quarter and given an extra fifteen minute break.
Wednesday dawns, and 8.30 finds us all at our desks, all dressed in bright blue House of Gas slave tunics specially handed out to us for the event, lest King Gas be confused into thinking of us as human beings rather than an anonymous mass of lowly peons who labour for His enrichment.
And King Gas doesn't even come over to us. Not a single one of us is blessed enough to hear a word that utters from His holy mouth. And for added glory, we don't get our extra fifteen minute break. When we challenge our call centre manager on this, she tells us dismissively that we will "get it next time". I don't know when "next time" is. Perhaps it is when King Gas will descend from on high and sweep us away in the Rapture, possibly sporting a new set of colour-co-ordinated manacles to go with our slave tunics. I can but dream.
Last Monday, our team has a supposedly-daily performance review, our first one in weeks. Our manager asks how we coped while she was on holiday for two days. A particularly slow-witted and rancid hag takes the opportunity to lambaste me, in front of our manager and the rest of the team, because I had the audacity to ask her to get the details of a newly-installed meter before she passed it to me to update said installation. The sheer nerve of me, asking her to tell me what it was the customer needed updating before I updated it!
And my manager says nothing. My team say nothing. I am alone with the shame of having asked someone to do her fucking job instead of doing it for her and perhaps wiping her arse at the same time.
So yes, I quit. Fuck you, 8pm finish. From now on, when 8pm rolls around, I'll already be at home watching Supernatural reruns or writing a script for a second Constantine movie.
Fuck you, shitty advocate. Enjoy your three-day weekend while you can, because someone is going to have to take my place.
Fuck you, predicted-to-be-busy Fridays. I hope the call queues stretch for hours and every customer who gets through spends twenty minutes bitching about the wait time. I'll be on my holidays that I selfishly booked over a year in advance.
Fuck you, managers-who-apparently-are-better-than-doctors. I will never again plague you by phoning in too early or ringing another number in order to comply with our sickness reporting policy. You will be so relieved to be rid of me and my moronic assumption that a trained health care professional knows more about what's wrong with my body than you do.
Fuck you, King Gas. Keep your fucking time-and-a-quarter and your shitty slave tunic. You can build the Great Pyramids of Gas without my help, you twat.
Fuck you, call centre manager. When the Rapture comes, I'll be taking my fifteen minute break on another fucking continent.
Fuck you, rancid hag. You will never again need to take a customers meter details, because there'll be nobody there to update them for you.
Fuck you all, House of Gas. I hope you fall into the fucking sea.