Ranty McRantersons
Jul. 15th, 2009 11:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
grrgoylThe only things I have to talk about this week are Ranty McRantersons that no one cares about, so I'll be nice and cut.
The trouble really started a few weekends ago on a Sunday. My day job (medical transcription) had put out the distress signal: "Massive backlogs! Help needed! Overtime for all!" Great! They've really been clamping down on the OT lately so these opportunities are few and far between. And I would have been all over this one had they found a better way to notify us than through the company email, which I don't check until I log on to start my regular shift. On Sundays that's 8 pm to midnight, so by the time I read it it was too late.
I was a little pissed to miss this rare chance at extra money. I've tried twice now to configure my work email to route to my regular email, but it's IMAP (whatever that means) and apparently impossible without administrative permission -- which they won't give, for security reasons. This seems stupid to me -- if I could get my work email at my regular address, I'd get the notification on my phone and I'd be able to jump in right away. Usually in my off hours I don't even turn my computer on because I'm so sick of staring at it during work. I'm not about to spend my free time compulsively refreshing my work mail page on the off chance they might offer OT.
The guy in Technical Support agreed with me, he didn't check his work mail either until he actually started working, but there was nothing to be done. I emailed my supervisor about it, reminding her about some new program they had instituted fairly recently -- an Impact Center, that was supposed to monitor our schedules and make calls if someone wasn't working who should be. Also they were supposed to make calls to ask for help when needed, sort of like that Sunday. The response came that "The Impact Center no longer makes outbound calls." Huh. Well what the hell are we paying them for? It remains a mystery, and emails asking for more OT help continue to be missed by me (and probably many others).
Then, the last week in June an email was sent out suggesting we put in some extra hours at the beginning of the week when we're busy, and take them off the July 4th holiday weekend when work traditionally tapers off. Brilliant! Why hadn't this ever been offered before? Because I hate spending holidays working when the reports are just trickling in, and I'm not making any money but have to keep sitting there anyway. So I eagerly put in an extra hour Tuesday and Wednesday evening.
The following week I received an email from my supervisor asking why I had worked OT on Wednesday without approval? I was confused. I mentioned the holiday switcheroo offer. She responded somewhat angrily that "anything over 8 hours in California is overtime. We've made it very clear that overtime wasn't approved. If it happens again you will be sent a warning letter."
Now I was REALLY confused. Was I considered a California employee? The company is based in California, but I pay taxes in Colorado? If I was considered a California employee, it would be nice to know after years of laboring under the impression that I wasn't. I said as much back to her. After a much longer interval, she finally wrote back, "Sorry, my mistake." Wow, thanks for the heartfelt apology. "But you did work an hour of overtime for the previous pay period. Don't let it happen again."
That was true. The pay periods run the 1st through the 15th, then the 16th through the end of the month. One of my switcheroo hours was worked on June 30th and then taken off the July 4th weekend, the following pay period. That was my mistake. But I really didn't appreciate her coming at me with both barrels blazing, as if this was a chronic problem and they were at their wit's end what to do with me. To my knowledge it was the first time I'd done it, and I'd only done it because they had sent out the email that day so I didn't think and assumed they wanted us to act immediately.
Plus I only have one day off a week as it is. It isn't like I'm clamoring to fill my free time with still MORE work. I do it more to be a good little team player than as a way to early retirement.
Because "overtime." Let's ponder that word in the context of my job. It's not the lucrative, "honey, get dressed, tonight I'm taking you to the GOOD steakhouse" pot o' gold that it might be for other lines of work. Overtime in my job means usually an extra $8 in my check. Hardly enough to bankrupt the company and hardly enough to drag the warning letters out of the filing cabinet. True, might add up if EVERYONE got it. But, as previously stated, this was an isolated incident and an honest mistake. Let's start from the assumption that I'm NOT deliberately trying to stick it to the company for that sweet $8 layer of icing on my check.
But I still like this job and don't much want to look for another, so I smiled and played nice and apologized and promised to be more careful. What else can I do?
This situation is a little less black and white, and I'm kind of interested in people's opinions.
Tery and I just celebrated our 17th anniversary (and her 46th birthday). She didn't want to do anything fancy, but I found an online coupon for TGIFriday's for a buy one get one entree. I thought we could swing that for such a special occasion (plus I had that extra $8 coming, don't forget).
We were served by a friendly, exuberant young guy, Scott. Scott knew all the entrees and could recommend anything. He was funny, personable, a really nice guy. We placed our orders: I wanted the Sizzling Cheesy Chicken and Tery wanted a shrimp dish. No problem.
After a few apologies about a back-up in the kitchen, our food arrived. Except it wasn't what I ordered. Well, it WAS, except with a side of shrimp that I didn't want. Scott seemed flustered, but promised the manager would come out and chat with us and work out a deal. Tery happily scooped the extraneous shellfish onto her plate and we thought that was the end of it.
Then we overheard what was going on at the table behind us, and Tery figured out I had gotten that guy's order by mistake. Oops. But it was far too late. We couldn't exactly put the shrimp back onto the plate and try to reconstruct it back to the original. That guy would have to wait a bit longer, and again Scott was apologetic and a visit from the manager was promised.
The manager DID come over to their table, offering a free appetizer, a free dessert, whatever he wanted to make him happy. We never heard another word about it. Until we got the bill, where they charged us for the incorrect (and more expensive) order and discounted Tery's as the cheaper one. Tery, ever the avoider of confrontation, wanted to drop it and leave, which makes me wonder why she goes anywhere with me because I just couldn't.
I asked Scott, "So, what ever happened to the manager making us a deal?" He got this look of terrified misery on his face, and it seemed pretty obvious he was desperately hoping the full magnitude of his error wouldn't be realized by his boss. He sort of weakly suggested maybe he could get us a free dessert or something, but his heart wasn't really in it. I was disgusted and Tery just wanted to get far away from there.
The difference was only $3, less than half of my sweet bonus, but as with everything the principle bothered me. It would have been so easy to fix it to make me happy: just off the top of my head, only charge me for what I ordered. Or reverse the coupon, charge me for Tery's dish and comp the wrong one. Or, as originally implied, a free dessert, something small and simple, a token but it would still go a long way. Promising me a visit from the manager and then avoiding me in hopes that I'll just forget and then making me pay for your mistake ISN'T a good option.
It would have been much less complicated had we just sent it back. But I think the train seriously derailed when the screw-up involved two tables instead of just one. And I don't think we should have been the casualty of that. But Scott was a nice guy and I certainly didn't want him to lose his job over it, so we just left (after leaving a 22% tip at Tery's insistence, even though I believe tips should be earned, not given automatically).
I couldn't drop it. It was building Tery's stress level to bitch in the car on the way home, so I let it go until the next day, when I went to their website and rationally explained what happened and why I was unhappy. To my surprise, two hours later I got a phone call from the day manager, who was all kinds of apologetic, who agreed absolutely that it was unacceptable and unfair that the other table should be so accommodated while we were ignored. He took my address and promised to mail me coupons to cover the cost of our entire meal (I would have been happy with just a free dessert, and told him so but he wouldn't hear of it).
Then another hour later I received an email from them, again apologizing, saying they had passed my comments on to their management team in hopes of improving service in the future. And please accept the "enclosed" as a sign of their desire to make things right and earn my loyalty back as a customer. Now THAT'S what I'm talking about!
Except....there was nothing enclosed. No attachments, no nothing. And herein lies my dilemma:
[Poll #1430476]
I'm inclined towards the last one, because it is still the principle and I feel I've made my point, but a free meal would be kind of nice. What do you all think?
Enough of that. I challenge anyone to look at this photo and stay in a bad mood:
Lilly, an extremely affectionate (and happy) Maltese puppy
The trouble really started a few weekends ago on a Sunday. My day job (medical transcription) had put out the distress signal: "Massive backlogs! Help needed! Overtime for all!" Great! They've really been clamping down on the OT lately so these opportunities are few and far between. And I would have been all over this one had they found a better way to notify us than through the company email, which I don't check until I log on to start my regular shift. On Sundays that's 8 pm to midnight, so by the time I read it it was too late.
I was a little pissed to miss this rare chance at extra money. I've tried twice now to configure my work email to route to my regular email, but it's IMAP (whatever that means) and apparently impossible without administrative permission -- which they won't give, for security reasons. This seems stupid to me -- if I could get my work email at my regular address, I'd get the notification on my phone and I'd be able to jump in right away. Usually in my off hours I don't even turn my computer on because I'm so sick of staring at it during work. I'm not about to spend my free time compulsively refreshing my work mail page on the off chance they might offer OT.
The guy in Technical Support agreed with me, he didn't check his work mail either until he actually started working, but there was nothing to be done. I emailed my supervisor about it, reminding her about some new program they had instituted fairly recently -- an Impact Center, that was supposed to monitor our schedules and make calls if someone wasn't working who should be. Also they were supposed to make calls to ask for help when needed, sort of like that Sunday. The response came that "The Impact Center no longer makes outbound calls." Huh. Well what the hell are we paying them for? It remains a mystery, and emails asking for more OT help continue to be missed by me (and probably many others).
Then, the last week in June an email was sent out suggesting we put in some extra hours at the beginning of the week when we're busy, and take them off the July 4th holiday weekend when work traditionally tapers off. Brilliant! Why hadn't this ever been offered before? Because I hate spending holidays working when the reports are just trickling in, and I'm not making any money but have to keep sitting there anyway. So I eagerly put in an extra hour Tuesday and Wednesday evening.
The following week I received an email from my supervisor asking why I had worked OT on Wednesday without approval? I was confused. I mentioned the holiday switcheroo offer. She responded somewhat angrily that "anything over 8 hours in California is overtime. We've made it very clear that overtime wasn't approved. If it happens again you will be sent a warning letter."
Now I was REALLY confused. Was I considered a California employee? The company is based in California, but I pay taxes in Colorado? If I was considered a California employee, it would be nice to know after years of laboring under the impression that I wasn't. I said as much back to her. After a much longer interval, she finally wrote back, "Sorry, my mistake." Wow, thanks for the heartfelt apology. "But you did work an hour of overtime for the previous pay period. Don't let it happen again."
That was true. The pay periods run the 1st through the 15th, then the 16th through the end of the month. One of my switcheroo hours was worked on June 30th and then taken off the July 4th weekend, the following pay period. That was my mistake. But I really didn't appreciate her coming at me with both barrels blazing, as if this was a chronic problem and they were at their wit's end what to do with me. To my knowledge it was the first time I'd done it, and I'd only done it because they had sent out the email that day so I didn't think and assumed they wanted us to act immediately.
Plus I only have one day off a week as it is. It isn't like I'm clamoring to fill my free time with still MORE work. I do it more to be a good little team player than as a way to early retirement.
Because "overtime." Let's ponder that word in the context of my job. It's not the lucrative, "honey, get dressed, tonight I'm taking you to the GOOD steakhouse" pot o' gold that it might be for other lines of work. Overtime in my job means usually an extra $8 in my check. Hardly enough to bankrupt the company and hardly enough to drag the warning letters out of the filing cabinet. True, might add up if EVERYONE got it. But, as previously stated, this was an isolated incident and an honest mistake. Let's start from the assumption that I'm NOT deliberately trying to stick it to the company for that sweet $8 layer of icing on my check.
But I still like this job and don't much want to look for another, so I smiled and played nice and apologized and promised to be more careful. What else can I do?
This situation is a little less black and white, and I'm kind of interested in people's opinions.
Tery and I just celebrated our 17th anniversary (and her 46th birthday). She didn't want to do anything fancy, but I found an online coupon for TGIFriday's for a buy one get one entree. I thought we could swing that for such a special occasion (plus I had that extra $8 coming, don't forget).
We were served by a friendly, exuberant young guy, Scott. Scott knew all the entrees and could recommend anything. He was funny, personable, a really nice guy. We placed our orders: I wanted the Sizzling Cheesy Chicken and Tery wanted a shrimp dish. No problem.
After a few apologies about a back-up in the kitchen, our food arrived. Except it wasn't what I ordered. Well, it WAS, except with a side of shrimp that I didn't want. Scott seemed flustered, but promised the manager would come out and chat with us and work out a deal. Tery happily scooped the extraneous shellfish onto her plate and we thought that was the end of it.
Then we overheard what was going on at the table behind us, and Tery figured out I had gotten that guy's order by mistake. Oops. But it was far too late. We couldn't exactly put the shrimp back onto the plate and try to reconstruct it back to the original. That guy would have to wait a bit longer, and again Scott was apologetic and a visit from the manager was promised.
The manager DID come over to their table, offering a free appetizer, a free dessert, whatever he wanted to make him happy. We never heard another word about it. Until we got the bill, where they charged us for the incorrect (and more expensive) order and discounted Tery's as the cheaper one. Tery, ever the avoider of confrontation, wanted to drop it and leave, which makes me wonder why she goes anywhere with me because I just couldn't.
I asked Scott, "So, what ever happened to the manager making us a deal?" He got this look of terrified misery on his face, and it seemed pretty obvious he was desperately hoping the full magnitude of his error wouldn't be realized by his boss. He sort of weakly suggested maybe he could get us a free dessert or something, but his heart wasn't really in it. I was disgusted and Tery just wanted to get far away from there.
The difference was only $3, less than half of my sweet bonus, but as with everything the principle bothered me. It would have been so easy to fix it to make me happy: just off the top of my head, only charge me for what I ordered. Or reverse the coupon, charge me for Tery's dish and comp the wrong one. Or, as originally implied, a free dessert, something small and simple, a token but it would still go a long way. Promising me a visit from the manager and then avoiding me in hopes that I'll just forget and then making me pay for your mistake ISN'T a good option.
It would have been much less complicated had we just sent it back. But I think the train seriously derailed when the screw-up involved two tables instead of just one. And I don't think we should have been the casualty of that. But Scott was a nice guy and I certainly didn't want him to lose his job over it, so we just left (after leaving a 22% tip at Tery's insistence, even though I believe tips should be earned, not given automatically).
I couldn't drop it. It was building Tery's stress level to bitch in the car on the way home, so I let it go until the next day, when I went to their website and rationally explained what happened and why I was unhappy. To my surprise, two hours later I got a phone call from the day manager, who was all kinds of apologetic, who agreed absolutely that it was unacceptable and unfair that the other table should be so accommodated while we were ignored. He took my address and promised to mail me coupons to cover the cost of our entire meal (I would have been happy with just a free dessert, and told him so but he wouldn't hear of it).
Then another hour later I received an email from them, again apologizing, saying they had passed my comments on to their management team in hopes of improving service in the future. And please accept the "enclosed" as a sign of their desire to make things right and earn my loyalty back as a customer. Now THAT'S what I'm talking about!
Except....there was nothing enclosed. No attachments, no nothing. And herein lies my dilemma:
[Poll #1430476]
I'm inclined towards the last one, because it is still the principle and I feel I've made my point, but a free meal would be kind of nice. What do you all think?
Enough of that. I challenge anyone to look at this photo and stay in a bad mood:
Lilly, an extremely affectionate (and happy) Maltese puppy
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
first?
Date: 2009-07-16 11:10 am (UTC)awayout.Do you find it as funny as I do that your company pays somebody to keep track of the overtime you shouldn't be working? Probably not.
First! For the first time in a long while
Date: 2009-07-16 05:36 pm (UTC)HA. Office Space. I love that movie. I hope someday you don't go off the deep end and set fire to an Awesome Blossom.
I like what you did, tying this conversation in with our earlier.
I do find it funny. In a bitterly ironic sort of way.
I wouldn't want to be predictable. Next time I'll be 6th-just, um, don't predict that.
Date: 2009-07-17 01:55 am (UTC)Oh, but think how flashy that would look! Anyway I'd be more likely to steal the office stapler and beat it up with a baseball bat (to the tune of some hardcore rap).
ETA: When, exactly, did they drop the first "e" in "judgement"?
Re: I wouldn't want to be predictable. Next time I'll be 6th-just, um, don't predict that.
Date: 2009-07-23 06:02 pm (UTC)As far as I know it was never there. One of those wonky original British spellings. But just to fuck with you, there's one in "acknowledgement." My favorite part of "The People's Court" (the TV show) is the disclaimer over the credits, where judgment is spelled properly at the beginning and wrong at the end.
no subject
Date: 2009-07-16 03:08 pm (UTC)Scott's mistake actually wasn't that big and he must fuck up a lot if he was that terrified of getting the manager involved. Mistakes like that happened nightly to one server or the other when I was at the Roadhouse. Shoot, at the very least he should have told the manager you were being charged for the wrong item.
no subject
Date: 2009-07-16 06:11 pm (UTC)Tery was a bartender for about 15 years, so we always tip very well regardless of the service.
no subject
Date: 2009-07-17 03:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-07-17 08:40 am (UTC)The waiter was very apologetic and British about it and they took it off the bill and gave me a free drink to match the one I already had (which was a mega-huge deluxe cocktail) and I wasn't able to finish it before my friends had to leave so I was by myself finishing this drink and the waiter was cheering me on and it was fun.
I guess TGIF can fail all over the world.
Also, congrats on 17 years!
no subject
Date: 2009-07-23 06:06 pm (UTC)Thanks :) We're pretty astonished.