Ben Gardner
Winger
Call centres are awful places to work. They even monitor to the second how long you spend having a dump and the line managers are pretty much forced to pull you up on taking longer than a few minutes on any given day. They try to remove any inkling of autonomy you might think you have and treat you like your incapable of any ability to think for yourself. It's f***ing soul destroying, I could never blame the line managers for it as they are the same, being forced to act upon certain discretions because of policies and the like they have to follow themselves as well.
Best thing I ever did was leave that all behind and become a nurse, it's a far far tougher job and we all feel underpaid for what we do but the ability to work autonomously, thinking for yourself and not worrying that your shit took 30 seconds longer than the 10 minutes allowed is so much better than working in those places.
Good for you, @Smiler , I mean that.
And yeah, I'd forgotten about being pulled up for spending a minute too long in the week in the lav.
When I was at BT 192, you had to keep average calls down to 24 seconds (or similar).
Woe betide you, if your average crept over 25 seconds through genuinely helping people. ONE F***ING SECOND!
At the same place, I got away with asking this pig-ignorant posh old cow if the veterinary surgeon she wanted (that wasn't listed) might have been for her.
The middle managers there, seriously. Instead of walking between their desk and the printer, they'd RUN as if their lives depended on it.
All they did was try and give the impression that they had the busiest job in the world, organising rotas and making f***ing pie charts.
Oh, and as for their incentives ... SPIN THE WHEEL anyone?!?
I can concur with Barclays managers on power trips, they were absolutely horrendous when I was there and each manager got worse than the last. I worked there from 2004 to 2016, the job in the last couple of years was easier and better than ever, but it was the nepotism and the corruption I could not take anymore, I just walked out one day, one of best decisions ever.
From what I remember, Barclays opened as a small office in 2001ish at Doxy park, then all of a sudden exploded about 2002/3 to two buildings and over 1000 staff. Some of the admin lasses in the small office of like 30, ended up getting manager jobs as they expanded very quickly. A good few of these managers were from Houghton, over the next 5 years or so they just all hired their mates who they went socialising with (one of the ones from Houghton was sound, rest were inadequate in man management).
Before I left I remember a 26 year old lass getting given a job as a team leader because she licked arse and went on holidays etc with top boss as she went through a divorce. This lass was absolutely awful, upset everyone and genuinely thought she was better than others because she was a manager. I could not witness her speak to 50 odd year old mothers/fathers like shit, the hierachy was all wrong. Once I walked out I told them all what a bunch of idiots they were and they soon blocked me on facebook, but I have no regrets
As bad as Barclays is and was, it can always be somehow worse which I found out a few years later in another job.
I was there just as the Bob Diamond thing exploded up in their face.
Senior managers were SHITTING themselves waiting for the FSA to walk in!
This paranoia was passed on to the middle managers.
BT- 192 - was fun as my first graft, shit place to work and got rumbled in the queue for tickets for first game at SoL on my lunch break (3 hours)… left soon after.
Fusion - May be the most soul destroying place I ever worked. Great group of colleagues but job sucked arse. Managed not to get fired for calling a customer a Cocksucker on a recorded line (to this day I don’t know how my managers saved my arse)… Still had to get out before I topped myself (came real close).
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