So......First day at the key store.....
I walk in and the manager says, "I'm going for a coffee. I'll be back in a little while."
Uh...Ok. So I hang up my jacket and pray that no customers come in. Fortunately, they didn't. Eventually the manager comes back and asks if I had gotten the letters of reference from my empoloyers in nova scotia yet. How would that even have been possible? I got the job friday, this was monday. I tell her no. She seems quite irritated.
2 1/2 hours of filling in forms. I have to sign a paper that says I understand the chemical composition of the lubricant used on the key making machine. I have to sign a paper that says I undestand that Windex should not be taken internally.
Along the way I learn a few interesting pieces of information about the job. We don't get breaks, no matter how long the shift is, except for a 1/2 hour unpaid lunch(if the shift is 8 hours+). If we need to take a break, go to the bathroom or something, the time comes off of that 1/2 hour unpaid lunch. I consider asking if her twenty minute coffee excursion where she left me in charge of the store would be coming off of her lunch, but I think better of it.
I also learn that besides management, all the staff is part time. There are six part timers who each get 10 hours a week. Great. 10 hours a week at $7.75. I'll be making exactly 10% of what my girlfriend makes.
Then the assistant manager shows up, and then things get crazy.
Appearantly the store does a lot of corrporate logos and name tag engraving. So the two of them start working on that in the back room. Some corporate people come in to inspect some nametags or something and they go back and there's a little engraving party in the back and suddenly the place starts filling up with customers.
Customers who want to buy things.
I have no idea how to work the computer. Its not like any POS system I've ever seen. Actually, it looks like they paid a high school student 20 bucks to design it with Microsoft Access. Even if I knew how to use it, I didn't have an employee number, so I couldn't log in anyway. I inform the engraving party that I don't know how to use the cash regester. Or engrave anything. In fact I don't know how to do anything other than not drink the windex. They inform me that corporate logos take precidence and the customers (six of them now) will just have to wait. Indefinitely.
Most of the customers are fuming and I am thinking they will eventually just storm off, but they won't. 30 minutes later they are still standing there. Staring at me.
The engraving party makes its way out to the front. There are now 6 people standing behind the counter and not one of them will help the customers. Then the phone rings and the manager answers it. Its head office. The manager starts fighting with head office about something, getting really upset. The assistant mangaer is trying to explain to the corporate people why their nametags are going to cost $300 more than they had been told originally. The Manager suddenly throws her hands up in the air and storms off, handing me the telephone!
"Uh....hello?"
"Who is this? What's going on? Where's Ellen?"
"Uh...she went away."
"We need to something something the regional something or other right now! What's going on over there?"
I quietly put the phone down on the counter and walk away. Eventually the manager comes back and picks up the phone and finishes the conversation. The corporate people agree to pay the extra 300 dollars even though (unbeknownst to them) Their logo is too complicated for the engraving machine and cannot possibly be done. I later find out that this was known all along, but they wanted the sale so they pretended that it could be done.
Eventually they even serve the customers and the store is empty again. There's still 2 hours left in my shift but they tell me they aren't going to teach me anything else, so I should just stand around for a couple of hours whilest they gossip amongst themselves. As I stand around doing nothing they keep intermittantly asking me if I'll be coming back for my next shift. After they've asked me a half dozen times, finally I ask, "do you normally have a problem with people not coming back after their first day?"
"Yes," they tell me. "we do."
Go figure.
Needless to say, I never went back.
I walk in and the manager says, "I'm going for a coffee. I'll be back in a little while."
Uh...Ok. So I hang up my jacket and pray that no customers come in. Fortunately, they didn't. Eventually the manager comes back and asks if I had gotten the letters of reference from my empoloyers in nova scotia yet. How would that even have been possible? I got the job friday, this was monday. I tell her no. She seems quite irritated.
2 1/2 hours of filling in forms. I have to sign a paper that says I understand the chemical composition of the lubricant used on the key making machine. I have to sign a paper that says I undestand that Windex should not be taken internally.
Along the way I learn a few interesting pieces of information about the job. We don't get breaks, no matter how long the shift is, except for a 1/2 hour unpaid lunch(if the shift is 8 hours+). If we need to take a break, go to the bathroom or something, the time comes off of that 1/2 hour unpaid lunch. I consider asking if her twenty minute coffee excursion where she left me in charge of the store would be coming off of her lunch, but I think better of it.
I also learn that besides management, all the staff is part time. There are six part timers who each get 10 hours a week. Great. 10 hours a week at $7.75. I'll be making exactly 10% of what my girlfriend makes.
Then the assistant manager shows up, and then things get crazy.
Appearantly the store does a lot of corrporate logos and name tag engraving. So the two of them start working on that in the back room. Some corporate people come in to inspect some nametags or something and they go back and there's a little engraving party in the back and suddenly the place starts filling up with customers.
Customers who want to buy things.
I have no idea how to work the computer. Its not like any POS system I've ever seen. Actually, it looks like they paid a high school student 20 bucks to design it with Microsoft Access. Even if I knew how to use it, I didn't have an employee number, so I couldn't log in anyway. I inform the engraving party that I don't know how to use the cash regester. Or engrave anything. In fact I don't know how to do anything other than not drink the windex. They inform me that corporate logos take precidence and the customers (six of them now) will just have to wait. Indefinitely.
Most of the customers are fuming and I am thinking they will eventually just storm off, but they won't. 30 minutes later they are still standing there. Staring at me.
The engraving party makes its way out to the front. There are now 6 people standing behind the counter and not one of them will help the customers. Then the phone rings and the manager answers it. Its head office. The manager starts fighting with head office about something, getting really upset. The assistant mangaer is trying to explain to the corporate people why their nametags are going to cost $300 more than they had been told originally. The Manager suddenly throws her hands up in the air and storms off, handing me the telephone!
"Uh....hello?"
"Who is this? What's going on? Where's Ellen?"
"Uh...she went away."
"We need to something something the regional something or other right now! What's going on over there?"
I quietly put the phone down on the counter and walk away. Eventually the manager comes back and picks up the phone and finishes the conversation. The corporate people agree to pay the extra 300 dollars even though (unbeknownst to them) Their logo is too complicated for the engraving machine and cannot possibly be done. I later find out that this was known all along, but they wanted the sale so they pretended that it could be done.
Eventually they even serve the customers and the store is empty again. There's still 2 hours left in my shift but they tell me they aren't going to teach me anything else, so I should just stand around for a couple of hours whilest they gossip amongst themselves. As I stand around doing nothing they keep intermittantly asking me if I'll be coming back for my next shift. After they've asked me a half dozen times, finally I ask, "do you normally have a problem with people not coming back after their first day?"
"Yes," they tell me. "we do."
Go figure.
Needless to say, I never went back.
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If you use European spellings in canada are you considered snooty?