A good friend of mine has become ‘involved’ with the job centre (because any other word gives the impression that she would like to spend time there). Like many of my other friends, and myself, who have had to throw themselves upon the bosom of a faceless bureaucracy, I hated every single moment of the experience, and want to stop from other people from making the same mistakes I did.
Because I have now got rid of almost every facet of my experience (apart from a dry mouth whenever I pass the place and a deep-seated fear of brown Revenue and Customs envelopes) , I have decided to put up a friendly, cut out and keep notice of what to expect for newbies to that particular circle of hell.
The only reason my local job centre did not have a queue outside of it, was because it was A PIT OF DESPAIR!!!
So, without much further ado:
1. The Job Centre does not care who you are.
Shut up. The Job Centre does not care if you are young, old, white, an ethnic minority, a drop out, a Graduate, a young mother, coming up to retirement age, a grandparent, or someone who has built up your own business from scratch using only your blood, sweat, tears and the Prince’s Trust (I did actually hear someone who was that last one. She was in tears). Don’t think that you are going to find the place tolerable, the workers human, or have anything useful happen to you while you are in the building. You, the bubbly personality and hard worker that you are, are now a personified National Insurance number.
2. Pay Attention.
That unemployed friend of yours has been bitching for a few weeks now about how much the Job Centre sucks, haven’t they? It’s bad enough hearing their tales of woe about the tables, the rude people and having to ask for the money for the bus ride home, without knowing that you are going to hear about it every. single. week. Maybe if you block them off and instead concentrate on that fine waiter’s arse they will finish soon. After all, it can’t surely be THAT bad…
Take the advice of Mr T; Don’t be a fool. Listen and pay attention, as these stories will give you valuable information when you are handing in your employment information.
Oh, and they are as rude as you heard they were. Expect your name, qualifications and your being to be subject to snarky comments at all times of the day.
3. No-one will remember who you are.
Even if you see the same person, while you are signing on, every two weeks for 3 months, don’t expect to ever remember your name without looking down at your booklet. In truth, this cannot be helped. Speaking as a till lady who could easily serve provide the change for around 100 people in a hour, when you deal with a lot of people, and are saying the same things every time, they become an undistinguishable blur. However, this makes it all the more important for you to remember their names, or at least something noticable about them. You are more likely to win arguments if you state that “That is not what the Belfast sounding/thick glasses/ginger/bald/thin guy told me!”
4. Try to get them on your side.
There will be lots of pointless arguments about traveling abroad for interviews, when you can attend, and what they want you to apply for. I advise to act reasonable. Do not go off the deep end for pointless causes. If you don’t give them a single thing to complain about , then they are more likely to help you win the big battles, such as getting money back.
4. Keep every single bit of paper.
Sign on book. Letters that read like they were spell-checked, translated from Czechoslovakian and have had vital words removed. Copies of anything you have been made to sign. It may look like landfill, but you will have to refer to it at some point.
5. Expect the worst.
It just saves you time, and saves you using up your valuable energy by thinking things are going un-naturally well when you are signing on.
6. The ‘diary thing’
When you start to sign on, you will given a diary. This diary is split into three bits, in which you write down what you did, what this led to, and what you will do next (i.e: went on website, saw interesting looking job, applied for it). My advice? Give too much detail. I’m not talking about a detailed essay on the questions that the company has asked you, but write a note (in different coloured pens every couple of days or so) about what you did, and make it a bit long-winded. All the staff do is look and sign, not read. The more gubbins you write, the less awkward questions will be asked (such as ‘had any interviews yet?’), and the quicker you can go back to skulking in the news agents by the magazines you cannot afford.
Me? Bitter? Nooooo…
Feel free to add any more advice to people here. The more tear stained and angry, the better.
Posted by Localfreak on May 19, 2010 at 5:02 pm
A great, and greatly truthful, post
RE 6: I foud that the best approach to this was to say “Oh, I didn’t have room in the book,” and provided instead a table, pristinely printed that morning, with columns for Job Title, Location of Job, Location Heard of and Response Thus Far. Not only did it generally mindboggle the gnome on the other side of the desk, it meant we didn’t have to talk much, which endears oneself to them. All they have to do is to copy out my sheet onto their computer (it also saved me a GREAT AMOUNT of painful wincing watching someone in a position of minor authority over me type with one finger and spell words like ‘Guardian’ and ‘Magazine’ wrong.