signing on

Farewell job centre

~ drjfernihough ~ Leave a comment

I recently received a charming letter from the lovely people at the department of works and pensions. You can tell its from them as soon as something that looks like brown toilet paper lands on your doorstep. It’s that or her majesty’s revenue and customs requesting money for tax and I haven’t made any money yet to pay tax on, so the job centre it is. In this lovely letter they pointed out that I could only claim job seekers allowance for 182 days and I had at that point in time already claimed for 160 days. Can’t fault their maths. Apparently many people do, though, as the remaining 2 sheets of A4 paper were dedicated to a lengthy explanation of how I could appeal this “decision”. In short though, my next appointment at the job centre would be my last.

I did briefly flirt with the online system that lets you know if there are other benefits you can claim for, however, I am fortunate enough to co-own my own home so that  rules me out of any benefits. I am curious to know how owning bricks and mortar automatically provides you with an income though. Could I turn the house into a B&B for small residents? Can I start charging my children for breakfast extras like golden syrup on Shreddies? Where do they get their income from? Without questioning this infallible logic though, I turned up to my last appointment, and jauntily made my way to sign on. With the familiar smell of the carpet on the way up the stairs, and the unfamiliar smell of the man coming down, I finally reached my final destination on level 2 right on time. Left with the usual 10 minutes to kill, I noticed that of the 10 manned desks, only 4 had anyone signing on, whilst there was quite a queue forming. Reluctantly my last unnamed female dragged herself away from her essential chatting to get me to sign the little electronic pad.

That’s it, I’m done. No more £72.10 a week and high quality advice in return for the blood, sweat and tears of job seeking effort.

However, after I had scrawled my name, she handed me my next appointment, following the normal ritual of not checking whether this is any way convenient at all. I politely asked  if she thought there was any point in me attending this next appointment given the delightful letter I had recently received? At this point UF let me know the delightful news that I could indeed keep attending, with the same commitment from me to find a job, the same process, and the same expectations of me from the job centre. In return I would get no money. However, I would continue to be considered as making Class 1 National Insurance (NI) contributions.

Anyone who does not understand Class 1 NI contributions is a) breathing and b) statistically higly likely to be working in a job centre. Just for kicks, I asked the UF what value the Class 1 NI contributions had? For example, if I were foolish enough to refuse their generous offer, how much would I have to “contribute” financially, myself to be eligible for the delightful process of applying for JSA again in the future? This is where UF reached for Google. I’m not even going to start. I’m sighing as I type.

Oh sod it, I am going to start. You’ve poured yourself a coffee before sitting down to read this, right? If you are employed to do a job, as in provide advice based on a knowledge set not widely held by “the crowd” then how does this situation ever arise? If you can be replaced by an electronic stylus and Google, then organisations should do exactly that. It would be cheaper surely?  How am I sat on the unemployed side of the desk, being “helped” in my career advice by an an Amstrad computer from the 90’s and a search engine? The ergonomic mouse that looks like an iron and the bent keyboard that could summit mount Everest if it was only a couple of inches higher must have cost more than the rest of the IT hardware on the desk combined. Without the human at the desk you wouldn’t have the repetitive strain injury of clicking “I feel lucky” in Google and the costs of signing me on and answering my questions would have been reduced 100 fold at least. I could still use the electronic pen to write my name and for any questions I might have, I could read a hand written sign, on a sheet of poor quality, recycled paper just like those in the stairwell, that says “Google it”.

Rant over. After much clicking, confused facial expressions and at one point a frankly defeatist attitude to the whole process when she thought she couldn’t find the data I needed, the following information was gleaned:

If I apply for JSA again, I can’t apply before the first Sunday of next January 2016. At that point in time, my Class 1 NI contributions for the two tax years  2013-2014 and 2014-2015 will be reviewed. If I have earned, more than 50 times the minimum weekly earnings limit I can successfully claim JSA. “Whats the minimum weekly earnings limit?” I hear you cry. Well, I did ask, but obviously UF had to go back and google for that (&^*%&^O*^%!!!!!!!!) and could only find the numbers for 2012. I didn’t start. Apparently “it doesn’t go up much each year”, £107 was the magic answer.

Right now I’m having a tiny panic. Is this Class 1 NI contributions or income I have to have paid? There’s no way I can calculate Class 1 NI on any of my previous 24 years income, no-one can. If it’s income, over what time frame do I have to have earned £5,350? UF female stepped into my thoughts and informed me that if I earned “say” £6,000 (I suspect UF can’t multiply 107 x 5) between April 2013 and April 2015, I could claim JSA again next January if necessary.

Be still my beating heart……

Whilst maintaining my best smile, I politely declined her generous offer of my next appointment. I did point out that whilst the quality of the support I had received in my job hunting wasn’t quite worth the two hours driving and parking time, without the financial incentive as well, I really didn’t see that it was in my best interests to attend any more. UF couldn’t cancel my appointment though, she’s not qualified/trained/able to do that, I have to phone someone else and do that myself.

*sigh*

It is MUCH better to be STUPID and unemployed/disabled

~ drjfernihough ~ Leave a comment

This week has been a bitty one to be honest. One sensory review of my smallest ADHD son, coupled with the ever increasing joy of signing on and parenting classes. Let’s start with the post though, and a refusal to renew the Disability Living Allowance for our eldest son who was born with bilateral cataracts and CMV infection. He only uses one eye, so has no 3D vision and what vision he has is low contrast, with poor visual acuity. His CMV infection has left him with a strange way of viewing the world. I spent half an hour with him recently trying to answer the question, “Mimi, what would happen if you’re stuck in a queue of traffic that’s not moving and as a result of an emergency you had to go backwards?” No amount of “you can’t drive backwards over the car behind you” was an acceptable response apparently. As his parents, we spend a significant amount of time helping him to make himself understood, adjusting his environment to remove visual hazards or helping him navigate his environment when it can’t be changed and making sure his glasses are clean and in front of his eyes, not half way down his face. As a result, he doesn’t manage too badly. This is particularly true when he doesn’t actually go anywhere new very often because we’re too exhausted or broke to go anywhere new with him. Therefore, he lives in a familiar, (visually speaking), world and he is bright enough to compensate for poor vision by using his brain. This requires a huge amount of effort for him, so comes at a cost to his ability to process mental challenges simultaneously. However, he’s smart, and at the age of 10, when nothing he does at school taxes his brain hugely, he manages this pretty well too. So, when he’s assessed for his level of disability he doesn’t rate as “vegetable” and is therefore not in need of significantly more care than his peers. If you’ve already invested significantly more care on your disabled son, you will reach a point where objective analysis deprives you of the means to continue providing that support. If you’re too stupid to do anything imaginative and constructive to help your son’s mental development and your son isn’t smart enough to compensate for his visual challenges by using his brain, you can receive £70 a week to spend in Lidl to feed your baby peperami (later my dear reader, bear with me). Instead, the benefits bill is clearly being cut significantly by removing entitlement from all the smart disabled people who have found their own alternative strategies intelligently and independently.

Which brings me on to my smallest son, currently (at least) in receipt of disability living allowance for ADHD with oppositional defiance disorder (ODD). The school staff, and us as his parents, are still at a loss to identify some of the triggers that cause spontaneous combustion of smallest son. These outbursts are violent and troubling for everyone involved, so solving this issue would be handy. Suggestion has been made that they may be sensory in origin so this week we went off to have a sensory assessment. As an aside until I had actually parked the car and already committed myself to a £3 fee, and gone through to the reception desk, I did not actually know what on earth the appointment was for. A full page letter received week ago, scattered with barcodes, snowflake codes, hospital number, an NHS number and lengthy text about parking and missed appointments said nothing about what the appointment itself was actually about. It could have been bed wetting. However, as the waiting list for this is so long, Connor has worked with the Rodger bedwetting system and/or grown out of this long before the referral has come through. I called over a week ago to try and find out why we needed a paediatric occupational therapist in our lives, and spoke to an answering machine. My voicemail was later called back, but no information left. When I rang up on the day, the reason for this lack of information became clear as there was no record of anyone making the referral at all. Instead they asked if my smallest son “had issues” to try and ascertain just which ones were being addressed that day. I resisted the urge to refer the paediatric occupational therapy department to my earlier post and promised to turn up at the prescribed time and place.

So, a sensory assessment is clearly an exciting thing for a bright 7 year old to do. Balancing, jumping, socks on and off, counting to 10 with your eyes closed whilst simultaneously doing things with opposable thumbs, it’s a riot. When he discovers that the “aim” of the game is to score 3 rather than 1 for each task, it becomes an Olympic sport. This level of activity, focused on getting an ever higher score appeals so much, that all thoughts of chewing pencils, defying orders or having a mega strop are long forgotten. End result, we have a kid with strong preferences (all school food is disgusting) and extremely high activity levels, but no dominating sensory issues. His level of ability means that all available strategies, like close fitted, stretchy, “huggy” shirts will be less than useless.

Note to self, stop carrying huggy shirt to and from school each day in the hopes that one day smallest son will think it is a good idea to wear this.

I did ask briefly if they thought if they thought that the child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) would be able to help, but this was not only outside their area of expertise but also pretty unlikely by the looks of the facial expression I got back during the polite silence. The parenting classes I’m doing are the gateway for access to CAMHS which now inspires me even less……….

On the topic of parenting classes, my dear reader, what can I tell you? Nothing I’m afraid, I am forbidden by confidentiality to blog on this topic. So instead I will delight you with information on the geographic area immediately surrounding the location of the classes: specifically, the city’s brand new Lidl. Now we’ve had a Waitrose in town for as long as people have been rubbing two sticks together and using them to eat sushi. A Lidl is a very new addition and a long way away from the centre of town/Waitrose/the library. As I needed to get some ingredients for supper after the parenting classes I thought I’d go in and see what the fuss is all about. It was also lunchtime so I thought I’d pick up a sandwich. Once I’d walked past the opening aisles (plural) of biscuit based carbohydrate, I was relieved to hear another couple ask someone for the location of ready-made sandwiches. They were shown to the location of the deep fill BLT and cheese ploughman sandwiches. That’s it, that’s the whole range. The couple decided they weren’t interested. As you can see from the image below this was a wise decision, with hindsight. However, it turns out this was not a decision made for themselves, oh no, it was made for their son in arms, probably no more than a year old. Before I had time to think “thankfully at least one couple in this neighbourhood knows how to bring their kid up moderately well after all” the father turned to the mother and said, “oh well, let’s go and get him a pepperami then”. *sigh*

unnamed

Back home I quickly fill out the online form to prove I’m looking for work. This is dutifully ignored the next day as I sign on. I ask if the job centre has any support from/access to companies that can sponsor me to get security clearance in order to be eligible for MOD contracts. At the immediately blank faced response, I pointed out that the online information makes it clear that I cannot apply myself; I need a sponsor and that personal contacts have told me that there is a six months backlog in people waiting for clearance and hence a lot of jobs available. The blank face continues to be blank. I knew this was a waste of time, it’s just too much fun not to try. “Have you tried the .gov web page to find a list of companies?” I tried to explain (again) that I know there’s a list of companies that can do the sponsoring, I wanted to know if the job centre could actually put me in touch with one of them. My question has been noted (on a post-it) for the advisor at my next appointment to help me with. We spend the rest of the 10 minutes appointment discussing my adviser’s month long holiday in Thailand he’s going on soon. I can’t wait to sign with “a member of the manager’s team” next time. Be still my beating heart.

I did get to engage my brain cells briefly at a professor’s book launch at Bath University, on the topic of manufacturing in the UK. I was able to discuss starting our own companies with a fabulously smart MBA colleague and friend and ask a former member of the government how to improve gender equality in technical industries. None of us could identify the content of the canapes, but the future of “making” in the UK looks safer than I had previously thought.

So what did I learn this week? Parenting classes, signing on, getting access to DLA and probably many other state derived support mechanisms are all much easier to access if you have done nothing intelligent to help yourself first. This seems wrong. Granted, I’ve watched parents (years ago) frustrated with their toddler’s aggression towards an older brother, who did not realise the hypocrisy of smacking him to tell him so. These parents may, therefore, be too stupid to help themselves and need state intervention. There’s a strong argument for the state being there to help those who cannot help themselves. Should the reverse logic be equally true, that those who can help themselves don’t get support when they need it? The quality of the state intervention leaves so much to be desired in this situation. The job centre may be the best oxymoron ever and the health service may be beyond repair. I certainly can’t fix either one myself, the worrying thing is that I haven’t seen much evidence that the people inside the government can either.

Vodafone- I’m loyal, not masochistic

~ drjfernihough ~ Leave a comment

As a bona fide geek, I joined the line of people waiting for the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge phone last month, and when I saw its metallic beauty in the shops at last, I called Vodafone customer services (191) from my decrepit elderly iPhone in order to upgrade. I’m calling this day, April 14th, Tuesday, Day 0. After pointing out to the Vodafone man at the end of the phone that their packages were more expensive than all other providers put together and I could just go to Carphone Warehouse for a much better deal, I was instantly offered a 25% discount. I ummed and aaaed further as the Vodafone signal at our house is on a par with a cup and piece of string, so there’s a lot to be gained from leaving Vodafone. My umming and aaahing got me a further 5% discount, apparently the maximum he could do, bringing the monthly contract bill for the hottest phone in town to £37.80. I had to pay £9 upfront for the “gold” handset, which is actually way more beautiful than it sounds. Excited beyond belief, I got a text on my phone promising next day delivery with DPD.

Day 1, April 15th, Wednesday, I waited in all day for DPD to bring my shiny new plaything. No phone. No additional text suggesting that it will ever be with me.

Day 2, April 16th, Thursday I call Vodafone, which is a fairly tortuous procedure through menu item 1 (problems with your account) followed by menu item 3 (upgrading) to get through to a random person as there isn’t a menu offering that says “hacked off with not having a Galaxy S6 phone here yet? Press 4”. The next thing you need to do is put your phone number into the system as although they can detect the number you’re calling from, this may not be the account you want to talk to them about. This would be a genius bit of process were it not for the fact that the very first question you get asked by every operator after that is “what is your phone number?” Once you’ve put your number in, at top volume the next thing you hear is “GREAT NEWS! The Galaxy S6 is here!” Irony noted, I finally get through to a real someone who tells me that in fact they don’t have any stock yet, and so it is likely to be Friday or Monday that I will receive my phone. I thank him and wait until Monday, when of course, I do not receive my phone. As the delivery slot runs to 6pm and the Vodafone lines are open until 6pm, it is Tuesday before I can call again.

Day 7, April 21st, Tuesday. I go through the whole menu, phone number inputting, “GREAT NEWS!” message and hold music to get through to a helpful man at Vodafone who gives me £10 credit on my account straight away for the inconvenience of not having my new phone yet. I should have been suspicious that this part of their system works well, but I feel quite amused that now Vodafone have paid me £1 for me to wait for my phone. Helpful Vodafone man also has access to a system that tells him that my phone is in the first batch to be delivered next, which will either be Friday or Monday. I begin to suspect that all Vodafone call centre trainees are told that their customers have goldfish like memories and one good weekend out will wipe their minds of calling 191 and listening to John Newman singing “Know I’ve done wrong, Left your heart torn, Is that what devils do? Took you so low, Where only fools go” for 20 minutes on a loop.

Day 11, April 25th Saturday I get a text to say that my parcel is on its way and I can track it with DPD online. Thrilled to the core, I do just that. At 2:51am it was in a ‘hub’ in Birmingham and is on its way to a depot very near me. Monday, it’s got to be Monday, I’m going to get my phone on Monday.

Day 13, April 27th, Monday, I don’t get my phone. By the time I realise I am definitely not getting my phone today, it is too late to call Vodafone.

Day 14, April 28th, Tuesday. I have to go out first thing for the thrill that is parenting classes and when I return home, my heart sinks to see the little red sheet of paper on the floor of my hall. DPD are “sorry to have missed me”. I am invited to track my parcel online where I can also change my delivery date. Online, my parcel is still “on its way to the nearest depot” and there is no option to change or do anything about that. Then I remind myself – DPD are not in the delivery business. Bear with me, because I’m sure you’re thinking they have white vans, surely one of the D’s in their name must stand for delivery? No. The only thing DPD deliver are little notes to say “sorry we missed you”. The numbers on these do not correspond to your package, so they can try multiple times and all you will get are more little numbers.  DPD’s business model is to get you to call them. They do not have a freephone number, but they do have long hold music and cheery people who try to talk to you for ages. They have to do this to a certain extent, because they are also trying to search through their systems to match up a random number generator (the card through your door) with one box in a million in a depot somewhere. Once they’ve tried to do this for me, and failed, they ask me if I am expecting more than one parcel. If so, I need to call the sender and ask them where it is. I point out that if I was expecting a second parcel, I would have tried the tracking number for that parcel, and got a different message online, so clearly I am not. So who exactly should I call about a parcel that I am not expecting? I give up with DPD and call Vodafone. “GREAT NEWS!”……. they suggest I call DPD as they have no information on my parcel other than “it’s on its way”.

Day 15, April 29th, Wednesday. I spend 3 hours dialling 191 10 times, yes, ten times. “Now I’m rising from the ground, Rising up to you, Filled with all the strength I found, There’s nothing I can’t do. I told you once I can’t do this again, do this again, oh no” – John Newman’s ‘Love me Again’ hold music was an apt, if not slightly repetitive, anthem for my afternoon with Vodafone. Part of the 3 hours was spent on hold because I had initially joined their queuing system 3 times and waited for them to call me back. However, even though I was sat in my office less than 2m away from a Vodafone “Sure Signal” box, all I got were voicemail messages saying that Vodafone had tried to call me. I did get through to someone once, they put me on hold to look at the system and half an hour later I was literally losing the will to live and wanted lunch. As there’s no chance of getting a signal outside my office, I hung up and Chose Life. The last person I got through to after another half an hour on hold told me that there was nothing she could to help, and there were no systems she could check as the last person I spoke to “has opened an inquiry” to see where my phone has gone. This can take up to 5 days. She admitted that they had lost my phone, and in fact, that entire shipment. At £700 per phone, that’s quite a loss for a company that appears to be competing on cost rather quality of service. Beyond fed up, I let this woman know that if they haven’t found a metallic Galaxy S6 Edge to deliver to me at the end of the inquiry I will be going to Carphone Warehouse.

Day 21, May 5th, Tuesday. With the Monday being a bank holiday, I would have called Vodafone on this Tuesday, except I was in the middle of the Peak District for a photography day with my mum. We had just had a wonderful lunch seeing a former colleague I haven’t seen for 10 years, hearing about her brilliant work outlined on www.breathingremedies.co.uk and we were all set for a day of beautiful landscapes. As our most knowledgeable and lovely tutor Stephen Elliott turned up, I reached into my pocket to turn my phone off, only to see that Vodafone had chosen that precise moment to call me. The all too familiar terrible, crackly line and Indian accent made me realise I was in for a good 5 minutes of pre-amble before the reason for the call became clear. The caller told me that I should have received my new phone two weeks ago. I told her I knew this. She apologised profusely for losing my phone, and I thanked her. She promised me that I would receive a new phone the next day, she was sorting it out for me NOW, to make sure I did not have to wait any longer. I received a text almost instantaneously to support this claim. The only slight snag in this whole plan was that the next day, I was still in the Peak District a good 4 hours at least from my house. There was no way I could bear to hear the overly loud and cheery “GREAT NEWS!” again, never mind listen to the hold music again, so I simply said “that’s great, I need to go now, thank you.” Manic texting followed to make sure my wonderful neighbour was OK with being available until 3pm and to my husband to put a note on the door to that effect. Finally, phone off, smile in place, I had a great day out and even managed to get a couple of good photos despite the weather.

millstones        Carhead

Day 22, May 6th, Wednesday. Exhausted, I arrived back in Bath in time to sign on in town, with my semi-regular guy. He asked me to use the electronic system and I couldn’t resist asking what benefit this gave over pen and paper. Call me cynical, but I had not seen a great benefit in any electronic system for a good few weeks. I was reassured that not only did the electronic system confirm that my signature was 98% similar to my last one, but it also approved my payment as well. I stopped short of asking how much longer he expected to be sitting on his side of the desk in the face of technology doing 98% of his job. I decided to go home and get my phone instead. So I thought………….. Once again, I realise that my text is only information that a phone is somewhere in limbo between Vodafone and a DPD depot and there’s no confirmation of anticipated delivery. Online tracking tells me that DPD is “experiencing technical difficulties in locating my parcel”. Just for the hell of it I call 191. Apparently, there’s great news: the Galaxy S6 phone is here! Once I get past the ironic announcements, menu items, hold music and an obligatory being cut off and starting all over again, because suspiciously, they no longer seem to have a queuing system whereby they call you back; I am told by a real person that Vodafone have no stock of this phone and they have no idea how or why I was called with a delivery promise.

Day 23, May 7th, Thursday. It’s my birthday and so I decide to celebrate by NOT calling 191. I go out into town and put a note on the door asking any delivery driver to try half the village before leaving a note but no parcel. I have a great day, and decide that I will call Vodafone the next day.

Day 24, May 8th, Friday. “GREAT NEWS!” More hold music, and two hours later I get through to someone. I’m so fed up I ask if I can still cancel my contract as it has been longer than the 14 days cooling off period since I started it. As I haven’t even received my phone, this action is indeed possible. I drive into town, park in Sainsbury’s to get an emergency 6 pints of milk (this lasts ~3 days in our house) and 90 minutes free parking and walk straight to one of the four Carphone Warehouse shops in town. 90 minutes later and £100 extra cost compared to Vodafone over 24 months I have a Galaxy S6 Edge phone in my hand and a contract with EE for £31.99 a month. Better reception in my home town, better service from the Geek Squad and staff in the shop use a computer system that can identify where their stock is, live. I even have a spare phone so that if there is any gap in service as the PAC code migrates, I will have a phone I can be reached on. How did we manage when phone screens were this small?

spare phone

My life is complete, or will be after just one more task. I call 191 and ask to cancel my contract. I am put on hold. When the person finally returns, she tells me that my phone is on its way, it’s being delivered with DPD, she can see that this has been delayed…………………. I have to stop her and remind her that I called to cancel my contract, not to be told the same thing I have been told for 23 days and could she please do what her customer has asked and cancel my contract. I am told to wait on hold while I am put through to cancellations. Half an hour later I am back with her and she tells me she is putting me through to Ian in cancellations. I am on hold again and another 10 minutes later, I finally talk to Ian. He offers to sort out my phone delivery for me. I stop short of hanging up as this might actually be the last call I have to make to 191 ever and I tell Ian that I do not want anything more from Vodafone at all. Ian offers to drop the monthly contract price. I resist the urge to sing back to him the hold music song Vodafone have been playing at me for days and which is now permanently etched in my brain, “It’s unforgivable, I stole and burnt your soul, Is that what demons do?, They rule the worst of me, Destroy everything, They bring down angels like you, Can you love me again?”

I tell him that I am happy to pay an extra £100 to leave Vodafone and there is nothing he can do to keep me, especially by dropping the monthly cost. I tell him that I value good customer service and promises being kept, and will pay for this even though I am in fact not even earning at the moment. I don’t appreciate companies who compete on cost alone to the point where all value has been removed for both the company and the customer. In the time it takes me to say that (rant), Ian has cancelled my contract and got my PAC code for me. Now totally unsurprised that this bit of Vodafone’s system works well, I pick my kids up from school and play with my new and very lovely phone.

Galaxy-S6-Edge

 

Take a seat!

~ drjfernihough ~ Leave a comment

*sigh* it’s that time again – you know, the one that comes round annoyingly twice a month and involves signing your name and swearing on the badly photocopied piece of paper that you’re looking for work, when not wasting your time in  the job centre. Today was “Spring into action Jobs Fair” day though. Be still my beating heart, I can hardly contain my excitement. I was told this would be a compulsory part of my signing on though, so I turned up especially early. So early in fact, I had to queue to get into the building as soon as it opened. This is 10am, for anyone who thought that the job centre might ironically have normal working hours. I even managed to avoid the eye of the security guard-come-receptionist-without-a-desk as I went in, thereby avoiding having the pointless conversation about which of the other two beige painted floors I was heading for, the one with bad carpet, or the one with domestic abuse posters everywhere. Unfortunately avoiding the eye of the security guard also meant I avoided getting a sheet of badly photocopied paper that told me what Job Fair company stands were located on what floor of the building. So, up to the domestic abuse I floor I went to hand in my “work plan book” for signing on. Still early for my appointment, UF (unnamed female – never engage with the unwashed, remember) grabbed my work plan, turned her back on me and barked at me to take a seat. That was tricky, as all the seats had been removed to make space for a jobs fair. I’m going to have a small rant about the value of following a process when it’s there to help, whilst still allowing space to use your own thought process when it doesn’t, in this and my next blog, there doesn’t seem to be enough made of this balance in life. So I stood and waited. As it happened, I was stood right next to the First Group stand, staffed by people who took one look at me and also turned their back on me. Apparently, I do not look like a potential bus driver. It’s a shame. I was once overcharged for a bus ticket for my youngest son, making the journey more expensive than a taxi. When I pointed this out to the driver and requested a refund he closed the door on me. Not, closed the door after I left. No, he physically closed the door on me with my body in the doorway at the time and called the police. When I wrote to the managing director of First and complained I was offered a month’s free travel on the buses. I politely declined his generous offer. I avoid using the bus now, particularly since taxis are cheaper for a whole family and cycling is cheaper for just me, but I would have loved to have asked the recruitment guys what the officially training manual recommended under such circumstances. I gather from the managing director that the driver had at all times followed the company policy process by not giving me a refund at the time.  Alternatively, as a regular train commuter for 14 years, for over an hour every day, I could have asked them what training they provided for staff who were struggling to be “on brand”.

Anyway, my musings were diverted by a very kindly looking UF who asked me if I would like to take a seat. I smiled and said I didn’t. She looked panicked but managed to give me a sheet of badly photocopied paper and asked me if I knew that there was a Jobs Fair on today. I thanked her and remained standing. Still clearly concerned about my height perhaps, she pointed out 3 occupied chairs approximately 3 metres away. As she explained, these are nearer to where my name would be called to sign on and perhaps I’d like to sit over there. I took two steps towards the chairs and she seemed happier, at least she stopped asking me to take their chairs. James then called me to sign on and once I had sat down, he said, “well I can see this will be a quick one”. Unemployed and at the job centre; surely, this is the only time that phrase can be welcome. Eight signatures later and I’m even registered on the electronic system. Farewell use of my Montblanc pen on alternating Wednesdays. Perhaps I should offer to do the cost analysis for the benefit of the electronic system over paper and pen. Then again………… I don’t think they could afford my day rate with all the money they’ve spent on domestic abuse posters literally papering every inch of the beige walls and electronic signing systems.

So, duly signed on, what to do with 15 minutes to kill before going to the cinema? Ask the nice people at the Learning Direct stand if they provide software coding training of course.

So, what to do with 14 minutes and 50 seconds to kill before going to the cinema? Ask the Firebrand guys what their IT skills training looks like. As an aside, I feel the need to explain my IT interest further…… I went to a very old fashioned, all girls, private school that was sold off to Roedean during the recession. The land and buildings were then sold again, presumably because the sum of its parts held more value than the whole as an educational establishment. When the school was established over 150 years ago, its mission was to turn girls into young governesses. When I attended, until 1989, its goal seemed unchanged. The school certainly did not envisage a world where writing an app would be a more useful skill for me to know than the art of choux pastry. I digress, in short, Firebrand’s training looks expensive. I asked if there was any funding available from the government to attend their courses. The very smart and helpful man looked at me, perplexed. Perplexed is better than panicked, but no more informative. “We’re a commercial company, the only money the government provide for people to attend our training courses is through an employer taking on an employee, who then attends our courses”. I didn’t have the energy to point out that if the company was paying for the employee, I failed to see how the government was involved at all. I did point out that everyone he would be meeting at the Job Centre today would be unemployed, so he may struggle to sell courses, for which you either need £2,450 or an employer.

It didn’t matter, he’d already launched into a description of a two year apprenticeship which would start by placing me at the first level of customer service for people with IT queries. I have a mother and two parents-in-law, I feel I have enough experience already to skip this step and thanked the man for his help on the apprenticeship, but perhaps that wasn’t for me. He continued, however, telling me that as an apprentice for two years, my employer would pay for me to go to Cambridge and attend several quite intense residential courses, the longest being 9 days duration. I gave up. I have a PhD and MBA and at times like this, you just have to bring them out, both guns firing. I pointed out that “intense”, and “long duration”, was not an issue, but the requirement to be several hours drive away from home for days on end, with three children to look after before 9am and after 3pm, every day, was more of an issue. Eventually I managed to extricate myself and left the domestic abuse floor.

I was briefly tempted by the first floor stands – waitressing, kitchen jobs, care in the community, housekeeping and landscaping jobs. I even briefly flirted with the idea of signing up as a volunteer “to assist in the care of people with brain injuries”. However, I figured that if I didn’t have any patience with the job centre staff this was unlikely to be a forte. Instead, I drove out of town to watch the Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. This is a very predictable, but quite beautiful film, portrayed by a stunning range of actors, demonstrating that with determination and enthusiasm, there is no time or place in your life that prevents you from starting a new career: you just need a supportive environment.

Signing on incompetence never ceases to amaze me (April 8th 2015)

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Today I had my appointment rescheduled by someone over the phone, so they started by asking me some security questions to check they were talking to the right person. 2 out of 3 of these questions were “when did you start claiming, roughly, and what day do I normally sign on?” So that narrows down the number of people who can fraudulently sign for me to about 300 Facebook friends then. At my new allotted time I walk in to the building and fail to miss the eye of the security guard/receptionist-without-a-desk. They always start a conversation by barking the name of the benefit for which they think you are claiming. Under hypnosis I couldn’t tell you any on the list I’ve heard but they’ve never guessed job seeker. Perhaps I don’t “look like a job seeker”. I was then told I wasn’t signing with Richard as Richard is never there on a Wednesday – I make the mental note to try harder to avoid catching the eye of the security guard in two weeks time as I am directed to the same place I have gone for over 3 months. Now 2 mins late I then wait another 15 minutes while the 2 security guards/receptionists discuss across me, almost out of earshot, incorrectly, my appointment time and what might have happened to the staff member to cause the delay. At no point do they update me. Now the fun starts. Unknown Female (remember they never reveal themselves to us) calls me over 20 mins after my nominal appt time. She asks me how my search is going. I make polite conversation about how terribly wonderful everything is. She then changes her tone and tells me in no uncertain terms that I should be signing with the same person each time. I point out that this is something only they can sort out and is well beyond my control. She repeats her command that I should sign with the same person each time. I remain silent. She then invites me to take the time to use the electronic signing pad for the first time. It’ll take a little while to train it, she says, but she’s clearly excited that I will then be able to sign on it rather than paper for all my next visits. I feel only a slight pang of sadness as I see that my montblanc pen go unused (Shirley Mitchell will understand). Training involves signing my name 6 times. I notice there are pen marks on the screen from where people have actually tried to use a pen rather than the stylus hard wired to it. *sigh* The machine hangs on the last go and we’re obliged to start again. Anyone who has signed their name repeatedly 12 times will now recognise that an Icelandic banker could have walked in and done a better job of my signature towards the end of this process but at least the system hasn’t hung. I have time to wonder that if they trust a glitchy electronic system to differentiate fraudulent signatures rather than humans with eyes and fuzzy logic processes and an ability to ask for ID if they don’t recognise the person who has presumably been signing with just them for weeks on end, it doesn’t bode well for the humans. I then actually have to sign on with the system. I read the commandments, scroll down the screen and touch “sign document”. UF nearly has a fit and asks me to read the text first. I point out I have, she says most people read slower. I point out that if you have a PhD and an MBA you learn to read quite fast. The electronic system now asks UF what my “new claim” is for and she is paralysed into inactivity, for I have the weary air of someone who is clearly not a new claimant and the computerised system has completely let her down. She folds a piece of paper in half, dates it, and hands it to me to sign. I pick up my montblanc pen……….

Ritual humiliation week at the job centre (March 16th 2015)

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Today combined both the usual signing on and the special naughty step meeting for failing to do anything constructive towards getting a job in 13 weeks. I wasn’t told I had this extra delight at an appointment on Wednesday this week so thankfully Sheenagh renewed my claimant commitment with me today as I have no doubt there would have been retribution for failing to turn up to appointments they don’t tell you about. So, “What does a renewal of a claimant commitment involve?” I hear you clammer. Well, to increase the bond I feel for my torturers, sheenagh went through the whole online form I filled out last November that includes my hopes, dreams, skill set, expectations and tasks around getting a new job. My 20+ year career experience to date is summed up as “project management, research”, for example, which felt perfectly adequate and was left untouched. However, it was clear that educational qualifications “phd and mba” was getting me nowhere. Sheenagh edited these horrors to PHD and MBA which I feel has expanded my horizons considerably already. I did point out that if she was that worried about the correct spelling perhaps she should put PhD, which bless her, she did. Form duly capitalised, she printed it out on the paper that rates just above “toilet” in the stationery catalogue and I re-signed it. Everything I actually DO to find a job over the last two weeks entered online as requested by the claimant nazis is dutifully ignored. £144 in the bank.

All ready to sign on…………………………… (February 11th 2015)

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……..but “Kath” is clearly having a gossip about having to move her car, so her desk neighbour has agreed to do it. “It” is still standing here 15 mins later. Oh the joy. Unnamed female (they never bother introducing themselves as human beings) asked me for the booklet that has apparently been replaced by an online service that they do not ask me about. I confessed to not bringing the booklet because I work online and needed to update the system as I had been busy in London yesterday talking about potential work. Unnamed female would not accept my verbal update on my job seeking activity (as others have) and requested that I use one of the computers to update online and them she would try and fit me in when I had finished. I, however, was not leaving that chair until I was finished I’ve got an arm to gnaw off in preference to a second chat with UF. I filled in the form online on my phone in 2 mins and told her I had done so. I then added a couple of other random job search activities just for kicks when UF told me that I was going to have to hurry up on the computer a her next appt was due. I told her again that I had already finished and gave her my govt ID and email address which no unnamed person has ever needed before. UF then presented me with my next appt to which I wondered our loud why no-one has the common courtesy to ask if that time is convenient. UF told me I wasn’t working. I pointed out that while this is true it does not mean I am not busy trying to find work, like being in London all day and I still have three children even if I don’t have a job. UF asked me if the next appt time was convenient through gritted teeth. UF was obviously very keen to see me go at this point but I felt it necessary to get my montblanc pen out and point out that I hadn’t actually “signed” on for today yet and did she not need me to do this? Thankfully, after writing the date on the piece of paper UF told me it was the 11th Feb today as that was the tricky bit about all of today’s experience.

Ritual humiliation at the job centre. January 15th 2015

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Ritual humiliation at the job centre yesterday involved being told off for not having my paper booklet to write the next appointment in. I provided the response that I was perfectly capable of remembering a date two weeks in advance if by some miracle my smartphone forgot. In fact I have been turning up fortnightly for two months despite not actually receiving any money yet. Turns out I didn’t make sufficient national insurance contributions in 2013 to be eligible for job seekers allowance. This is incorrect to the sum of £4,904.69. One slow computer system and a failed call back yesterday and hanging up on me instead of being put on hold today – I now have £299.95. Do these people seriously run our country? They couldn’t run an egg and spoon race.