Vanishing Act So called friends at work mysteriously vanished as soon as our bosses E & J were out of the building at a conference all afternoon in Newcastle. Ordinarily I wouldn't mind as I enjoy the peace and quiet and I can get on with the accounts with no interuptions but whenever my workmates vanish its for a reason. IE rats deserting a sinking ship.
For example, JK is supposed to have all Self Drive buses lined up, full of fuel, with their keys left in an enevelope at the gatehouse for clients to pick up at their alloted time. How hard a job is that I ask you? Today the bus was there but had minimal fuel and most importantly, no keys. I searched the offices from top to bottom looking for those bastard keys only for JK to roll up 20 minutes later with them in his pocket.
Great - except for the fact I had to keep an irrate client amused for the past 20 mins while he was away Xmas shopping in the bloody Bridges. God he so owes me a drink.
What A Fucking Liberty If that wasn't enough a guy called A from our rival company in Newcastle phoned me turning on the charm as he usually does when he wants us to do one of his jobs. Seriously one of these days I'm going to scream at him - "It's not our job to help you out of the shit when you havetaken on massive £ making contracts and just left your community based, low paying regulars high and dry."
Its disgraceful and I hate helping him knowing how he treats his regular clients. So I didn't. Ha. Why the hell should we bend over backwards to do a job outside of our turf when he's the one that gets paid for it and we don't?
Magic Touch Then to top the day off nicely this girl phoned to get a quote for a job. I asked her the list of usual questions - What time she wanted the bus? (All day) Is it a self drive? (yes) Where is it going to (30mins away). Seriously how vague is that?! There a millions of places "30 mins away". I explained I needed an exact destination before I could say how much it would cost. After a few more minutes of her avoiding the question, JK popped his head round my office door to see if I was alright. Deciding I couldn't be arsed with her I transferred the call to him - well he is the one that is supposed to work out all the price after all.
It must have been his dulcet times as within seconds she'd told him the times and destination when I'd been trying to extract the very same info for the last five minutes. I decided to take this as payment for the bus key incident earlier on so he doesn't owe me anything - for now.
Mr Know It All Finally I bring you to my last moan for the day. A really horrid, disgusting guy came in the office like a bull in a china shop. He threw a cheque down in from of me, saying "We havent received an invoice for this yet but here is the payment. Its what we were quoted."
Lying tosser - I sent him the bill two days again which he must have received as the amount the job eventually cost differed to what they were originally quoted and his cheque was for the revised amount. He must think I'm fucking stupid. Still, I'm not paid to argue with clients so I kept schtum.
I went to make out a receipt. "Its for group 110 for 2 buses to Winstons Hotel on 27th Oct" he ordered me to write. I politely told him I would write it out the way I have been taught by my boss which gained me a scowl. After I filled it in before I even had the chance to log the cheque number & sign it to say I'd received it, he boomed, "YOu haven't signed it. YOu can't get away with that with me. I'm the groups treasurer." I smiled sweetly and signed when really all I wanted to do was throw him out of the window head first. Just as well E & J weren't in or they might have thought I wasn't doing my job correctly with him shouting about all my "mistakes". Arrogant bastard.
Aah I feel so much better for that. Until the next time. Ciao
TJ