I mentioned in a previous blog that I had almost run out of Annual Leave. It was a great worry to me at the time because it meant that I would not be able to take any time off over Christmas and would not be able to go and visit my family, who live a long way away from me. I shouldn't have worried. It was simply our Resource Planning Department showing me just how many brain cells they have between them.
I smelled a rat when I totted up just how much leave I have taken to be with Bobbie when she goes to clinic. I've been at the Dark Satanic Mill for over 11 years now and my leave entitlement has gone up to the maximum, 216 hours. After some rapid mental arithmetic, I realised that they had got my entitlement wrong and had put me down as having 134 hours. Now, I really don't know how they managed to calculate it but I'm sure it involved an Excel Spreadsheet.
I let my manager know and she passed on the message. I soon had a revised Holiday Sheet in front of me. They had realised their mistake and had increased my annual entitlement to... wait for it... 162 hours! Well, they were getting there. I let my manager know they still hadn't got it right but she asked me if she could let them know the following morning. She didn't like to tax their brain cell too much in one day.
After a quick reminder the following day, they finally got their act together and I have a Holiday Sheet with the correct entitlement of 216 hours showing. This means that instead of 1 hours leave to last me until April 1 2008, I now have somewhere in the region of 75 hours. It is worrying though. I really should have spotted it earlier.
I can also confirm that I have been given the last week in July that I had rather stupidly forgotten to request and so the breaking loose of All Hell Chez Jester has been averted. I feel a bit like Doctor Who after defeating yet another seemingly invincible opponent.
Showing posts with label resource planners. Show all posts
Showing posts with label resource planners. Show all posts
Saturday, 7 July 2007
Monday, 2 July 2007
Jester, Bobbie, her kidneys and the Resource Planner
Yesterday, I had to take my youngest daughter, Bobbie, to an out-patients appointment at the Renal Clinic at our local NHS Trust Hospital. I mentioned in an earlier blog that Bobbie has Henoch Schonlein Purpura (or HSP for short). The main area of concern is her kidneys and a recent blood test showed that her kidney function has deteriorated so the Doctor has put her on Steroids (with all the associated supportive drugs) and re-biopsied her kidney last Thursday. She was asked to come back into the clinic on Monday - i.e. yesterday.
My husband was not going to be able to take her, so on Friday I applied for 4 hours annual leave so I could take her. Our Resource Planners refused it, so I told my manager that I would have to take it as unpaid dependant leave. She was fine with that.
Yesterday, I took Bobbie to the clinic. The doctors increased her dose of Ramipril because her kidneys are still leaking protein into her urine. The consultant (not the usual one, who is on holiday) also told her that they are thinking of using Cyclophosphamide, which would suppress her immune system, which is causing all this trouble in the first place, or try a Plasma Interchange, which would entail removing the plasma from her blood and replacing it with new - a sort of human Power-Flush. Bobbie took this all in her stride. I have to say, I am really proud of her.
I went to work as soon as we got home and my manager had a little anecdote waiting for me. She was eager to tell me, it had amused her so much.
That morning, she had e-mailed our Resource Planners and asked them to mark me down as being on dependant leave for the morning. She had received an e-mail back saying that I should have taken it as annual leave. She replied that I had applied for annual leave but it had been refused (by the same resource planner). The reply then came from the head of our Resource Planning Department. He said that hospital appointments are made 6 weeks in advance and I should have applied for my leave 6 weeks in advance. She replied to him (and I think she enjoyed herself doing it) by explaining that Bobbie's illness is not predictable. Sometimes Bobbie is quite well and then sometimes she is not (all very true). When Bobbie gets worse and needs to see a Consultant, her body doesn't give her 6 weeks' notice so that her mother can apply for leave and, therefore, sometimes Jester can only give a couple of days notice. She did not get a reply.
That's what I love about resource planners. They never let you down.
My husband was not going to be able to take her, so on Friday I applied for 4 hours annual leave so I could take her. Our Resource Planners refused it, so I told my manager that I would have to take it as unpaid dependant leave. She was fine with that.
Yesterday, I took Bobbie to the clinic. The doctors increased her dose of Ramipril because her kidneys are still leaking protein into her urine. The consultant (not the usual one, who is on holiday) also told her that they are thinking of using Cyclophosphamide, which would suppress her immune system, which is causing all this trouble in the first place, or try a Plasma Interchange, which would entail removing the plasma from her blood and replacing it with new - a sort of human Power-Flush. Bobbie took this all in her stride. I have to say, I am really proud of her.
I went to work as soon as we got home and my manager had a little anecdote waiting for me. She was eager to tell me, it had amused her so much.
That morning, she had e-mailed our Resource Planners and asked them to mark me down as being on dependant leave for the morning. She had received an e-mail back saying that I should have taken it as annual leave. She replied that I had applied for annual leave but it had been refused (by the same resource planner). The reply then came from the head of our Resource Planning Department. He said that hospital appointments are made 6 weeks in advance and I should have applied for my leave 6 weeks in advance. She replied to him (and I think she enjoyed herself doing it) by explaining that Bobbie's illness is not predictable. Sometimes Bobbie is quite well and then sometimes she is not (all very true). When Bobbie gets worse and needs to see a Consultant, her body doesn't give her 6 weeks' notice so that her mother can apply for leave and, therefore, sometimes Jester can only give a couple of days notice. She did not get a reply.
That's what I love about resource planners. They never let you down.
Thursday, 28 June 2007
Jester, Annual Leave and Amusing Quotes
I discovered to my horror, yesterday, that I've almost run out of annual leave. I also discovered that I only booked one week's leave in July when we've booked and paid for a 2 week holiday and I've had to put in a request for the 2nd week. I sincerely hope the request goes through or all hell is going to break loose Chez Jester. The problem is, and I think I've mentioned it before, our Resource Planning Team is mainly comprised of petty gauleiters, who enjoy nothing more than refusing leave on the grounds of staffing levels and moaning about how much time we spend on "After Call". It's my mistake though, so I'm going to have to sort it out.
I heard from an ex-Jester this morning, who has moved further up north and now works in a call centre up there. He sent me some amusing things he overheard at work recently. I sincerely hope the quotees were joking but you can't always be sure. Here they are:
Where does wind come from? Is it made by those wind turbines?
Was Jesus around at the time of the dinosaurs?
It's great, isn't it?
I heard from an ex-Jester this morning, who has moved further up north and now works in a call centre up there. He sent me some amusing things he overheard at work recently. I sincerely hope the quotees were joking but you can't always be sure. Here they are:
Where does wind come from? Is it made by those wind turbines?
Was Jesus around at the time of the dinosaurs?
It's great, isn't it?
Friday, 2 February 2007
Jester, Saul and the Accusation of Theft
Let me tell you a little about the Dark Satanic Mill. Strictly speaking, it is an assistance company, working on behalf of insurance companies. Our remit is to get plumbers or gas engineers or electricians or other tradesmen to our customers in times of crisis. We have a network of approved contractors, some of which have been working with us for many years. I work in the complaints department and so have to deal with complaints about them.
I received a call from Saul, one of our contractors, on Wednesday. He asked me to see if I could find a letter that one of our policy holders, Ms X, had sent to us. He explained that his partner, Jim, had been accused by another policy holder, let's call him Mr Y, the neighbour of our correspondent, of stealing £200.00 from his house when he was there on a job. Saul gave me the postcode and I found the letter. It was a marvellous character reference for Jim, explaining that he had worked quickly and efficiently. He had only entered the house in company with Ms X and had been polite and courteous but, when it had become evident that he would have to go onto the neighbouring property to complete the repair, he had refused.
Mr Y had already told Ms X that a plumber from our company had stolen some money from his house but she had told him to look closer to home. Ms X questioned Jim and he confirmed that he had been accused of stealing money and therefore would not go back on the property. She went on to tell us that she had told her neighbour he should look closer to home for the culprit and not to accuse Water Company employees (many of our customers confuse us with the Water Company) with no evidence to back him up.
She explained further that Mr Y has two grown up children living with him. His son is 19 and prefers not to work and his daughter, a young unmarried mother, who apparently takes drugs, lives there with her baby. On the day that Jim visited, his daughter had a friend with her, a girl who is a well-known drug dealer in the area. Of course, Ms X believes that the drug dealing friend took the money and she wanted to tell us so that Jim would not get in trouble.
Her main problem though, was that her pipe could not be repaired unless Jim went onto Mr Y's property and she had wanted our company to resolve this problem. This had all been done by our Call Centre and Saul told me that the repair was being dealt with.
Saul asked me to show the letter to Spencer, the Area Network Manager, and asked if we had done anything about Mr Y's accusation. I checked our records and told him that at the time of the accusation, we had advised Mr Y to report the theft to the police but had not taken it any further. Saul was evidently relieved about this (so was I, it was nice to see our Call Centre follow a sensible course of action) and I told him that I would show the letter to Spencer when he was in the office the following day.
This I did and Spencer told me that he heard about the accusation but had never believed a word of it. Personally, I believe Saul, Jim and Ms X. You get a feel for contractors in my job and this lot are one of the best we have. As for Jim stealing money from a policy holder, well, it's laughable. I'd sooner believe that our resource planners are not a bunch of power-mad, jumped up gauleiters.
I received a call from Saul, one of our contractors, on Wednesday. He asked me to see if I could find a letter that one of our policy holders, Ms X, had sent to us. He explained that his partner, Jim, had been accused by another policy holder, let's call him Mr Y, the neighbour of our correspondent, of stealing £200.00 from his house when he was there on a job. Saul gave me the postcode and I found the letter. It was a marvellous character reference for Jim, explaining that he had worked quickly and efficiently. He had only entered the house in company with Ms X and had been polite and courteous but, when it had become evident that he would have to go onto the neighbouring property to complete the repair, he had refused.
Mr Y had already told Ms X that a plumber from our company had stolen some money from his house but she had told him to look closer to home. Ms X questioned Jim and he confirmed that he had been accused of stealing money and therefore would not go back on the property. She went on to tell us that she had told her neighbour he should look closer to home for the culprit and not to accuse Water Company employees (many of our customers confuse us with the Water Company) with no evidence to back him up.
She explained further that Mr Y has two grown up children living with him. His son is 19 and prefers not to work and his daughter, a young unmarried mother, who apparently takes drugs, lives there with her baby. On the day that Jim visited, his daughter had a friend with her, a girl who is a well-known drug dealer in the area. Of course, Ms X believes that the drug dealing friend took the money and she wanted to tell us so that Jim would not get in trouble.
Her main problem though, was that her pipe could not be repaired unless Jim went onto Mr Y's property and she had wanted our company to resolve this problem. This had all been done by our Call Centre and Saul told me that the repair was being dealt with.
Saul asked me to show the letter to Spencer, the Area Network Manager, and asked if we had done anything about Mr Y's accusation. I checked our records and told him that at the time of the accusation, we had advised Mr Y to report the theft to the police but had not taken it any further. Saul was evidently relieved about this (so was I, it was nice to see our Call Centre follow a sensible course of action) and I told him that I would show the letter to Spencer when he was in the office the following day.
This I did and Spencer told me that he heard about the accusation but had never believed a word of it. Personally, I believe Saul, Jim and Ms X. You get a feel for contractors in my job and this lot are one of the best we have. As for Jim stealing money from a policy holder, well, it's laughable. I'd sooner believe that our resource planners are not a bunch of power-mad, jumped up gauleiters.
Thursday, 1 February 2007
Jay, the resource planner and the disciplinary
Tales from the Dark Satanic Mill
My friend Jay had a disciplinary hearing at work yesterday. I know Jay from work. I don’t socialise with him outside work but I think of him as a friend. I digress, as usual. The first I heard of it was when a mutual friend told me that two people from her team had been suspended. One was suspended because he was talking in an Asian language (she didn’t know which although from the demographic of my Asian co-workers, I would hazard a guess at Gujerati). The other was Jay and he had been suspended for telling a resource planner to “F*** off”. I actually think he should be commended, not suspended.
I suspect that all call centres (and the Dark Satanic Mill is a call centre, of course) have resource planners. When people work on telephones, you need somebody there to make sure that they are taking calls and not sat on “After Call Work” or whatever jargon is available to describe having your phone set to unavailable. Resource planners are a necessary evil but the job seems to attract people of the same ilk as Traffic Wardens.
Actually, my husband is a policeman (he introduced me to The Policeman’s Blog and couple of others I will have to mention). They now have a resource planner and guess what? He’s an ex-traffic warden. So apt!
Our resource planners are a mixed bunch but when your job entails ringing people up and telling them to go back on available or ringing their managers and asking them to tell them to go back on available, it tends to affect ones personality in a strange way. I suppose I’m trying to say that they end up power-mad individuals.
Well, back to Jay. We’re very busy at work at the moment and although he was suspended, he was allowed in to work overtime. Strange Alice-through-the-Looking-Glass-thinking. I had a chat with him and asked him the truth of the matter. He said that the resource planner in question had told him to terminate a call because he believed it was a personal call. He had refused to do so because it was not and he was not going to terminate a business call and it escalated from there.
I do think that if I had been told to terminate a call, even a personal call, I would have reacted in the same way but then, our resource planners seem to be a bit scared of me. When I’m on “After Call Work”, they ring up and say “Did you know you’re on ACW?” and I say yes or no depending on whether I knew or not. I frequently leave my phone on the “toilet state” and just tell them I had the squits. I’ve never been disciplined. I think the answer is I work in the complaints department, I’ve worked for the company since most of the resource planners were in short pants (or pigtails) and Jay doesn’t and hasn’t.
He had the union in to represent him yesterday so I’m hopeful that all went well and he won’t be so jumpy for much longer. He’s a good lad and a good worker and the company would be downright bloody stupid to sack him for telling some jumped-up little squirt to eff off!
Goodwill Jester 02 February 2007.
My friend Jay had a disciplinary hearing at work yesterday. I know Jay from work. I don’t socialise with him outside work but I think of him as a friend. I digress, as usual. The first I heard of it was when a mutual friend told me that two people from her team had been suspended. One was suspended because he was talking in an Asian language (she didn’t know which although from the demographic of my Asian co-workers, I would hazard a guess at Gujerati). The other was Jay and he had been suspended for telling a resource planner to “F*** off”. I actually think he should be commended, not suspended.
I suspect that all call centres (and the Dark Satanic Mill is a call centre, of course) have resource planners. When people work on telephones, you need somebody there to make sure that they are taking calls and not sat on “After Call Work” or whatever jargon is available to describe having your phone set to unavailable. Resource planners are a necessary evil but the job seems to attract people of the same ilk as Traffic Wardens.
Actually, my husband is a policeman (he introduced me to The Policeman’s Blog and couple of others I will have to mention). They now have a resource planner and guess what? He’s an ex-traffic warden. So apt!
Our resource planners are a mixed bunch but when your job entails ringing people up and telling them to go back on available or ringing their managers and asking them to tell them to go back on available, it tends to affect ones personality in a strange way. I suppose I’m trying to say that they end up power-mad individuals.
Well, back to Jay. We’re very busy at work at the moment and although he was suspended, he was allowed in to work overtime. Strange Alice-through-the-Looking-Glass-thinking. I had a chat with him and asked him the truth of the matter. He said that the resource planner in question had told him to terminate a call because he believed it was a personal call. He had refused to do so because it was not and he was not going to terminate a business call and it escalated from there.
I do think that if I had been told to terminate a call, even a personal call, I would have reacted in the same way but then, our resource planners seem to be a bit scared of me. When I’m on “After Call Work”, they ring up and say “Did you know you’re on ACW?” and I say yes or no depending on whether I knew or not. I frequently leave my phone on the “toilet state” and just tell them I had the squits. I’ve never been disciplined. I think the answer is I work in the complaints department, I’ve worked for the company since most of the resource planners were in short pants (or pigtails) and Jay doesn’t and hasn’t.
He had the union in to represent him yesterday so I’m hopeful that all went well and he won’t be so jumpy for much longer. He’s a good lad and a good worker and the company would be downright bloody stupid to sack him for telling some jumped-up little squirt to eff off!
Goodwill Jester 02 February 2007.
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