Jobs, we don't need no education... Options

[Pokey]

Care to mention which company? Just so I can avoid them.

Medibank. But it's no use avoiding them because other funds are just the same.
PHI is a horrible industry because half the people that are members of funds have no fucking clue how private health insurance work .. so if they go and get a crown done for a tooth and dont get 100% of it back then somehow that is my fault that they didn't read information that was sent to them. More than half the problems come down to people just not bothering to find out what they're paying for. They'll ring up the day before they go into hospital "just to make sure" that they're covered when they've had weeks and weeks or even months to do so and then freak the fuck out when things aren't exactly as they thought they would be with only hours before an operation.

Not to mention it's a heavily regulated industry by the government and so much of what we can say and do has to stick to government guidelines. When I worked at optus, if some whinging asshole wouldn't stfu I could just throw some money at them to make them go away as a "goodwill gesture". Can't do that with PHI. And yet I've had morons ring up and want us to price match and one guy even asked if we could do his premiums any cheaper for cash. And would you believe it I think 99% of these people are from Queensland .. I swear to god they breed them extra stupid in that state.

ok .... breathe ....

[+Ed+]

Care to mention which company? Just so I can avoid them.

I work for an IT company. My official role is a software developer, but I surf the internet all day.

Wow, ex-colleague!

Used to work for a huge oursourcing software developer in marketng though.Do you work with Documentum, Dan?

[jclive]

Care to mention which company? Just so I can avoid them.

I work for an IT company. My official role is a software developer, but I surf the internet all day.

I work in IT/Technology staffing. i.e. I sell people for a living.

We hire people like you! I'm certain that many of them do quite a bit of surfing.

[OutToDry]

I work in IT/Technology staffing. i.e. I sell people for a living.

We hire people like you! I'm certain that many of them do quite a bit of surfing.

You weed out the bad resumes too before they get onsite?

[thefunkyredcaboose]

Anybody want to give me a job? Mine is the suck.

[Infrequent Poster]

Grocery store stockboy. Was better things before this, and hope to be better things after, but for now I have to deal with dumbasses who can't use their eyes or their brains. That goes for the customers and the management, sadly.

[Pokey]

I think I'd actually kind of like doing some work like supermarket stuff when I go back to study. Something part time where I don't really have to engage the public would be ideal right now. I'm sick of customer facing roles.. the ironic part is that I'm good at them. But people just piss me off .. now I'm gonna go off and listen to Nick Cave's "People ain't no good".

[jclive]

You weed out the bad resumes too before they get onsite?

Absolutely! Our guys go thru normally pretty extensive interviews before they start anywhere.

[Merica]

My official role is a software developer, but I surf the internet all day.

Cool! What kind of software do you develop? What languages do you us to code?

[sh4rpz]

I have two degrees - one in Architecture (Bachelor of Architectural Studies) and the other is a Bachelor of Social Sciences degree in Media, Marketing and Communication, majoring in Internet Studies and Philosophy (Technology and Cognitive Science).

I started off working for an architect, but I now have my own Design, Media and Marketing company/studio in Durban, South Africa (since late 2001).

[Badman]

some smug little fuck in the company who denies the claim and thinks it's just as easy as going "sorry, we're not covering you" and the customer will say "That's no problems, just thought I'd ask anyways, sorry to trouble you!" ... you feel like passing the phone to the manager and say "if it's so easy to fucking deny the claim why don't you tell this guy who has cancer that he's paying for all his chemo treatment himself".

Wam, do you have a second noose I could borrow?

Pokey, you may have the worst job on the board. Movies like Sicko probably don't help the situation. I have never been able to afford insurance, but I'm starting to think it may be better to pay $500 a month to an emergency fund rather than an Insurance company.

[Pokey]

Pokey, you may have the worst job on the board. Movies like Sicko probably don't help the situation. I have never been able to afford insurance, but I'm starting to think it may be better to pay $500 a month to an emergency fund rather than an Insurance company.

I'm gonna rant some more here so..

haha well it's not quite like Sicko, Australia's system isn't like America's. Private Health Insurance is a "luxory" here, people are still covered by medicare in the public system. However with the public system you're usually going to have to wait longer for doctor's to become available for elective surgery, so going private means you'll get your operation a lot sooner. But if you have a massive heart attack and are rushed to hospital it won't matter because you'd be covered by the public system in medicare for emergencies.

The problem I seem to have is that private health insurance is expensive and people are stupid and companies are ruthless, bad combo. You'll have some situations where someone has been paying for this service for years yet fail to really understand what they're covered for, they book in for an operation and decide only the day before they go in to call up and check if they're covered .. then when they find out they arent because they're not on the right cover they go balistic like it's my fault they didn't read any information that was sent to them over the past 15 years.

The other side is when the person literally gets screwed out ... we had a few levels of our covers change recently, things people were previously covered for are now no longer covered. Information was sent out back in Feb, but the changes take effect on July 1st. Now if you'd pre booked an operation before March 31st and the operation was after July 1st, we'd honor the cover prior to the changes. But if you booked in on say April 20th and the operation was on July 20th ... you're fucked.
The big problem came when people would book their doctor and the doctor then books the hospital ... the condition is that you book the hospital before March 31st. People were booking with their doctor prior to March 31st and thinking they were fine. The doctor then might not book with the hospital until some time in may .. too late.
The customer is livid because they thought they were doing the right thing, we're washing our hands of it saying "sorry, can't help, blame the doctor!" and the doctor is saying "hey it's not my job to work out things with your health fund, I didn't know the urgency".

Complete fucking mess. That probably didn't make any sense at all.


The plus side is that I'll be out of that place in late August to go overseas and I'm not going back. The down side is that they're downsizing at the moment and they're getting rid of a lot of people, rather than offering redundency which I would gladly take, they are picking on faults in people's performances as an excuse to fire people for under performing. Things you previously got a slap on the wrist for and some extra training are now gaining written warnings.

So I suck at sales, I can give great customer service and tell you all about how you're covered and investigate your missing claims and all that, but when it comes to the end and going "hey I notice you also don't have any dental coverage, want some?" ... I just suck at it. I never meet my sales targets. It also wasnt part of the job when I signed up, so now they're circling like vultures and I could be out on my ass much sooner than late August without any pay out. This would be pretty disasterous for my trip too.

Anyways, enough ranting, where's the booze.

[+Ed+]

Pokes better goo watch your national team play and chill after the work!

[Infrequent Poster]

Damn Pokey, that's awful. A lot of companies it seems are getting more strict with their employees and in terrible ways. At least on my end I still see the terrible employees getting by with their terrible effort with not as much as a slap on the wrist but the good employees here are getting the screws put to them.

I feel like ranting a bit some I'm gonna rant on your quotas comment, as that type of numerical, lazy managing pisses me the fuck off. No matter how good your statistics are, how solid the equations or logarithms you cannot, cannot, completely encompass an employee's worth in a single number. Very few employees are good at everything and no one is great at everything so trying to force a square peg into a round hole by harping at, or "building up" an employee's weakness often does more harm then good.

I've got a guy who works in my department who's seventy years old. He can still lift the 40lbs+ required to do the job but he can't do it efficiently and I don't make him. However, my fuckwad managers, who haven't a clue between the lot of 'em, will blindly assign him to milk load, juice load or the floor. He'll do it, because he's a good soldier and does the job he's asked to do but he just can't do it with the speed and efficiency of the younger guys. The managers blindly ignore this and then bitch at us as to why we're not getting product up fast enough.

There's just too many lazy, stupid managers. One number is easy to understand. A line graph is easy to understand, but easy to understand does not work for a manager. People and jobs are complex (even basic ones) you have to address them in a complex manner. Unfortunately thinking is hard and the best way to keep your job now-a-days is to be invisibly mediocre so numerical management reigns supreme. God, it pisses me off.