The office: Chatter about your job

Dude, for delivery jobs, never guess about your driving record. You can almost certainly get a copy from the Secretary of State's office for a fairly minimal fee — here in Illinois it's a sliding fee scale depending on who you are and why you want it, but you can get an abstract of anyone's driving record if you know the name it's under and either the license number or addy and social security number. A copy of your own for your personal records is $12.00; for a PI in connection with an investigation it's something like $45; for a LEO or officer of the court in connection with an investigation is free.

Every time I've applied to delivery jobs (not just pizza), any applications that got past the initial screening needed to be accompanied by an official, recent copy of your 3 year driving record.

Anyway, Para, some advice/warning, based on my pizza delivery experience the past few months and the half-year I did at another company, back in 2005:

Advice:

• Get comfortable folding boxes. You're going to be doing a lot of it, no matter how much experience you have.
• If you don't already have one, get a flashlight to keep in the car. Make sure it's not some chintzy $5 Walmart special that only has like 5-10 lumens of output. Spend the $20 or so for something at least mid-level, ideally with triple digit brightness. I started with a cheapy flashlight that maybe does 8 lumens, and it didn't illuminate squat beyond a few yards. I spent $20 on a 150 lumen flashlight, and it's saved me a world of frustration in reading apartment building numbers at night without stopping to go up to the building to read the plaque, or read the numbers on the house because their mailbox either doesn't have numbers or has them covered/blocked by shrubbery.
• Bring along a pen (ideally a working one ) when you go up to a customer's door, especially when they're paying by credit card. It will save you some time to just loan them your pen instead of waiting for them to rummage around for a pen of their own.
• Get a notepad, and record tips and mileage religiously, even if they're recorded elsewhere automatically.

Warnings:

• If you're closing, some asshole customer will almost always place an order like 10 minutes before the store closing time. It's a crapshot as to whether it's a close run that only takes a few minutes each way, or you're heading out to the edge of the delivery area in the back reaches of Fuckoffia with at least a half hour spent in transit to/from the customer.
• Some times, no matter how much advance time a customer has between placing the order and getting the delivery when you get there they still won't have a thing ready to give to you, and may have to go digging through couch cushion cracks, their underwear drawer, or a change jar sitting on a shelf to get you the money. Said money may well be wadded up in a big ball of paper, for the non-coin currency, instead of the neat folding that makes it fit in your pocket much more easily.
• Einstein supposedly said that only hydrogen and stupidity are the only things in the universe that are infinite. All too often you may well find yourself delivering to people out to prove the latter part right. Try not to strangle them, and resist the urge to Dope Slap particularly dense customers.

Maybe more later, this is all that comes to mind offhand.

The pen and notepad were part of what I was told when I trained. And I'm more comfortable folding boxes than working with the food or taking orders. Folding isn't terrible when I know I'm going back in the car sometime soon. I was just miserable doing it without breaks and no idea when I was going to be sent home.

Oh, god, yes, the flashlight! Definitely get a good one. I like the Mini Maglight. I know that supposedly the ones that have multiple LEDs are "just as bright" as the ones with a single high-intensity bulb, but to me they simply don't have the same reach.

Oh, and in case you haven't already figured it out, a GPS will lie through its teeth if it can't find the address you give it. It will make something up and swear blue that you're supposed to go seven-tenths of a mile straight ahead, even if you're sitting on a decaying blacktop one-lane road with a barricade in front of you and a cow staring over it at you.

edited 26th Nov '14 6:48:57 PM by Madrugada

The lost art of paper map reading. Sometimes worthwhile picking it up so you can argue with the GPS more authoritatively.

Those maps are not very handy in rural areas. I learned that in the past. The number of small side and back roads that folks live off of but don't appear on a map are disturbing to say the least.

So the Missus already has some tales. Simple ones but she has some. I learned that state ID's not Drivers Licenses but the separate ID's are apparently easy to fake. So the state of NE does not allow sale of tobacco or liquor to anyone with an out of state ID Card. They accept Passports, Military ID's, and Driver licenses. They only accept state of Nebraska state ID's because they can verify those through a state system.

So her stories of course start with her predecessor. A nasty, filthy, rude, and apparently idiotic creature that should never have had the job in the first place. She would do things like mop and not wash her hands before prepping food or lick her fingers and handle donuts, or never wear gloves. She got caught on all of those and told to knock it off or else.

The winning piece of stupidity involves a deliberate sale of alcohol to a minor. The minor was a kid of a regular that everyone knew was under age. He tries his luck with her and her knowing full well he was under age tried to trick the camera by having him hold up something other then proper ID. So the kid cf course carries on with his personal stupidity. He gets hammered and gets into the trouble with the cops. He quickly rolls on his source. They review the footage. The store gets a $5,000 fine and she gets fired with a $500 Dollar fine.

So my wife is making sure she is doing her job. Just like when I have to inconvenience someone with required protocol they get lippy. She had some guy of "Latino persuasion" from a construction site nearby try and buy booze and tobacco products. He had a state ID from Hawaii. He didn't like being told the state of Nebraska won't allow her to sell to him. So he calls her a racist.

The next one is some gal supposedly from Ohio whining about ID because she had an ID card that was cut in half and taped back together. Auto-rejection because it has been notably altered.

The final was some snot nosed 19 year old twerp while of age didn't like the fact that he was carded because someone else "knew him".

By law she has to card anyone and everyone regardless of age or appearance of age.

I think this is just the start of the wife's work stories.

In more mundane news her feet are killing her. She needs some good shoes with some nice supportive inserts and a good thick pair of socks for work.

^^ Google maps is pretty good if you cross-check the map with the directions and the road in front of you.

Nursing or waitress shoes. Yes, they're spendy, but the difference they'll make in her feet at the end of the day is enormous. Also, get a footbath machine (like this ) for her.

edited 26th Nov '14 9:33:38 PM by Madrugada

Good idea. Spend on decent footwear that keep your feet alive is a good expenditure.

*snicker*

Remember, to err is human. To really screw things up takes a computer.

(I've resisted buying one, even when I was initially having trouble with some of the back-way streets. My experience is that GPS allows you to get lost with confidence.)

On the subject of navigation, look to see if you can find a spiral-bound map book of the area you deliver in. Much more convenient than trying to manipulate a fold-out map in a hurry. Even if it doesn't have all the roads (and odds are it won't), with sufficient references you can at least get a decent guesstimate about where you are and where you need to be (other than at home, in bed, with the covers pulled up over your head ).

edited 27th Nov '14 8:39:49 AM by Nohbody

I have been well and truly lost using paper maps. I have been well and truly lost using Google Maps or Mapquest. I have never been as utterly and completely lost as I got following a GPS that was making shit up. I wound up two counties (about 45 miles) from where I was supposed to be, on the above-mentioned decaying one-lane blacktop road. Complete with barricade and cow. And it was 1:30 in the morning. And raining.

edited 27th Nov '14 11:34:07 AM by Madrugada

In the North of the British Isles, it'd be a sheep. Well, several sheep. Most looking as if they're mortified on your account.

Last week I got steered wrong, but the GPS was working fine, Google just thought a search for "(restaurant) (very well-known location)" meant "(restuarant) (completely unrelated location on the other side of town)"

For maps in general, learning to read a good topographical map can be a lifesaver; for me at least they're much more easy to follow than your standard road maps I've found. A road/topo map combo is handy to have.

Euo: cows mostly do sort of "vacantly curious".

Okay, I've been actively looking for a better job since I got hired, but now I'm starting to wonder if it's worth the money to stick with it. One thing that's becoming clear is that I'm a bad driver when I'm on unfamiliar roads. I'm worried I'm going to wreck my car.

It's often easier to find a job when you already have one. I'd stick with it for that reason alone and step up your hunt for something else. Just be careful driving.

I don't think I've ever found a job while I already had one. Though that's largely due to lack of trying.

When I'd been at Target about a year I decided that now that I had a full year somewhere on my resume, I'd have an easier time finding the next thing. I put out three or four applications and never heard back. Ended up staying at Target another two years.

Until two weeks ago, my approach to job searching had been "brainstorm companies I'd like to work for, then find out how to apply to them". Then after I spent those few days trying and failing to reconnect with the Starbucks manager, I decided it was time to try a job board, and I'd heard an endorsement of Snagajob recently, so I went there. And then I was employed by the end of the week. (And I hate it. )

Unexpected day off tomorrow in observance of Ovenmas (they're installing a new oven).

And I've been informed that I'll be informed around 2 PM tomorrow when we're going to open.

Yay, less income right when I need to pay my bills!

I've got a loan from my father moving between Paypal and my bank, and I think even if it doesn't make it by the day my rent is due, it will make it there by the time the payment authorization is processed, but it'll be close.

My second job is at a butcher shop. We close at 7. At ten minutes till, someone rang the back doorbell. The doorbell is for delivery drivers and no one delivers 10 minutes before closing. We were in the middle of cleaning out the pork and beef cases and there were customers so someone finally got to the door after a minute or so. It was the floor washing crew. They were there to strip and rewax the floor.

This activity requires us to move all of the shopping carts, bread cases, cash registers, anything not tacked down in the kitchen area, the kids toys, the front island and all of the stools. And we usually have several hours notice and can move stuff in stages. The four of us (plus the floor guy) got everything done in ten minutes. I personally slung the entire charcoal inventory onto a cart, and man I can feel it now. I called the owners and they were just as surprised as we were, but were on the way. At seven on the dot, we pulled in the outside signs and were able to start closing. As one of my co-workers said "we recovered".

I think I'd do great as a bank teller. Capital One apparently disagrees. Onward.

So my workday sucked. Like, a lot.

Which is funny because the day started on such a good note; I was the first one to show up, I made coffee for everyone before I started my shift, and for the first two hours I was totally on my game. I got shit done ahead of schedule and better than expected. I went to my first break thinking "hell yeah, today's gonna be a good day for me."

After that, not so much. After that Murphy said "I'mma gonna fuck with you."

If it could go wrong, it did. If something could be wrong, it was. If an expensive disposable could die...well shit son, it was dead.

Example: my young assistant co-worker made a mistake with a very expensive tool that could have broken it. We caught the mistake in time and I gave him a speech about how he needed to watch out for that particular situation. He nodded and agreed to watch out in the future.

So 45 minutes later he makes the exact same fucking mistake and the very expensive machine gets fucked up because of it, all because he didn't do the thing I told him to do 45 minutes earlier.

Result; a $200 blade for our primary saw is now a paperweight - we'd just bought it and were hoping it would carry us through the job we are currently working. I kinda wanted to smack the shit out of my co-worker for that...but there are laws on such things. He admitted he was stupid and that he should have been paying attention, but I was all "This right here is what I was fucking talking about!!"

Yeah, my boss wasn't pleased. And I had to eat the shit that resulted. This is only one thing that happened today. Thus why I Need a Freaking Drink, and I found a bottle of whiskey to curl up in.

Fuck today. That is all.

Interviewed at Homegoods today. If I were to be offered a job there, I'd make about 2/3 of what I need to live off of, as opposed to the job I'm working at and hate, which I estimate pays at least twice what I need.

But I'd have a lot more time to do unpaid work that keeps me in a position to do paid work in my chosen career.

Drunk: If it is the kind of saw blade I think it is maybe you can recoup at least a small amount of loss by selling it to a black smith or metal worker? I know quite a few of those blades are used in many projects and sold after they wear out. Hang in there man sounds like a rough day. You apparently have your own equivalent of a private.

Have a joke. If you leave a locked conex box with two high grade steel anvils inside and leave a private to guard it for an hour. When you come back without the private having moved one anvil will be missing, someone will have taken a piss in the corner of the box, one anvil will be broken and there will be graffiti on the walls all without the private touching the conex box.

Para: Good luck man.

@Tuefel: It's a band-saw blade. We put it in the scrap pile with all our other metal and we'll get a few bucks for it maybe, but nowhere near the $200 it cost. And its all worked out; my boss got two more on the cheap because of a tool sale and two chew outs later (one from me, one from my boss) said employee learned his lesson.

Plus, we talked about it today and I did turn it into a teaching experience for him; about how it is important to pay attention all the time at this job, because little moments of inattention can be very costly. He took the lesson well. And you're right about him being a "private"; he's a good kid and he wants to work hard and make good, he's just...well, very nineteen. xD