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An Update
6 years ago
General
In eternity, where there is no time, nothing can grow. Nothing can become. Nothing changes. So death created time to grow the things that it would kill and you are reborn but into the same life that you've always been born into.
Now that the annual DDoS attack seems to have subsided, it's time I give all of you a more thorough update. I HATE 2020 with a passion that I have never hated any year with, even the infamous 2016. Any time I have received news this year (mind you, we're less than two months in which has me both hopeful and legit terrified) it's been bad news. Along with my issues with Newegg and Paypal, which I've kept you all fairly up-to-date with, I also lost my job. I'm not being picky in my pursuit of more work. The details concerning that are this: I worked for Domino's as a delivery driver. In early February, they decided to implement a policy that fixed a problem that wasn't a problem and it tied the hands of the delivery drivers in our attempts to do our jobs effectively.
They passed this new policy with NO prior notice, no meetings, no discussion. Driver don't make as much taking deliveries. When we get stiffed (and keep this in mind any time you order pizza to be delivered), we're pretty much paying out of our pocket to deliver to you. When things are good, they're great. But when we get several stiffs in a row, managers try to tell us "It's the nature of the job dude" but there's also the issue of "We're paying out of pocket to deliver to some of these people and when they never tip, it's frustrating and some of these cunts live in BFE and we have to include vehicle maintenance in our consideration." I've had tire issues from working this job, I've had to change my oil more frequently, I've had to pay a lot more in gas than if I was just driving to and from. When the pay is good, it's great. When it's not though, I'm pretty much paying to work.
There is a hitch to all this: Inside tips. A lot of customers will tip when they order carry-out, even though they know they don't have to. This is also great because it gives the insiders (people who actually make the pizzas and such) a chance to receive tips as well. I have tried not to be a dick in regards to that, but there are times when we are absolutely slammed with carry-out orders and the insiders can't help all the customers themselves. So drivers has to help out with that.
The new policy that was put in place made it so drivers could not receive ANY tips inside. Period. It was all pooled and divided among the inside staff. That annoyed me bad enough as it is because the attitude of the policy makes it sound like we're stealing tips. We're not. Drivers are not trained to make the food. We're trained in almost everything else and there is a lot of overlap in training, but beyond prep and Quality Assurance, making the food is not priority training. Despite that though, often times driver will learn how to make things on their own initiative (I did this as well). I'm sure many of you can see the issues coming up already, but it gets worse.
The way we were informed was almost in passing, like "Hey, we got new pizza cutters so just throw the old ones away." No, we got told that we couldn't accept tips at the counter anymore and if we did receive them anyway, we had to give that money up to be put in the safe (we're ALL personally responsible for any money we touch, so passing that off to somebody else's care is a major risk). I asked for clarification and what I heard was sketchy as fuck. So I refused to help customers at the counter PERIOD. I got chewed out for that. So I responded that I've had issues with getting shorted in the past for stuff that wasn't my fault and I'm not agreeing to a new policy that takes money that I'm responsible for out of my hands.
There was an argument over the issue and I had a decision to make. To give a little more background on the problems at that location, we have a GM who's been fucking with peoples' work times (drivers have to "clock out" on delivery, so that we can gauge delivery times) to make overall store times look better, sometimes at our detriment (we also make less when we're out on delivery). I brought this issue up and that stopped, at least with me. I had an incident where I requested time off, got it approved, then got scheduled to work some of that time even though I would be out of the fucking state. LUCKILY the cunt had switched to pen and paper requests so I had documentation. I sent her a photo of the approved request when she tried to make an issue of it and she tried to accuse me of forging it, but everyone knew (including her) she had no evidence of that. Tellingly, she changed up request methods after that...and wouldn't keep to anything consistent. There were a lot more problems that I don't have the time to go into detail about here.
So the issue was this fight over not being allowed tips inside the store and drivers having to surrender money that we were responsible for to another person (which, again, could result in us having money stolen from us with impunity), it was just another big fight among other fights over unethical practices. I told the GM "Alright, cash me out. I'm done." the look on her face was outstanding. I've been one of the few workers who's been consistent and has powered through all the other bullshit. In the couple of weeks since my departure, they've lost three other people (including the assistant manager) and it was at a point where losing ONE person would be devastating to times and such. This GM was completely unwilling to compromise at all, any kind of "compromise" she made ensured a loophole for her. I had to call in sick several times just to get the days off that I needed (I have a situation where I need to go out of town frequently to help my brother and/or grandpa and I need two consecutive days off to manage that). She would also change people's schedules without advance notice or asking them if they were able to do so. As such, write-ups were a joke. Nobody took write-ups seriously because she overstepped her boundaries so much that if she acted on write-ups and treated them like she was supposed to, everyone would have been fired for stuff that was her fault.
So yeah, my work skill is kind of bottom-of-the-barrel right now. I'm working on getting away from customer service, but I can tolerate anything for at least a few months. And let me tell the rest of you something, those of you who don't believe that you can get any better than customer service. Workers like you (and me) are a dime a dozen. So are the employers that would hire you. When an employer becomes abusive, you just remember they do NOT have a monopoly on treating you like shit. You can go to any one of a dozen other corporate entities and getting treated as bad, but maybe better (or worse), and get paid the same minimum wage bullshit. Seriously, people, don't put up with it! Also try looking around and seeing what you really could get into as far as work. It is surprising what a HS Diploma or GED can get you into.
That being said, you have to be willing to step outside your comfort zone. And do keep in mind that "comfortable" does not mean enjoyable. It just means you're used to it. You're numb to it. That's okay too, but don't expect it to get better just because you can tolerate it. Make it better some how. That's what I decided to do.
But yeah, 2020 is fucking with me in a pretty bad way. I'm going to keep pushing though.
They passed this new policy with NO prior notice, no meetings, no discussion. Driver don't make as much taking deliveries. When we get stiffed (and keep this in mind any time you order pizza to be delivered), we're pretty much paying out of our pocket to deliver to you. When things are good, they're great. But when we get several stiffs in a row, managers try to tell us "It's the nature of the job dude" but there's also the issue of "We're paying out of pocket to deliver to some of these people and when they never tip, it's frustrating and some of these cunts live in BFE and we have to include vehicle maintenance in our consideration." I've had tire issues from working this job, I've had to change my oil more frequently, I've had to pay a lot more in gas than if I was just driving to and from. When the pay is good, it's great. When it's not though, I'm pretty much paying to work.
There is a hitch to all this: Inside tips. A lot of customers will tip when they order carry-out, even though they know they don't have to. This is also great because it gives the insiders (people who actually make the pizzas and such) a chance to receive tips as well. I have tried not to be a dick in regards to that, but there are times when we are absolutely slammed with carry-out orders and the insiders can't help all the customers themselves. So drivers has to help out with that.
The new policy that was put in place made it so drivers could not receive ANY tips inside. Period. It was all pooled and divided among the inside staff. That annoyed me bad enough as it is because the attitude of the policy makes it sound like we're stealing tips. We're not. Drivers are not trained to make the food. We're trained in almost everything else and there is a lot of overlap in training, but beyond prep and Quality Assurance, making the food is not priority training. Despite that though, often times driver will learn how to make things on their own initiative (I did this as well). I'm sure many of you can see the issues coming up already, but it gets worse.
The way we were informed was almost in passing, like "Hey, we got new pizza cutters so just throw the old ones away." No, we got told that we couldn't accept tips at the counter anymore and if we did receive them anyway, we had to give that money up to be put in the safe (we're ALL personally responsible for any money we touch, so passing that off to somebody else's care is a major risk). I asked for clarification and what I heard was sketchy as fuck. So I refused to help customers at the counter PERIOD. I got chewed out for that. So I responded that I've had issues with getting shorted in the past for stuff that wasn't my fault and I'm not agreeing to a new policy that takes money that I'm responsible for out of my hands.
There was an argument over the issue and I had a decision to make. To give a little more background on the problems at that location, we have a GM who's been fucking with peoples' work times (drivers have to "clock out" on delivery, so that we can gauge delivery times) to make overall store times look better, sometimes at our detriment (we also make less when we're out on delivery). I brought this issue up and that stopped, at least with me. I had an incident where I requested time off, got it approved, then got scheduled to work some of that time even though I would be out of the fucking state. LUCKILY the cunt had switched to pen and paper requests so I had documentation. I sent her a photo of the approved request when she tried to make an issue of it and she tried to accuse me of forging it, but everyone knew (including her) she had no evidence of that. Tellingly, she changed up request methods after that...and wouldn't keep to anything consistent. There were a lot more problems that I don't have the time to go into detail about here.
So the issue was this fight over not being allowed tips inside the store and drivers having to surrender money that we were responsible for to another person (which, again, could result in us having money stolen from us with impunity), it was just another big fight among other fights over unethical practices. I told the GM "Alright, cash me out. I'm done." the look on her face was outstanding. I've been one of the few workers who's been consistent and has powered through all the other bullshit. In the couple of weeks since my departure, they've lost three other people (including the assistant manager) and it was at a point where losing ONE person would be devastating to times and such. This GM was completely unwilling to compromise at all, any kind of "compromise" she made ensured a loophole for her. I had to call in sick several times just to get the days off that I needed (I have a situation where I need to go out of town frequently to help my brother and/or grandpa and I need two consecutive days off to manage that). She would also change people's schedules without advance notice or asking them if they were able to do so. As such, write-ups were a joke. Nobody took write-ups seriously because she overstepped her boundaries so much that if she acted on write-ups and treated them like she was supposed to, everyone would have been fired for stuff that was her fault.
So yeah, my work skill is kind of bottom-of-the-barrel right now. I'm working on getting away from customer service, but I can tolerate anything for at least a few months. And let me tell the rest of you something, those of you who don't believe that you can get any better than customer service. Workers like you (and me) are a dime a dozen. So are the employers that would hire you. When an employer becomes abusive, you just remember they do NOT have a monopoly on treating you like shit. You can go to any one of a dozen other corporate entities and getting treated as bad, but maybe better (or worse), and get paid the same minimum wage bullshit. Seriously, people, don't put up with it! Also try looking around and seeing what you really could get into as far as work. It is surprising what a HS Diploma or GED can get you into.
That being said, you have to be willing to step outside your comfort zone. And do keep in mind that "comfortable" does not mean enjoyable. It just means you're used to it. You're numb to it. That's okay too, but don't expect it to get better just because you can tolerate it. Make it better some how. That's what I decided to do.
But yeah, 2020 is fucking with me in a pretty bad way. I'm going to keep pushing though.
I wish there was something I could do besides lending an ear.