Ah. The joys of payroll.

I posted this elsewhere sometime ago, and meant to double post to here, but never got round to it and lost the link. Found it today (thanks Google).

10 ways to nark off your payroll department

I work for a large payroll company and I'm currently working on a payroll that is a rather well known utilities company in the UK. For those inexperienced with contacting payroll, here are 10 easy ways of getting your payroll clerk aggravated:

1. A convo on the lines of this:Employee: "I'm paying too much tax." Me: "Have you handed in your P45?" Employee: "No. Do I have to?"
2. Rant. And Rant. And Rant. And swear. It don't get you anywhere honey. My trick is to hold the phone away from my ear until you've finished. I can't understand a word you're saying anyway. Other tactics, include, at best, terminating the conversation. At worst, putting you on speaker so the Payroll Manager can hear. PM has hot line to top man (or woman) at client. So be warned and watch your language.
3. Holding your baby whilst on the phone and allowing it to BAWL down the phone so I cannot hear a word you're saying, and yours and my blood pressure goes up. Oh yeah, I can do without Sky Sports on in the background too. Turn it off!
4. Telling me your life story, your latest operation, the troubles with your daughter, son, husband, wife, partner. It won't get the sympathy vote - the client doesn't pay us to cause sympathy to make us change the rules. I'm sorry for you - honestly - but it will not cause any change in the stance. Tell your sob story to your boss - HE can probably make things happen. We can't.
5. Tell me how to do my job, or tell me you could DO my job. One woman tried to teach me the joys of customer service (somewhere along the line of the customer is always right). The biggest laugh I got was when I was at the lower end of the pay scale (around £5) per hour and had an employee in a shop (on £3 per hour) telling me that payroll was easy and she could do my job, and indeed, HAD done my job. Right, lady, so why didn't you stay in payroll rather than be on your feet ALL day for £2 less an hour?
6. Tell me its MY job to chase up YOUR personal information. No. Its you or your manager. Beck and call girls (and boys) we are not.
7. Phone up at 9am on pay day, consultant unavailable, other consultant takes your phone number promising I will phone you back....you phone back at 9:30am demanding to know why I haven't phoned back. We get close to 200 phone calls on pay day, and your call stating that your union dues balance is incorrect is NOT priority. Oh, and we have until 3pm the next working day to phone back UNLESS you've been severely underpaid.
8. Be on over £50K, be underpaid by the price of a Malteser, and DEMAND payment NOW. Since when should I pay you out of principle, when I have a girl who's been underpaid SEVERELY, which was maybe ours, maybe the client's fault, and they say - its OK, I can wait. You high paid employees should be ASHAMED.
9. Say "I bet your pay is never wrong". Oh boy. Of course my pay has been wrong on occasion, because, like yours, MY payroll department is human. I don't get on the phone and talk to them the way you talk to them. (They're too close for a start)
10. Say "My pay is wrong every month". Y'know, out of morbid curiosity, all payroll clerks check this statement out. We usually find that your pay was wrong one month (our fault), wrong the next month (because we fixed our error, and the client, out of 'kindness' or some form of weird humour, instruct us to do something specific to fix it, so the correction is doubled up, and you're paid wrong again), and then....nowt. Rien. Nada. Your pay has been right 9 months in a row. Be careful again, we have the hot line to your boss and we record every query.

There are more. Much more. But these will do for now.

Farewell to The Red Baron

This is about 5 days too late, but better late than weak tea.

I started watching F1 in '96 - I think mainly because a certain British driver was doing rather well. He, along with most of the others in the paddock, and the entire F1 fanbase had something to say about one Herr Michael Schumacher. Most of it uncomplimentary.

Damon, of course, won the F1 World Championship that year, although a lot of peeps were saying it was more down to his car rather than his driving ability. Michael had got himself disqualified - from the whole season. I don't remember the full details (though trying to run Hill off the road had something to do with it) but I don't think that British had been that pleased since 1966.

Course, I went along with the views of a lot of the fraternity - here was one arrogant, self centred, precocious son of a gun.

Then I watched his driving over the next 10 years and the disgust turned into utter admiration.

Oh yeah, sure, there were 'incidents'. And I'm not about to excuse them. Some of them were Michael all over, some of them he admitted and some of them weren't even his fault (but because he was 'involved' this all added to the 'Schumacher is ruining F1' debate)

I hear a lot about Senna - I wasn't watching in those days, but it seems that those that say that, although Schumacher is, statistically, the greatest F1 racing driver there ever was, that Senna is still their number 1 all time greatest racing driver.

For those that know all there is to know about racing, this could be informed opinion. Unfortunately, for the majority that say that it is down, in part, to that niggling little irration we have with all things and people German (though we do like Mercedes) and in part they don't want to be associated with someone that they think cheated his way to stardom.

You don't cheat all 90+ wins.

And I hate conjecture. Like when they say 'Senna would have wiped the floor with him'. Senna's dead guys. Senna could have been just seriously injured and given up racing the next day. He could have been so shaken up that he was never the same again. Or he could have been knocked down by a bus after the season ended. Conjecture is pointless. Just look at the guy's ability, particularly when Brundle, who is not, it has to be said, Schumacher's greatest fan, be awstruck by the sort of talent he displayed last Saturday. Effectively running last, he finished fourth and it seemed that every lap included another jaw-dropping, edge of the sofa with screams manouvre. It was like he was saying 'This is Me, this is what F1 will be missing when I'm gone and I am, and always will be, the greatest there ever was'.

Arrogance? Oh sure. But who cares about arrogance when you see a car driven so perfectly?

Some said Schumacher ruined F1. But I, for one, will probably not watch much more because of him dropping out. I can't see anyone beating his records, and I can't see any other personality in the paddock that will give us something to talk about on Monday morning. You see, one thing that Michael wasn't, was boring.

Farewell Michael, gosh I'll miss you.

This could be heaven or this could be Rhyl

No particular reason for the title of this post, other than I thought of it on the way home and found it vaguely amusing.

Talking to a contact at the client today, she spoke of her former employer, another rather well known utilities company, saying "You must have seen all the stuff in the news about all that." "No," I replied "world news simply does not interest me any more. In fact, there is just one headline I've been following lately and that's Richard Hammond."

(Before I continue, can I ask you please donate to Hammy's Heli, if you can. Worthy cause.)

She laughed and I said "It's sad really, the world is blowing itself to bits, our Prime Minister is crap and I have no interest in it whatsoever." She said everywhere was bombing everywhere else and there was absolutely nothing we can do about it.

But is it wrong I have a degree of ennui about world affairs? Its a bit like environmental issues. Have you noticed recently that there are no less than 4 camps? There's the "Trying Hard To Do Something About It" camp, the "Couldn't Care Less And Where Did I Park the 4X4" camp, the "Global Warming Doesn't Exist" camp and, more worryingly, the "The World Is Coming To An End and This Just Speeds Up The Process" camp.

Okay, so I whinge as much as the next person when I think the government has made a rubbish decision. However, I only do so if I can see a better idea. And only if I feel it's going to affect me, or my Belief, personally. So I may get a little uncomfortable when 'Religous Hate Speech' Bills go through parliament (thankfully, nothing has really been really passed into law. Suprised with my attitude? Ha, that's for another time). Wind Farms? Show me a better solution I may take an interest. They're quite pretty actually and liven up Rhyl and Prestatyn. It's when stuff gets close to home that I care. I've been a fan of Top Gear along with the SOH for years now, and when someone with obvious guts and a sense of fun, and makes me laugh, has a brush with death I feel I have to pray.

Sad, really, when there are lives being lost every day and you pray for one person that, in the scheme of world politics, doesn't really matter. Perhaps I should pray about that too.

Perhaps living one day to the next is what is important, and to try and make a difference in stuff around me, people around me. Doing the best I can, and being 100% of what I am. Being Real. It's all I ever wanted to be. At least I made one person laugh today, and kicked a bit of bottom at work. If only I could be as that effective in the world.

weemee

Looks nothing like me. The lack of dress sense is about right.

Give us a '9

Over and out

When I was about 16, my dad acquired a CB radio to play about with. He was an electronic engineer, but it was more than a job, it was a hobby. He rigged up a voice operated microphone on his crash helmet and got me to try and speak to him on his drive off somewhere in the suburbs of SW London, to see if it worked.

We had picked a channel that was quiet, but what we didn't know is that it was a channel that got kicking late in the afternoon with a network of people from Richmond Hill into the far reaches of Surrey. The first to switch his rig on called himself 'Desperate Dan' and he lived on Richmond Hill.

Within 20 minutes of first trying to speak to my dad, there were at least a dozen people trying to speak to the guy on Richmond Hill, as he had a good rig and a large aerial. Me, with my cheap little rig and small loft aerial, could not hear most of them, and I was a weak signal or 'no copy' to them. Of course, the channel got well chaotic and I couldn't even speak to my dad.

Eventually, my dad got to his location, but I stayed on and talked to all that I could. I met 'Black Swan', 'Redstripe', 'Amber Gambler', 'Spirit', 'Wildmouse', 'Crazy Camel' among others. So began my relationship with this 'night light' which lasted about 2 years. I eventually adopted a 'handle' for myself - I was 'French Connection' of Strawberry Hill. (No, I do not drive cars like a maniac and I don't do hard drugs. Somehow though, like the nic 'honestfi' it seems to suit me somehow - you had to be there) The relationship with the 40 red channels was rocky at best, and I think the main reason why I stopped using it was because of a couple of nasty incidents of verbal abuse and there came a time I was regretting the day that I first picked up the mic.

CB was waning in popularity then, and now there are only 20,000 odd license holders (though probably just as many unlicensed), and we now have the internet and chat rooms and it is nothing to speak to someone in Florida whereas this would have been an achievement on CB. However, you can pretend to be somone you are not on the internet, e.g. a 7 year old girl when in fact you're a 40 year old man...dashed difficult on CB. And although you can just about keep your exact location a secret on the internet, (though the determined can find out) as your 'copy' on the CB was doubtless less than 10 miles away, he could leap into his car, track you by looking at the signal when you spoke, until eventually he would 'key up' right outside your door, blasting your speaker and causing the meter needle to click loudly to 'n stop.

Reading the article at the BBC, and the positive comments underneath it, brought back a flood of memories, and I am able to forget the heartache and reflect on the happier times.

• 'Wildmouse' and his mate Jamie finding out where I lived and driving their cars down our road shouting "Chrrrrroooome!" (quiet location, and I think the neighbours must have had apoplexy!)
• Developing my first, serious crush on another 'breaker' and the long long long long walk we had on our 'eyeball' (I think it was about 10 miles!). Sadly, the love I thought I felt was not reciprocated. I wonder where he is now?
• The thrill late at night of copying someone in Canary Wharf!
• The sweet offers of friendship, maybe more, from various guys, rather desperate for a girl methinks, but an important part of life when you're turning seventeen
• In fact I think there was one who held a candle for me, but never asked. Seems that boys have the same trouble as girls in expressing their feelings sometimes. If he had asked....well....I think given the circumstances at the time, I would probably have said yes
• The conversations with the 'old boy' network, who, despite the difference in age, welcomed me into their talks and never left me out.

I realise all this, and more, contributed into me turning from an adolescent into an adult and certainly boosted my confidence - I was a 'mouse' that barely spoke but I started to become a little more forthright and less introverted. So. Happy Birthday, CB Radio, and may you have many more, even if you are isolated to Age Concern - and such a brilliant way to earn your keep.

There is one more, precious reason that CB Radio will always have a special place in my heart and memories.

A few years after their first meeting, 'French Connection' married 'Desperate Dan'.