At this Time...

on july 6, i wrote about losing my grip of the julian calendar and the general happenings of society due to my shift. that day, i handed my manager (one of four) a SMF, or schedule modification form.

four days later, i'd received no response and the manager had left for a business trip to chicago. occasionally he would email us from chicago telling us he was having a wondrous time and that we were doing a horrible job. the usual. i swiveled in my chair a few times, wondering why the ergonomics nazi had not provided me with that new, spectacular, chair she'd promised my back would appreciate.

and then i sent out what i believe to be a very professional follow-up email.

To Whom it May Concern,

Recently, I filled out a Schedule Modification Form requesting earlier hours and wanted to follow up to see if that had been looked over. I currently work Friday through Tuesday 2-11pm and while the days are fine, I would really love to have the hours changed to something in the vicinity of 10am-8pm.

It seems with the patterns of call volume, I will be a greater asset during an earlier part of the day as there are very few calls after 8pm and the mornings can always use an extra hand. I would much rather come in during the peak hours and be of more use—also, the constant inbound calls would keep me in a certain flow that I believe will improve my performance as a Concierge.

I would love to hear back about what options I have or don’t have whenever you have the chance.

Thank you in advance.

after two weeks of waiting for a response to my follow-up email i was a bit confused. how can a company which preaches customer service so much that they even have a team of people grading every call ever made and every email ever sent have so much trouble responding to what is already a follow-up email?

i wasn't sure if i should write a follow-up email to my follow-up email or just quit.

on monday, the scheduling team emailed a couple of my coworkers (who were having similar issues) asking the two of them to come in for overtime because they'd given a concierge a week off and needed coverage.

"why would you give someone a week off," one of them asked, "before being sure you had coverage?"

"and why should we be expected to cover someone else's shift because of it?" the other asked.

"why should i even respond to this email," the first continued, "when they never reply to my requests?"

"it seems to me," i chimed in, "managers have no interest in addressing our problems, but are on top of us the minute we make a mistake."

a company chat message came to me from a third concierge that read, "so true, bro. so true. speak the truth!" we weren't the only ones upset-- just the only ones with mouths.

"the trick is," the second concierge said, "wearing shorts at work. if you wear shorts on casual friday, a manager will be at your desk writing you up faster than anything. that or just don't sign into the company chat and suddenly they have time for you."

"i wrote about getting a raise two weeks ago," the first concierge continued, "i've been here for a year and i'm ranked second best in terms of client ratings. i deserve a raise and i haven't even gotten a response to my request."

"you have to understand," our program lead said, "these managers are also answering to the clients and they are naturally more worried about what the clients think-- hence they will message you quickly when you slip."

"yes," i said, "and the importance of keeping their clients happy should be equivalent to the importance of keeping their employees happy. after all, we're the ones pulling the weight of those clients."

the program lead-- who, by the way, is amazing and quite possibly the only person in the upper-up team that actually listens and responds to our issues-- informed me that i ought to forward her my request for a schedule change and she'd see to it i get a response.

i did and, within two minutes, there it was: a timely response to her request that my follow up request be taken care of.

this is what i received:

At this time, we do not have an opportunity to change your schedule because you cover hours in the evening. At this time, we are going to keep it on file so that when we are bringing additional staff on or making changes to existing staff we have this request to go from.

If you have additional questions, please reach out to me as myself and WFM would be your primary contacts for this request.

Thank You.

first off, that's not even true. i've had plenty of time to think about this and there are only two days out of my work-week that i am even remotely necessary-- the other three days, there are two other concierge with the same hours as me and we collectively take four calls at night.

if this weren't true i couldn't be having three-day nerf wars.

secondly, he just copied and pasted the standard "fuck you" letter. he didn't even add the classy-corporate "My apologies for an extended delay in response." or bank of america's, "After trying to reach you several times by phone..."-- no, just an "At this time we don't fucking care. At this time we can shit on you all we like at this time."

the response was a complete insult. partly because it was over two weeks late, but also because it in no way addressed the benefits of my potential schedule change which i had highlighted in my email. if he wants to talk about coverage, i agree, that's why i should be working an early shift-- when there are calls to actually cover.

it looks like i'm just doomed to die in a lonely office unless i find a new job.

i'm a-looking. but let it be known this does, of course, mean war.