What goes around comes around
People never fail to amaze me with their stupidity. Yesterday I received a phone call from the aunt of a girl at my work. The aunt was complaining that her niece hadn't been paid for the first 3 weeks she had worked for us. Pretty shocking, yes for sure but with around 130 staff to pay it's hardly surprising that some people slip through the cracks. I explained to the aunt that the person who usually completes payroll was away but that it was definitely just an oversight which we were already in the process of fixing. In fact, I'd talked to the girl herself on Saturday and given her a form to fill in which would tell us when she'd worked but hadn't been paid. I could then put the pay through this week.
The aunt apparently didn't find this acceptable and said that 'she was glad I was at least willing to fix up someone else's mess since that person didn't have a problem with taking advantage of the young people who work for us.' I should have just agreed and left it at that but I couldn't because the accusation was so unjustified and was against one of my friends. So I argued that it was an accident and that no-one was trying to take advantage of anyone. The argument continued and I am ashamed to say got quite heated. The aunt thinks that some of the people who work for us are too young to come and talk to management so they get taken advantage of. I pointed out that anyone who is old enough to have a job is old enough to talk to us if there is something wrong. She said that not paying someone for 3 weeks of work was illegal and that she was going to get the union involved. I pointed out that with so many staff it was impossible to catch every mistake and that we relied on the staff to point out inaccuracies in their pay to us which was why we provided them with payslips and that we would definitely expect someone who hadn't been paid in 3 weeks to speak up pretty quickly.
The argument went on for around 15 minutes and ended with the aunt hanging up on me. It's pretty stupid. I shouldn't have got riled up about it but the aunt didn't help matters. Of course I will still get the pay problem sorted out and I won't be doing anything to treat the girl differently but I imagine the girl will be pretty embarrassed about the situation. There are also times when I spend quite a bit of my own time sorting out rostering problems for staff when they need to swap a shift or need some time off (for a non-urgent reason). I will hardly be inclined to do that for this girl after being treated this way. It never pays to alienate those who are willing to go the extra mile for you and that is something some people just don't seem to understand.
In other news I have spent today doing a LOT of thinking. I'm pretty sure I've made a decision. I'm going to keep thinking on it for a couple more weeks but I had a bit of an epiphany, if you will, today and I'm pretty sure I finally know what is right for me. It's going to be hard and I know that but, unfortunately, often what's right and what's easy aren't the same thing. share this: facebook
The aunt apparently didn't find this acceptable and said that 'she was glad I was at least willing to fix up someone else's mess since that person didn't have a problem with taking advantage of the young people who work for us.' I should have just agreed and left it at that but I couldn't because the accusation was so unjustified and was against one of my friends. So I argued that it was an accident and that no-one was trying to take advantage of anyone. The argument continued and I am ashamed to say got quite heated. The aunt thinks that some of the people who work for us are too young to come and talk to management so they get taken advantage of. I pointed out that anyone who is old enough to have a job is old enough to talk to us if there is something wrong. She said that not paying someone for 3 weeks of work was illegal and that she was going to get the union involved. I pointed out that with so many staff it was impossible to catch every mistake and that we relied on the staff to point out inaccuracies in their pay to us which was why we provided them with payslips and that we would definitely expect someone who hadn't been paid in 3 weeks to speak up pretty quickly.
The argument went on for around 15 minutes and ended with the aunt hanging up on me. It's pretty stupid. I shouldn't have got riled up about it but the aunt didn't help matters. Of course I will still get the pay problem sorted out and I won't be doing anything to treat the girl differently but I imagine the girl will be pretty embarrassed about the situation. There are also times when I spend quite a bit of my own time sorting out rostering problems for staff when they need to swap a shift or need some time off (for a non-urgent reason). I will hardly be inclined to do that for this girl after being treated this way. It never pays to alienate those who are willing to go the extra mile for you and that is something some people just don't seem to understand.
In other news I have spent today doing a LOT of thinking. I'm pretty sure I've made a decision. I'm going to keep thinking on it for a couple more weeks but I had a bit of an epiphany, if you will, today and I'm pretty sure I finally know what is right for me. It's going to be hard and I know that but, unfortunately, often what's right and what's easy aren't the same thing. share this: facebook
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on Tuesday, August 28, 2007 at 8:26 PM.
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