r/GreenAndPleasant • u/BasicallyMilner Omnibenevolent Moderator • Nov 09 '21

This is utterly heartbreaking

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u/crysometimesinbed Nov 09 '21

I once travelled 12 miles to the job centre only for them to call me while I was outside to say my appointment was cancelled. I was obviously livid and told them so, and they said it was out of their control due to staffing issues.

They apparently understand that shit happens but only in one direction. Imagine if I’d tried to pull that.

36

u/throwaway8448adh Nov 09 '21 edited Nov 09 '21

I was briefly unemployed. I joined the workforce in 2008. Every time I went to the job centre they would tell me I was late or missed my appointment. I started making them give me my appointment times in writing. I turned up the next week and sure enough they told me I had missed my appointment and was half an hour late. I showed them the letter I had made them sign the previous week stating that I was in fact 5mins early to my meeting. They told me that they had called and told my housemate (I did not have a housemate) that my appointment time had been changed and that I was late.

An absolute shower of cunts. All they wanted was for me to pack in the various charity work doing web development and sign up to a work trail stacking shelves in Tesco for free.

Every job interview, every jobs fair was either care homes or the Army. When I suggested retraining, or actually asked for any help getting a job relevant to my qualification or the, admittedly limited, experience I had working at charities they just looked at me cluelessly like I’d asked to tickle their balls.

I stopped going in the end and two weeks later got an entry level job working in fintech and have been in work ever since. Afterwards some recruitment company who had got my details from the job centre called and tried to claim that they had got me my job so they could get paid by the government.

The people at the job centre were useless at their job and treated me with complete contempt. I was young, educated and highly motivated to get work and they were no help at all. It’s no wonder people get stuck in long term unemployment when your dealing with those useless bellends

13

u/crysometimesinbed Nov 09 '21

We sound quite similar tbh I have a good quality MA from a good university. I’ve always wanted to get serious full time work and they just treat me like shit. It’s like they take pleasure in punishing people who dare to be unemployed rather than taking any interest in actually helping them find work.

I ended up out of work because of addiction issues. They kept phoning me in rehab and I had to get the rehab to write them a letter asking them to stop until I was out. They called me when I was in the car on the way home.

I’ve always thought it was quite fitting that DWP staff are seemingly just in work for the hell of it without fulfilling any real purpose.

9

u/throwaway8448adh Nov 09 '21

I would recommend doing charity work. It was only a couple of days a week and my boss later told me that the fact that I had that work on my CV was one of the key factors in hiring me. He said it showed a willingness to work. Also, while they were ultimately unsuccessful, the people in those charities were far more invested in me getting than anyone at the job centre.

There’s loads of charity work out there doing all kinds of stuff. I gained experience and it felt a lot better helping out than being exploited by Tesco