Any Other Jobseekers Out There?

[ajax95]

Hope you're right about the recession, although I think mid-2011 is a bit optimistic.

 

Btw, a little reading about the Keynes Theory if anybody is really bored

 

Keynesian economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Surfer01]

Ajax95 mid 2011 is when it starts to move upward but very slowly whereas 2014 will probably be the real turning point, but by that time I should be retired! In the meantime I would really like any damn job as long as it pays £7 or more an hour and is based on a 39 hour week.

Despite economists warning against the government using Keynesian policies due to long term effects, typically they ignore the people who can offer a better solution.

If money were to be "tight" for the next two to three years and people spent very little, there will be surplus funds and the economy would kick start on its own as people start to spend. At the moment no one really wants to spend in case they get made redundant tomorrow.

The good thing about the recession is that the companies with good customer service will survive whereas the others who treated us like dirt will fold and I think I can name a few of these.

Unfortunately the utilities companies have us over a barrel and I don't think the neighbours woudl appreciate a generator in our back garden. Thinking about moving into a touring caravan to get round these bars***ds with their inefficient service. We try and budget on a low income but these guys have your bill all over the place. A final bill from Npower started at £260, then down to £105, then down to £80 as I argued the toss with them as I had all the readings from every month. Now offered a refund plus £75 compensation! Atlantic Gas the same thing. They stated we owed them nearly £150 as their read was 551 units whereas the meter at present is only reading 259 units and they had the cheek to say the reading was based on a true read from a visit! Now getting a £80 refund from them.

The point is that the end result is that it is difficult to budget on a DMP when these clowns make up bills as they go along.

RANT OVER!!!!!!

Apologies for digressing.

[godpikachu]

That figures.

 

I spent a short time a while ago using one.

 

They got me 2 interviews within a space of 2 weeks, so not bad.

 

But, the first interview wasn't for the position that the agent told me it should have been, and the 2nd was a complete disaster that put me off using one again.

 

They told me what the salary was (the minimum I told them I'd accept) I went to the interview (didn't think to confirm the salary as I trusted the agent) got through to a 2nd interview, went to the 2nd interview and got a job offer from the employer a week later directly by to me by phone. Turns out that the salary the company was offering was around 5k lower than what the agency had told me. Absolute waste of time.

 

 

I am registered with approximatley 40 different agencies that are based all over the yorkshire region, some of them in the past have managed to get me interviews, but said interviews have never really amounted to anything.

 

for example, i registered with one agency, who managed to get me an interview within 1 day of my registration, however this interview was for a commission based telephone sales job, which i had stated i wasnt interested in when they asked me what sort of work i was looking for. The consultant who called me told me that the job i was being interviewed for was a team managment position within a customer service department, so imagine my surprise when in the interview they started telling me about a cold calling telesales job.

 

conversley, another agency sent me for what seemed like a good job working in technical support, however what they neglected to tell me was that the company operates on a 24/7 basis.

when i got to the interview, the interviewer began saying about me having to work unpaid 18 hour shifts, working every weekend and having to make myself available 24/7 in case the needs of the company required me to work.

i rang the agency immediatley after the interview and told them what had been said, and they said that it wasnt their problem!.

 

its not all agencies that tell lies though, ive had plenty of direct interviews where the job advert is a complete pack of lies.

i applied for a job working with a large insurance reseller firm, who were advertising for an office administrator with a yearly salary of £14500. However once it came round to inteview time the interviewer said that the yearly salary was in fact £9500, so when i asked if it was only a part time job, she replied in the negative and said it was for a full time 40 hours a week. a few more pointed questions revealed that they were actually looking for an "office boy", and were ideally looking for a school leaver, but they said they were unable to put that in the job advert...hmmm, so the salary was a misprint then eh?.

[Happyfeet24]

i registered with one agency, who managed to get me an interview within 1 day of my registration, however this interview was for a commission based telephone sales job, which i had stated i wasnt interested in when they asked me what sort of work i was looking for. The consultant who called me told me that the job i was being interviewed for was a team managment position within a customer service department, so imagine my surprise when in the interview they started telling me about a cold calling telesales job.

 

That was the same position I ended up being interviewed for.

 

The agent told me it was for field sales (rep)

 

Being unemployed once had a stigma attatched to it, but with recent times being unemployed is becoming as common as being employed. The figures today estimating 2 million out of work by the end of the month (or was it by the end of Feb:???

 

But it's not our fault!!!!!

 

I'm sure I read somwhere today that the latest bright spark idea is to send new JSA applicants on a 2 week unpaid work trail of the job centres choice to prove you're looking for work.

 

Well that's just great. That'll really help.

[godpikachu]

That was the same position I ended up being interviewed for.

 

The agent told me it was for field sales (rep)

 

 

 

most agencies will have loads of these types of jobs on their books, because firstly no one is really interested in them as they offer no stability or guaranteed income, and secondly because jobs like that have ridiculously high staff turnovers due to people not meeting sales targets etc and getting sacked.

 

jobs like that are usually for those sort of people who arent very pleasant, and who lie habitually because they enjoy chasing commissions.

[Sparklez30]

Well I'll be joining the list at the end of March (2nd time being made redundant in a year!).

 

I'm not having any luck with the agencies either although am on about 10 of their books! Have had 2 interviews and although have applied for everything I can I'm struggling to find enough to apply for. I do want to work but as a mother of a toddler it has to be worth my while (to pay for the childcare) and although I have an impecable work record for the past 13 years I'm having trouble finding any decent jobs out there

[Happyfeet24]

jobs like that are usually for those sort of people who arent very pleasant, and who lie habitually because they enjoy chasing commissions.

 

I understand what you're saying, and to a degree there is truth in the statement.

 

Don't confuse field sales ( commercial) with the likes of direct sales, Double glazing ect (much experience)

 

Sadly, commision chasers (even dca phone staff) are as you describe, not all but a majority, it's a tough environment. I'd love to be a whistle blower, I could confront one of the UKs largest double glazing companies for their practices.

 

Commercial field sales aren't quite as bad, but I do see where you're coming from.

[ajax95]

Well I'll be joining the list at the end of March (2nd time being made redundant in a year!).

 

I'm not having any luck with the agencies either although am on about 10 of their books! Have had 2 interviews and although have applied for everything I can I'm struggling to find enough to apply for. I do want to work but as a mother of a toddler it has to be worth my while (to pay for the childcare) and although I have an impecable work record for the past 13 years I'm having trouble finding any decent jobs out there

 

Best thing to do methinks is stick to your guns and keep nagging them!

 

Good Luck!

[godpikachu]

Sadly, commision chasers (even dca phone staff) are as you describe, not all but a majority, it's a tough environment. I'd love to be a whistle blower, I could confront one of the UKs largest double glazing companies for their practices.

 

 

Well, one of the things ive read is that the "commission culture" is one of the reasons for the current economic crisis we are facing. Stockbrokers and futures traders, who all live in their ridiculously privileged little world have been taking cuts out of OUR money and gambling the rest away, and regardless of wether they win or lose, they still take home in excess of £10,000 a week, hence why peoples pensions, investments and bonds have vanished overnight, but yet they still get paid, we dont.

 

Dunno about you, but i certainly wouldnt be paying someone to lose huge amounts of money, if i was working in a shop and money was missing out of the tills, id be expected to make it up out of my own pocket!, so why shouldnt they?.

[ajax95]

Well, one of the things ive read is that the "commission culture" is one of the reasons for the current economic crisis we are facing. Stockbrokers and futures traders, who all live in their ridiculously privileged little world have been taking cuts out of OUR money and gambling the rest away, and regardless of wether they win or lose, they still take home in excess of £10,000 a week, hence why peoples pensions, investments and bonds have vanished overnight, but yet they still get paid, we dont.

 

Dunno about you, but i certainly wouldnt be paying someone to lose huge amounts of money, if i was working in a shop and money was missing out of the tills, id be expected to make it up out of my own pocket!, so why shouldnt they?.

 

Me neither

 

Sad thing is, they've been doing it for decades and they never learn

[godpikachu]

well, its hard to learn anything really when youre knocking back 10 bottles of £500 a bottle champaign a day and snorting your way through £2000 worth of cocaine a week.

 

yes, thats what really happens.

[ajax95]

I know, they've got such a hard life

[Gilbert_O'Sullivan]

Well, one of the things ive read is that the "commission culture" is one of the reasons for the current economic crisis we are facing.

 

And the commission culture was born through deregulation and privatisation by Thatcher here and Reagan in the US.

 

The free market economy advocated by this pair has ended in disaster and lasted less than 25 years-expert economists at the time said we will only be able to tell if it has failed in a generation or so. Now we know and have to pay for it.

 

Even the Yanks have had to intervene with state bail outs-something that would have been unimaginable even just a few years ago.

 

Thatcher cast her dark shadow over this country for 11 years until her own stabbed her in the back-yet her disastrous legacy will be felt for at least another 20 years or even more by which time this country will have returned to what she first abolished.

[Surfer01]

And the commission culture was born through deregulation and privatisation by Thatcher here and Reagan in the US.

 

The free market economy advocated by this pair has ended in disaster and lasted less than 25 years-expert economists at the time said we will only be able to tell if it has failed in a generation or so. Now we know and have to pay for it.

 

Even the Yanks have had to intervene with state bail outs-something that would have been unimaginable even just a few years ago.

 

Thatcher cast her dark shadow over this country for 11 years until her own stabbed her in the back-yet her disastrous legacy will be felt for at least another 20 years or even more by which time this country will have returned to what she first abolished.

 

Codswallop! Labour have been in power for 10 years so how cna you blame a previous government for mismangement? Perhaps it should also be noted that the government prior to the last one left a legacy that took several years to clear up.

[godpikachu]

Codswallop! Labour have been in power for 10 years so how cna you blame a previous government for mismangement? Perhaps it should also be noted that the government prior to the last one left a legacy that took several years to clear up.

 

The "new" labour party has continued some of the conservative parties more destructive economic practices, and has followed on with some of their own, modelled on some of the conservative long term plans.

 

such things as council tax (see:- fresh air tax), privatisation of public sector business (such as allowing councils to take charge and outsource such things as parking attendants, housing maintainance etc).

They have also followed the destructive practic of "cost cutting", whihc has seen once efficiently run departments such as the tax office etc become little more than glorified call centres, and has seen hundreds of thousands of people put out of work.

 

Add to that that the labour government has followed on with the practice of deregulation of the banking industry, the gambling industry and credit agencies.

 

They have done very little in the way of tackling unemployment, other than to institute the "new deal", which in itself is an empty gesture and does pretty much nothing to help the unemployed back into work, unless they are under 25 of course.

The unemployment situation has done nothing but breed serial unemployed individuals who are content to sit at home and do nothing other than go collect their benefits (some of them cant even be bothered to go do that).

 

While living on unemployment benefits is by no means cushy, as the amount of money you get is ridiculously low, to a lot of young people, it is preferable to having to get up and go out and work for a living, especially as they now give extra money to people who are drug addicts or alcoholics....such people dont need extra money, they need shooting.

 

As gilbert said, we are now feeling the knock on effect of thatchers mass privatisation and deregulation, because as per her governments thinking that the working classes are ****, it is us that are now suffering the punitive effects of the thatcher and blair governments preference for the middle classes.

 

You dont see any MPs or cabinet members having to scrape together their last few pence to pay their bills, you dont see board members of companies going down to the dole tosign on do you?, no, of course you dont, because people like that are not being affected in the slightest by the economic crisis, in fact its a miracle that they even know theres one going off.

[Surfer01]

It does not matter whether a person is working class, middle class or upper class we are all in this together and we should look at getting ourselves out of this situation ourselves because as sure as nuts the current government is not going to do anything. I am open to suggestions. Legal suggestions as brothels are illegal!

[godpikachu]

It does not matter whether a person is working class, middle class or upper class we are all in this together......

 

 

dont be daft!, we are certainly NOT all in this together.

do you see any MPs living in scruffy council flats?

do you see the board of directors of RBoS travelling to and from work by bus?

do you see anyone with a title having to write CCA letters or telephone harassment letters?

 

of course not, because those of privilege couldnt give a rats ass about those "beneath" them. They live in their nice comfy, carefree world where no matter what, their investments reap huge dividends, their bank balances are always in the 6-7 figure range, and their applications for credit to buy all that expensive stuff re never turned down.

 

and what do they do to recieve all this money?, very little, unlike the rest of us that work 5 or more days a week for a pittance which then gets swallowed up by the tax man, the utility companies, the credit agencies and shops who charge stupidly high amounts for basic nessecities.

 

do you think lord farquahar-much richer of kensington says to his household staff "oh, dont get the bollinger '56 this month jeeves, get some of that £2.50 a bottle stuff from netto, cos moneys a bit tight at the minute. Also, how is my claim for council tax benefit coming along?, and while youre at it, can you get a quote for fully comp insurance for my peugeot 209, i think the bentley is going to have to go because its too expensive to run!"

[Surfer01]

I was referring to all of us that have been made redundant. Apologies for not making that clear.

[godpikachu]

ah right, but still, a lot of the rsponsibility for us being made redundant rests on the shoulders of those who are so ridiculously rich that they forget to look down occasionally to see what it is theyve stepped in.

[Surfer01]

I found the following article which seems to place the blame for the recession squarely on the government, past and present. I thought it made an interesting read;

Great Britain - The “Rust Belt” of Global Finance

By Martin Hutchinson

Contributing Editor

Money Morning/The Money Map Report

Think about Michigan or about Ohio’s Mahoning Valley in the 1980s. Both were famous for industries that were world leaders in their time. Yet, once those industries decayed, large parts of both areas became wastelands of home foreclosures, crime and alcoholism.

The decline of the global financial services industry from its unsustainable 2006 peak may produce a similar effect in a once economically thriving country – Britain.

Thirty years ago, Britain had its own rust-belt problems. The British automobile industry, a shining star until the Morris Motor Co.’s Lord Nuffield died in 1963 (remember 1959’s hot new model, the Mini?), was subjected to a series of government-directed merger deals in the 1960s, and the resulting mess, British Leyland, was nationalized in 1975, amid appalling losses.

The steel industry was nationalized in 1950, denationalized in 1954, and nationalized again in 1965; not surprisingly, the political football became a byword for high costs, strikes and inefficiency. Even Rolls-Royce Ltd., Brian’s premier high-tech company and maker of both luxury automobiles and aircraft engines, was effectively bankrupted and forced into public ownership in 1971.

In 1979, however, Margaret H. Thatcher became prime minister. Whereas her American contemporary, U.S. President Ronald Reagan, had little direct effect on U.S. industry, Thatcher had a huge direct effect on the shape of the British economy – she had little option, since the government owned so much of it. She forced British Leyland to shrink drastically, privatized British Steel, British Telecom and Rolls-Royce, and dramatically downsized British Coal after a yearlong face-off with the miners union.

At the same time, she deregulated the City of London’s financial-services business on a supposed “level-playing-field” basis, allowing foreign banks to dominate it and effectively putting the 200-year-old London merchant banks out of business.

Thatcher’s restructuring of British manufacturing, together with her tax cuts and government spending restraint, put Britain on a growth path that lasted a generation. Even after her Labour Party political opponents under Tony Blair gained power in 1997, growth continued, although government spending began creeping back upwards, and is now slightly above its 1970’s peak as a percentage of the economy.

Her restructuring of the City of London brought immense wealth to London itself, as huge global banks deployed increasing amounts of resources to growing their London-based international finance businesses. By 2006, London was rivaling New York as a financial center, even though the base of British domestic business was a fraction of that available from the giant U.S economy.

Traders, hedge fund managers, private-equity managers and dealmakers in general were paid fabulous sums. Since London residents were not liable to British tax on their non-U.K. income, the city also attracted footloose glitterati of all kinds, from the Indian steel billionaire Lakshmi Mittal to the seedier but immensely rich top members of the Russian mafia.

In the United States, financial services doubled its share of gross domestic product (GDP) and trebled its share of Standard and Poor’s 500 Index profits between 1980 and 2006; in London, the growth was even greater and its dominance of the economy more extreme. House prices, too, became far more overblown in Britain than in any but the most speculative areas of the United States.

The 2006 celebrations of the twentieth anniversary of the Financial Services Act of 1986, Thatcher’s deregulatory bombshell, rejoiced in London’s newfound wealth, sneered at the relative impoverishment of Britain’s provinces and missed one key weakness of the economy: Almost none of the major institutions generating such fabulous wealth were owned or headquartered in Britain. When London-based “masters of the universe” wanted to speak to those controlling the huge amounts of capital they deployed, they had to pick up the phone to New York, Frankfurt, Paris, Tokyo or Dubai.

Now, the financial services business is in trouble. What’s more, the parts of the business in which London specialized are in most trouble. Securitization and derivatives were the two immediate causes of the credit crisis, while the 50% declines in the emerging-market stock markets have made the exorbitant fees of the private-equity and hedge-fund managers seem extortionate.

It is now abundantly clear that the financial services sector has incurred gigantic losses and that even when those losses have been subsidized by some unfortunate group of taxpayers, the sector is likely to end up being far smaller than it was. In fact, as a share of the economy the sector will probably end up being only a little larger than it was back in the 1970s.

For Britain, this has three appalling costs.

First, the assets of its financial services sector are around 400% of its GDP, below only the much smaller Iceland, Switzerland and Ireland and twice the U.S. ratio (and most Swiss banks were notably cautious in the bubble). Because of the importance of Britain’s financial sector, its bank bailouts need to be nearly as large as those in the United States, yet its tax base is only one quarter the size.

Second, the downsizing of financial services will produce an immensely damaging decline in British asset prices, particularly those of London and southeast England housing, in which so many middle-class Britons have invested their entire life savings (investing in the stock market is much less embedded there than it is here in the United States). That will have a further unpleasant effect on bank loan portfolios, pension and insurance assets and the British tax base, which will deepen the economic downturn.

Third, and most serious, since the British financial services sector is almost entirely controlled from overseas, there is very little long-term reason why it should remain in Britain. After all, it’s not as if London’s climate is particularly attractive except to aficionados, while its infrastructure is appalling. The product areas in which London-based houses appeared to have a particular expertise have mostly been shown to be over-elaborate Ponzi schemes.

Even if the top management of a German, American or Japanese bank wishes to keep its stable of overpaid London financial whiz kids, it will have to deal with enormous shareholder and political opposition to do so. The Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (LEHMQ) bankruptcy, in which money was remitted at the last moment to the United States, so that London-based employees and creditors fared far worse than those in New York, is symptomatic of the “hollowing-out” process that is likely to continue for several years. Even the Russian mafia may find it prefers somewhere warmer.

Eventually, probably after a steep decline in the value of the British pound sterling and a major reorganization of the British economy, and at the cost of an enormous increase in British government debt, the inventive and entrepreneurial British will no doubt find new ways to make a living. In the meantime, I wouldn’t put my money there.

[Editor’s Note: As the financial crisis continues to sweep the globe, it’s clear that “uncertainty” will continue to be the watchword for at least the first part of the New Year. That's really no surprise, given that the global financial crisis continues to whipsaw the U.S. financial markets in a manner that hasn't been seen since the Great Depression.

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[Gilbert_O'Sullivan]

Codswallop! Labour have been in power for 10 years so how cna you blame a previous government for mismangement? Perhaps it should also be noted that the government prior to the last one left a legacy that took several years to clear up.

 

If you really think that in just 10 years the devastation caused by Thatcherism could/should have been rectified by now then I doubt you understand just how much damage was done to this country.

 

The mass selling off of our country's assests cannot just then be brought back into state ownership at the stroke of a pen for financial and legal reasons.

 

Our energy should never have been sold off because there is no good social/financial reason to put that into largely foreign hands and then charge the British population massive bills instead.

 

The only winners were the likes of EDF who are effectively the French government!

 

Our schools, hospitals and most other public services were neglected and crumbling, it was Labour who pledged to bring these into the 21st century and they have largely succeeded.

 

These were quite rightly priority and even more time is needed to rectify the massive damage, especially now.

 

However, I agree the council tax was a pledge by Labour to modernise and they have failed to do that and it is a scandal.

 

But today's ill's building blocks were put in in the 80's.

[Surfer01]

Althgough Labour have been in power for a number of years, they have made absolutely no move to rectify any issues that might have arsien during the Thatcher era. It seems that they allowed it to continue as they knew they would be riding the crest of the wave for awhile.

I totally agree that we should not have allowed foreigners to buy a lot of our utility and other companies due to the consequences. This is all highlighted in my prevous post.

[Happyfeet24]

So when is everything likely to recover?

[godpikachu]

as soon as the rich minority start losing their dividends probably.

[389shell]

You know what, I went into the jobcentre and told them that I had done a bit of research, and I wanted to train to work for Trading Standards, as I was fed up of being the **** on peoples shoes when you work in retail and are treated like that by customers, so i wanted to try get myself a career.

 

The advisor made a kind of, er yeah well er, kind of face and told me that I probably need a degree to do it. I said it is helpful, but not essential, and some certificates are needed, which can be done at college. I asked her to find out how much help i can get, and her actual words were these,"Look, I'm not saying you're thick or anything, but these jobs are extremely hard to get into. I think you should just stick with what you know and keep doing retail, as you have to understand, you have now set your sights too high over retail, and there is 99% chance you won't get on the course to earn those certificates, you are technically not making yourself available for work."

 

I walked out of there, feeling like I'd been shouted at by my dad when I was 5. I'm not ashamed to admit that I have been handling depression for the last two years, was finally having something in my head to work towards, a bit of light at the end of the tunnel, ya know? and after that interview, I have lost all desire to do any job that can inspire me and further my career. I can't believe the attitude of that person

 

Well I dealt with these idiots when my husband was out of work about 7 years ago, my husband told them what he was looking for - which was quite flexible, but he said that it would have to be within a 10 mile radius of home as I worked evenings and so he had to be home. They told him tough, we would have to organise childcare! The way they spoke to him was disgusting, I went with him to the 'interview', and once we got outside, I walked into Woolies (RIP) bought a pen, pad and envelopes, wrote a complaint letter, walked back into the job centre and handed it to the manager. We got a groveling reply.

 

If I were you, skip the job centre completely and go to your local college, you will find that they are very helpful and they can tell you what courses you would be entitled to study for free in your chosen field. There may also be a few more you fancy that you didn't think of before, then go back to the job centre and TELL THEM what you are doing and to find you a job, you may even get an EMA of £30 a week if you study over 12 hours.

 

Good luck.