so gist is, been working a part-time office job for about a year and a half now. and for the most part, not too bad of a gig, all things considered. i get the option to work up to eight hours if i want, and if they have the work to spare. and the work is so mind-numbingly easy i get eight hours worth of work done in three. since nobody checks up on me for the most part (hearing and seeing the sheer totalitarianism of american businesses makes me feel really lucky about this place), i spend the rest of the time learning new things like coding, maths and sciences, history, or just getting some creative writing done.
now, at an e-meeting today, supervisor mentioned an opening for a full-time position that's one step up the corporate ladder: pretty much the same thing but with extra duties like training new hires. the downside is the loss of flexibility in the schedule (rn, as long as i'm in the office for a specific four hours, i can come and go whenever i like; and that's valuable for when i have a health flare-up and need to go home earlier without getting docked); but i could use the extra hours and money to pay off a loan asap, and it also looks okay on a resume when you move up a little.
thing is, i go to apply for the job on the company website: no salary listed. i ask my supervisor what the pay increase is like, and they gave me a wishy-washy idk answer, citing something about “pay scales” and “it depends” where i would fall on that. ask some co-workers who have been there for decades, they have no clue how it works either. so then i figure ok, maybe hr can point me to the right person to ask about payroll–only to find out the hr rep quit suddenly not too long ago, so there isn't one right now (gee that makes me wonder).
i figure i wouldn't get the position anyhow bc i'm a smidge underqualified (they want two years experience and a kind of specialist certification i can get by taking a government-administered course. i'm thinking about taking next time it's open if i can afford it bc hey, looks ok on a resume). but if comes with a relatively substantial raise, even two or three more dollars an hour, i figure it's worth a shot; especially since i'm still a bit miffed about my annual raise of 2% (wow, that'll tide me over till next june jfc).
except judging by the looks of things here…. there isn't gonna be a raise here, is there? definitely not applying until i get a number bc i'm sure as shit not taking on more work and sacrificing my schedule flexibility for free. but is it worth it to apply anyway, see how it turns out? like, if i apply and succeed, and they pull the bait and switch, is it possible to haggle for better? would they fire me later if i turned them down over it? would rather not leave atm, at least until i get that certificate training as something to bring to another firm, bc i got a pretty good thing going here. but it's definitely getting clearer every day that i gotta move on soon if i wanna make more money. thoughts?