A few years ago I got this fairly low-level job but the pay was decent.
Being low on the totem pole, I was asked to do this mind-numbing tedious job that no one else wanted, but details were important — if you messed up, the clients were not happy.
Anyway, after doing this a few times I asked why wasn’t this automated?
I’m told it can’t be done why not? because it can’t
Long story short, I automate the process. I get a huge promotion. Everyone is happy.
Then one day without any warning, I’m fired. To this day, I have no idea why. They did have high turnover.
As I’m sitting the HR’s office while turning in my badge, my relatively new boss starts yelling at me. Not accusing me of anything, just yelling. Him being a big guy, I should have either left the office or called for help. Seriously.
I’m asked to sign off on a mind-boggling multi-page NDA to get a whopping 2 week severance package. I declined.
Which brings me to the meat of my post.
I get unemployment compensation. Since I was earning good wages, I maxed out on the employment benefits which were very good at the time so all I have to do is apply for at least 2 jobs/week — which I do.
Then a few months later, everyone who is receiving unemployment benefits must come to the unemployment office in person to fill out a form.
The form required you to enter:
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The name of the company you applied to
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The email & phone number of the person you contacted
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Job title
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And, of course, the date
But here’s the kicker: For the previous two months you had to make sure that:
- The company you applied to which cannot be the same company as previous jobs searches.
So if MegaCorp had dozens of different divisions, every application to MegaCorp all counted as one.
In other words, if you applied to multiple different divisions at MegaCorp, those applications counted as one application and you were kicked off of unemployment. The problem is there were several giant companies with many divisions
- You had to know the actual email address and phone number of the person you applied to.
Unbelievably, I actually saved all of this information and was able to fill out the form. I asked the guy at unemployment how many people were able to complete the form. He said, not many.
This was a clever (insidious) way for the state to kick off tons of people off of benefits since none of these rules were ever known in advance.
This time I got lucky.
But a month later, the state stopped all benefits to everyone.
So not so lucky.
We were required to retain this information for 3 years for any later audits.
Didn’t get audited.