Oh the things you'll wish you did

Oh the things you'll wish you did instead

This is an entry that has been a long time coming. I am no longer a recent graduate. I've been off the beaten track of higher education for going on 8 months now. Much like an addict I would do almost anything for one more hit of learning.

Instead, I have spent the last six months working in a call centre. Customer care has lured many a bored and strapped for cash individual. It seems like easy work, you're not exposed to the elements and those ergonomic spinning chairs are as comfy as they look.

However beneath the shiny veneer of £7.53 an hour and 21 days holiday a year (including bank holidays) lies a waiting beast. The creature known as Customer Service. Like a war veteran hearing the words Saigon, customer service causes those who have escaped to inwardly shudder.

Like war and getting attacked by bees, I treat customer service as a learning experience. The lessons are many and the verbal assaults flow as freely as office stationery.

Here are the things I have learned:

The customer isn't always right, but they have a point

"The customer is always right" is a phrase trotted out in circumstances to persuade you to engage in activities that are against company policy and may very well drop your arse right in the fire. Be it extra fries with your burger or a free cinema ticket, because no-one warned you this film contained Renee Zellweger.

It's easy to cast off these customers as prats and chancers. However some of them do have a point (hence the clever subtitle).

I work for a company that consistently boasts that they "make dreams come true". A rather ludicrous starting point for any company. So instilled with this ethos a customer rings with a problem which isn't resolved on that call, you are accused of not meeting company standards. At this point your inner monologue starts fusing and the desire to spit out some vitriol rises. Rather than explain theories of artistic licence to the woman who's threatening to gut you with a BHS Steak Knife Selection. You are instead expected to sit there with a smile, which they can't even see and apologise without confirming any level of culpability for you or the company.

You can see why so many people throw in the towel after only a few months. But these customer raise a good point. If this is promised why isn't this service delivered? Which leads us rather succinctly to my next point.

Maximum solution, minimum spend

Your real job when working in customer service is not to directly solve a problem but rather control it, to stop a full-scale revolution taking place. Business even in an age of social media and 24-hour advertising still relies heavily on word of mouth. Nothing drops a company's popularity than Sharon from the salon, regaling you with a nightmare tale of misdirection and wasted time. This is where I step in, which would be fine as the odd free product and gift voucher is enough to shut up most people. However these are only toted as last resort, rather the promise that this 'matter will be looked into' is apparently all you need to diffuse any situation.

As we all know, this is not the case. This serves only to exacerbate an existing problem. Coupled with being on hold for twenty minutes and a sugary opening greeting most mild-mannered people at this point are ready to garrote the next poor sod who answers the phone. Cue myself and thousands like me trying to keep the cost down at the price of their own sanity and quickly dissipating self-respect. To put it rather simply unless you shout, write, moan and generally eat up my time you are not getting any kind of priority service.

What, you again?!

That's right, that shmuck who vowed to never darken your door or engage in your services has returned. With a new problem and a fresh tin of "it's not my problem, it's yours". Who are these masochists? These men and women who will never shop with you again and avoid you, out of principle. Then expect your sympathy and patience, as they explain how once again they are disappointed with the service and products they have received. Fresh with a rudimentary knowledge of your system processes and company procedure they will make your life a living hell, just for the sake of so-called principles. 

For the record I'm all for principles. Save the Rainforest if you have to, just don't do it with your feet up on a mahogany coffee table. In the same vein don't boycott us and then demand free products to ensure we keep you as a customer.

Passing the buck

If there was ever a lesson worth knowing it's this. You've got work to do but want to go drinking. Give it to the intern. Arrange to call someone back and take the next day as holiday, why not let someone else deal with it. I say this with confidence as I have just taken a week's holiday and I can guarantee someone has taken flack for my laziness or broken promises.

We all keep doing it so it keeps on happening. If you can't be blamed, even better. If not feign ignorance and move on Skippy. Yes there is a certain Karmic element to this business practice, so give as good as you get.

Filling the hours

What do you know, only one more hour until I have to work another two hours before four hours worth of work, then I can go home. If you recognise this scenario, well done on you're as bored as we are. There will always be peak times in any industry, for ours it's Christmas and really any major public holiday. When those pressure-filled months have finally passed, the rest seems like a desert of backward moving clocks and various counting games.

You will always have jobs like this, where you will stagnate for hours on end and then expect to be ready to leap into action with a sharp mind and an answer to everything. It's on these days the biggest fuck-ups will most likely occur. A promise of a service that isn't provided or worst of all assuring a customer that someone will call them back in an hour.

Remember when in doubt stay vague and promise nothing. This is also a brilliant piece of advice when you engage in the painful conversation with friends and loved ones, when they ask "what do you really want to do with your life?"

There ain't no party like a call centre part, 'cos a call centre party don't stop

Definitely the most important lesson of all. No-one has the ability to bounce back more than someone who deals with irritable people all day. Be it a birthday or your second cousin's Bar Mitzvah. It is going to be wild.

You will see your average customer service worker either crowded around a busy table, there will never be less than ten of them. Or drinking ludicrous amounts of cheap liquor and telling bawdy stories of people's ridiculous names and there even more ridiculous problems.

So there you have it, a look into my life and many people like me. The person on the other end of your phone or answering your email, isn't a robot or some kind of unintelligent drone. Rather they are a hostage of binding company policy and unexplainable abuse from bored cretins and Guardian readers.

Rock and Roll.

The Slacker's A-Z of University

This week I was meant to write a nice, lengthy and responsible post about the online hacker group Anonymous. However that would've required some semblance of a work ethic and effort, so instead I bring you the ultimate A-Z of university life in England.


A- Acceptance

The start of your journey, you've scraped the minimum grade requirements and you are on your way to a three year government subsidized holiday, goodbye safe suburbia and hello crack-den student housing and questionable 2-for-1 vodka and mixer deals. Quick note, this victory should not apply to those of you who got into Oxbridge. You are well and truly fucked; say goodbye to sunshine, sunshine. Prepare to enter a world of ridiculous stereotypes and deadlines so tight you'd think you were being punished. Serves you right for trying so hard.

B- Bursary

That's right they actually give you money for dicking around and not contributing to the economic well-being of the country. God save the Queen. These normally go to those who have tried hard their whole lives and have had private tutors since they could talk, ergo the rich or those who have grown up in council tenements that are a cross between post-communist Russia and an Adam Deacon cocaine nightmare.

C- Cash

Look I'm not going to tell you to get a job, because I'm not your mum and to be honest she probably doesn't give a toss anyway because let's face it you're an adult and studying something called 'conceptual theatre' and she's still saying she's proud of you. Most student experiences centre around being absolutely skint, just remember a three-litre bottle of off-brand cider will knock you out for at least half a day if downed straight out of the bottle. That completely takes of breakfast and lunch the next day, sorted.

D- Degree

That's what you're here to get mate, that magic piece of paper that will open the doors to every P.R. firm and accounting office in the London area. Oh wait scratch that this isn't the eighties. See these days employers want this odd thing called 'experience', this isn't gained from sitting in your pants eating cornflakes and watching re-runs of Cash in the Attic. Sorry about that. A degree is nothing more than something to hang on your wall and remind you that you did indeed spend three years eating nothing that wasn't from a tin and building up an alcohol tolerance so mighty that you have to take your Kestrel super-strength lager through an IV drip.

E- Ecstasy 

Where the Christ did you get money  for recreational drugs, oh yeah that bursary, told you it would come in handy. University is the time that most young people will dabble in a bit of class-A hilarity. Just remember to keep grinding your teeth and hugging the wall even if you don't feel anything. Chances are you've actually just bought a Nurofen, because let's face it you don't actually know what ecstasy looks like because it hadn't really spread to the delightful suburbs of Shropshire. Just blag your way through it and in the morning you'll feel like the dog's bollocks, thank god for the placebo effect.

F- Fashion

Prepare for Jack Wills and those ridiculous climbing shoes. Jesus man you're walking to campus get a grip. That's not the worst of it however, a university hoody and flip-flops are standard dress-code whatever the weather. Wouldn't want people thinking you actually took yourself seriously now would you.

G- Girls

OK don't panic but you will be surrounded by the opposite sex in all their glorious states including moody, angsty and homesick. On the off chance you manage to persuade one of them to come back to yours after grinding on them all night in your local basement pub/club remember she doesn't want to see your stereo and she also has no idea what she wants to do when she graduates. Keep it strictly about the job in hand or arse if she's proper naughty.

H- Home

You will eventually have to go back whether it's for holidays or to get your laundry done. Remember you are the conquering hero, Christopher Columbus in a duffel coat. If anyone asks you've already got two girls on the go and your weed dealer is the same bloke who sells to Wiz Khalifa, simples. Make sure you raid your parents cupboards for all they are worth and there is no shame in scamming your parents for a cheeky twenty pounds for 'textbooks'. Repeat after me 'It's much more expensive than they make out in the brochure'.

I- Internet

Twenty quid a month you're having a laugh. You can get Facebook on your phone and if you still need pornography you're really not getting the most out of your university experience. If you're that fussed just steal your local Costa's WI-FI and you'll have access to endless re-runs of Friends and videos of cats playing pianos.

J- Jokes

Students are great practical jokers, especially those awesome lads on the rugby team... If you want to keep it fresh instead of stealing a road sign why not steal a road, that will really fuck up someone's day.

K- Ketamine

No, just no. Stick to Fosters and dry-humping on a futon, at least then you won't have to explain to your mum why you were on CrimeWatch for trying to jam your cock in a postbox and claiming it led you on.

L- Library

Welcome to the Wild West of your university, a place where everyone is one novelty ring tone away from slashing that girl with the gym bag in the face with their university emblazoned ruler. You will see people absolutely wrecked on Russian energy drinks and fear, all while trying to cram a semester's worth of revision onto flash-cards two days before the exam. Good luck getting a seat and watch out for the librarians, those come-hither eyes are full of nothing but empty promises.

L (again)- Lads

University used to be the home of spotty chaps in trench coats and rich kids with ripped jeans selling copies of Socialist Worker. All the while chasing girls who claimed to be Marxist-Anarchist-Feminists and took holidays in the Maldives. Somewhere this all changed and a far more sinister group began to take over. Be on the look out for brightly coloured polo shirts, pockets stuffed with free drink vouchers and gang-rape disguised as 'banter'. We are the lads.

M- Moping

You'll do your fair share of this, especially during your second year. When that year-long hangover that is Freshers finally wears off. Just remember no-one knows why they came to university or what they're going to do with their lives. Most people go to escape these questions, just remember if you were at home right now your biggest adventure would be arguing where has the cheapest Carlsberg; Yates or Wetherspoons. So strap on a pair go for a walk and remember the clubs open at nine.

N- Notes

You're meant to take these on those rare occasions you bother to turn up to lectures, just copy the powerpoint, the lecturer only really wants to read what they agree with. That's why courses such as 'Advanced Hitler Studies' are really on the decline. A quick note for lectures, try to attend about fifty percent of them. It's a nice round number and you'll probably soak up enough bullshit to feed your parents if they ever act concerned and ask 'so what are you really doing at uni, besides drinking ha ha'. Yeah that one never gets old.

O- Optimism

Bear in mind there is a light at the end of the tunnel and you won't be living on noodles and shitty promises of a brighter future forever. Soon you'll finish these stressful three years and then your real life can begin. A life of council tax, lining up at the post office and working for sweet, sweet minimum wage. Just remember Barista is Spanish for English Graduate.

P- Politics

For god's sake don't get involved involved with Student Union politics. No president can make any real difference because they don't handle any kind of big money, it's a con so students don't start getting pissed off when they're pints start going up ten pence a year (they will by the way). If you decide to get involved in S.U. politics you will end up fighting over what colour this year's graduation banner should be. An environment filled with people who have more of a sense of self-importance than a room full of community support officers on a Die Hard binge. You've been warned.

Q- Quarrels

Oh yes you will have more than your fair share of these sonny. Whether it's who ate your Jaffa cakes, who used the last of the hot water, or who keeps shitting without flushing. The best thing to do is have a bare-knuckle boxing tournament every week to sort out any issues you may have. To those people that leave pussy little notes about the house, grow up.

R- Religion

A bit of a cagey issue I grant you, best to avoid the topic altogether. Unless you're absolutely mullered on snakebite and bitter about the fact that just because you can't keep it in your pants you're not allowed into heaven. If so go spray paint the word fascist on the Christian Union building. They'll think it's hilarious, if you have to pick on one religion try Buddhism they'll forgive you the quickest. They're good like that. Quick side note, a lot of people who claim to be religious tend to lose their shit at university, watch out for mental breakdowns and activities that make Girls Gone Wild look like a day at the farmer's market.

S-Studying

OK, the exam is in two days. You know nothing about Forensic Criminology and that marathon of CSI Miami has done nothing but help you think of shit puns about horrible accidents. The trick is to stop paying attention to what everyone else is doing and focus on your own angle. Chances are your lecturer has probably already told you the exam questions, if this fails there is no shame in paying off that Serbian bloke that sort of looks like you to take the exam for you. After all why is his future more important than yours.

T- T.V. Licence

Unless you fancy shitting yourself for the next year every time the doorbell rings I'd recommend getting a T.V. licence, they're a bit pricey but who can put a price on Jeremy Kyle in the day-time and Babestation for when the WI-FI has a strop. Plus it gives you a brilliant excuse for procrastination, that BBC documentary on Wallace and Gromit will definitely help you pad out that essay on British folk art.

U- Undergraduate

That's you, or was you if you're viewing this list as a nostalgia trip. If so get off the internet and go help your mum with the washing-up. Your under-grad years will be the best at university and require little to no effort to pass. However if you follow that same mindset and embark on post-grad studies you are in for a wild ride full of doing lecturer's marking and not seeing your mates. It is a nightmare unless you're training to be a teacher, then it's weirdly nostalgic as you walk through the halls watching kids beating the shit out of each other for wearing the wrong kind of trainers and thinking Dizzy Rascal is still the cat's pyjamas.

V-Virginity

Now if you have not lost your virginity before you go to university chances are you were either waiting for Mr. Right or everyone thought you were a wanker. It's called the double standard get used to it. Needless to say this will all change as soon you enter the hallowed halls of further education. Nothing makes a man look more attractive to repressed countryside women than knowing how many joints you can roll from an eighth and knowing all the words to Eminem's 'Encore' album. That and the fact in Fresher's week everyone is so drunk they'd probably try to shag that tree outside the union bar if it said they liked they're new gilet. Happy hunting.

W-Wanking

Holy crap there's a lock on my door and I don't know the neighbours. You will spend a fair amount of time engaging in this age-old hobby. Until you get into your first serious relationship and then you'll spend even more time doing it, this is because at university all couples like to play house. At the end of your six month stint as boyfriend and girlfriend you'll hate each other so much that you can't bear to think of them sexually, sorry about that champ.

X- Kisses

You know like the ones you put on cards. OK I'll admit it, I didn't have one for X. In terms of kissing, just remember: no guts no glory. You won't get a second chance and she never will be at the club again, so straighten up that M&S blazer and go in for the kill. If they turn you down they were probably gay anyway either that or she found out your blazer was from M&S you sad bastard. Speaking of cards, Christmas cards are childish and Valentines day cards just show that you didn't have the imagination to say something nice so you paid the bloke at Clinton's two pound fifty to do it for you, amateur.

Y- Yates

Ah yes the old stomping ground. It's a comforting place and every one around the country is pretty much the same so you'll always feel at home. Here's the problem you're not at home and the locals know it. You are two sambucas away from getting your head kicked in because you decided to tuck your shirt into your jeans. Leave the locals alone and head back to the union. They have a right to hate as every year they have to deal with an influx of workshy wankers who complain about the price of everything in an annoying accent, you can't really blame them.

Z- Zeitgeist

This is an awful film that you're almost guaranteed to have to sit through sometime in your time at university. Conspiracy theories are always rife at universities because people can't seem to deal with the fact that the world is an unfair place. It is, now stop trying to topple the government and go do some reading.



There you have it an almost complete guide to all the shit you'll have to put up with for the most entertaining and sometimes miserable three years of your life. You may have hated every minute of university, but you're guaranteed to look back on it as the happiest days of your life. Which is in fact really sad.

So This is Where it Starts... ah F**k

So this is where it starts.... ah fuck

My name's Josh I'm twenty-one and I've decided to keep a blog because I suppose I'm a millennial and this is what you're meant to do. Apparently going down to the pub to complain is no longer an option because no-one goes down to the pub anymore, and even if you wanted to you couldn't because the council has shut your pub down because nobody goes to it anymore. When Joseph Heller wrote catch-22 I'm really not sure this is what he has in mind.

I'm currently sitting in my room in the beautiful knife-crime quarter of Southampton. To be honest I couldn't be happier right now. The cupboards are stocked full of tins of Heinz and Super Noodles. The staple diet for everyone who claims they are a 'busy intellectual'. I am not but it's cheap and scurvy would be one of the cooler illnesses to suddenly get, chlamydia is so 2009. But I digress, I am happy right now because I am a student. A group of people constantly told that they are the future but at the same time being told this future is pretty bleak mate because you didn't apply for an internship In Derby or Scarborough that is vaguely related to the field you didn't want to get into.

You didn't bother to make savvy connections at business fairs; and the last time you spoke to anyone in the finance industry was when you got that phone call from your bank manager asking if you wanted to extend your overdraft. While I'm here I might as well tell you, for the love of all that is holy do not extend your overdraft. Yes for a few days you can start eating meat that didn't come frozen in a tray with pasta or off the back of that van next to the Wetherspoons. However in two months time you are going to be right back where you started and five hundred pounds worse off for it. I'm beginning to think that's what must have happened to Lehman Brothers. They probably kept nipping down the Natwest every few minutes to make sure they had enough in their accounts for tonight's champagne bar and the next thing you know they're dealing with an interest rate that would make an East London loan shark blush.

So I'm getting ready to dive into a now flailing job market. It's not like the old days either when people like Harold McMillan would tell stories about how if he couldn't find work he'd hop on his bike and go looking in the next town. Well I'm afraid I've got bad news squire, EVERYONE'S town is low on work, you'll probably end up commuting to Sunderland every morning, you'll have to get up so early you probably won't have finished yesterday's shift. All you're contributing to is the sale of Lycra and ridiculous looking cycle helmets, you berk. So yes the job front is well and truly knackered and in three weeks I'm going to be ripped from the cosy womb that is further education and thrust into a world where going into a job interview and saying you have a degree is the same as saying I I once watched an episode of the apprentice so I'm pretty sure I can run this shit.

But for this current moment in time I am happy, I started this blog to take an honest look at how a mediocre student, with a questionable work ethic, with all the career trajectory of a bloke selling 'Jim'll Fix It' t-shirts can survive in England and more importantly the real world. Strap in it's going to be a bumpy if not depressing ride.