Another BAD DAY

[The Real BFO]

I am wondering if the following is unique to the office where I work

It was 1015 on a busy Monday morning when I looked up and noticed the queue was out the door - the manager and assistant manager were sat in their office having a practice run over tomorrows WTL session.they were reading bits out to each other and congratulating themselves when they managed to read out a paragraph without making a mistake.

I looked across to the the desk where our 2 FSS'S sit and they were sat looking at each others laptops (you could have been mistaken for thinking they were playing computer battleships)

My first thought was - I wonder for how long can we carry these passengers - bearing in mind we are one of the offices that are to loose hours .

[simjan]

No its not only your office. One problem is that customers notice these things,get annoyed and then by the time they are at the front of the queue they just want to get out, don't want to invest or buy anything other than what they can in for. But then you are questioned as to what you have been doing, ie are you asking the right question.

[Weeman]

Sounds like any branch these days-and not just Crown Offices at that. Any Sub Office will tell you the same. They are fed up being put under pressure from the Area manager to sell products to customers who do not want them-well the sub offices who still have customers.
Ho wlong until POl want to close more branches?

[PostalOfficer]

My first thought was - I wonder for how long can we carry these passengers

I would add the ever more frequent visits from Area Sales Managers, Bureau Sales Managers etc (I group them all together under the heading of "3-letter acronyms").

You know the sort, they come to ensure our compliance with the 'new sales model' and either sit talking all day on mobile phone conference calls, fiddling with a laptop or hanging round by the office door listening to our conversations.

How much money do these folk cost? i.e. how many credit cards do I have to sell just to pay them?

And they are in addition to our own manager leaning on the end of the counter with a file writing down what we are saying. Sooner or later my temper/stress will get the better of me and I'll invite one of these passengers to try sitting at the counter while I stand and watch them...then we could see how many policies they could sell

P.S. Laughed so much with recognition when I read the original post that I joined the forum!!

[Running Man]

I fully agree with Postal Officer's comments on the wealth of acronyms masquerading as managers within our business.
The sooner Richard Barker and Alan Cook realise that the SEMs, CAMs, APMs and any other set of initials that have no idea of what actually goes on in a Crown Office are stealing a salary from a business with no money, then the better for those of us who actually work for a living.
I would mention Adam Crozier in the same sentence but that man clearly does not know his arse from his elbow, as any postman will testify.
That's it for now. Looking forward to another conference call tomorrow to once again be told that we are not selling enough financial services to an office full of customers with a shortage of staff to serve them.
(Would they really want another credit card/ insurance/ savings conversation even if we had enough staff to serve them?)To close on a positive, we currently have no FSS and long may this continue!

[billyhayes]

I fully agree with Postal Officer's comments on the wealth of acronyms masquerading as managers within our business.
The sooner Richard Barker and Alan Cook realise that the SEMs, CAMs, APMs and any other set of initials that have no idea of what actually goes on in a Crown Office are stealing a salary from a business with no money, then the better for those of us who actually work for a living.
I would mention Adam Crozier in the same sentence but that man clearly does not know his arse from his elbow, as any postman will testify.
That's it for now. Looking forward to another conference call tomorrow to once again be told that we are not selling enough financial services to an office full of customers with a shortage of staff to serve them.
(Would they really want another credit card/ insurance/ savings conversation even if we had enough staff to serve them?)To close on a positive, we currently have no FSS and long may this continue!

Without a doubt one of the best and most accurate posts I have EVER read on here!!!

[The Real BFO]

Here Here

[PostalOfficer]

Well, the 3-letter-acronym (3LA) visited today as it was a (wait for it) - life day. Must be at least two days since we had one of these So we were treated to numerous updates, warm ups, online coaching to say our last conversation was god/bad etc. This level of monitoring just gets everybody tongue-tied as they stop being natural and concentrate what to say My stress level UP, nearly retired sick. [Serious question, when does all this coaching become 'harrassment'?]

Anyway round lunchtime it got busy so it wasn't long before 3LA gave up on us as we just got stuck in and tried to shift the queue.

The 'good news' is that she is returning with reinforcements - we'll have 3 x 3LAs monitoring us on Friday, so with one of our regular managers my colleague reckoned that would be about £120,000-worth of managers watching us sell a couple of credit cards. There again we could all go sick, leave them to man the counter and see how many cards they sold...

Finally, a little thought for those of you like me who couldn't sell bottled water to the population of the Sahara. We've only got to do one measly Transcash payment and we've made more revenue for the PO than a 3LA does all day.

[monica]

we have had several acroynms "helping out" this week and not one of them has managed to get a sale

[Running Man]

Firstly thanks to billyhayes for your very kind observation especially since it was my first (and certainly not my last) contribution to this forum.
Secondly I absolutely love Postal Officer's rather caustic title of "3LA" that he or she has given to any useless senior manager that claims to be of any use whatsoever in the day to day running of a Crown Office.
And thirdly I have noted with a sly chuckle monica's sarcastic use of "helping out" in her superb comment. The day any of these useless, bullying time-wasters can understand anything more than their own inflated level of self-importance will be a very strange day indeed for Post Office Limited.
Finally here's a bitter and twisted yet truthful observation to leave you with. As Crown Office Managers we are told on at least two occasions each year (Annual Conference and Christmas) what a "fantastic job you do" and "how important you are to the future of our business". If that's the case then how come we spend the other 258 working days of the year receiving a kick up the arse from the CAMs, SEMs, Regional Managers and anybody else who cares to join in this 21st century Post Office version of a lynching? Ask your manager and see if he or she agrees. Who knows, it may even give him or her something to smile about in a business sadly lacking any sense of humour at present!
Bye for now, Running Man.

[The BFO]

For once I am lost for words – you are all spot on. Isn’t it curious how we don’t know each other, but all feel the same?