new manager making work unbearable.

mandy1955 · 20 April 2018 at 9:45PM

hi,
I have searched for a place to put this question but couldn't find anywhere but here.
I have worked at this job for over a year and I loved it till a new female manager started. I am in my early 60's and my job is customer service/admin it is a small office of around 30-35 people.

we all get on well, but have been very unhappy since this woman took over her role of customer services manager.

if she sees a team getting on really well she moves you to another team, for no other reason than what we believe is spite.
She is imposing strict rules on us, we are not to discuss work in our break room, we are not allowed to use any profanities in our break room or discuss anything done or said on a night out that she would deem inappropriate..one young lady was disciplined recently for telling her friends about her boozy night out, she was reported and received a verbal warning.

we are not a call/contact centre as we order medicines and drugs for pharmacies so we need to be accurate and efficient but the addition of newly introduced stats are making life on the phones very stressful.
People are very upset at work as the atmosphere is very tense and even the younger ones are scared they will make mistakes because they are under such stress and as we send out drugs to pharmacies and hospitals we cannot make mistakes.

is there anything we can do or say that wouldn't get us into even more hot water with this manager? is it worth speaking to HR?...This was a lovely job but she doesn't seem to care if people hate moving she just tells us that the decision has been made and that's that.
we log into to a phone system and she has recently brought up the fact that even if we log in dead on 9am we show up sometimes as 3 seconds late..yes SECONDS.. but if we get stuck on a call near home time that's no problem for her at all.
She wants us to log in at 8:59 everyday or we will show as late.

I don't want to leave as I do love the job but she is making our lives miserable with her pettiness and many of the younger girls are job hunting so I know it's not just me. Does she have any rights over our break out room please?

sorry for the rant...

tacpot12 · 20 April 2018 at 10:03PM

If you are being put under undue stress, and you think the stress is likely to lead to mistakes, you need to report the situation to HR, as it is a health and safety issue. You should have some protection, but I would expect that the manager will find out who the 'ring-leader' is and do everything they can to manage them out. HR amy or may not be able to stop this.

So you need to be very careful that you are not overreacting. Perhaps the management has brought her in because they think the teams need shaking up? Being asked to be logged into the phone system at 08:59 is not unreasonable. Not using profanities at work is also a reasonable expectation - you don't really know who you are offending as some people may be too polite to object. She has to try to get the best out of all the teams, so she has a legitimate right to move people between teams if she can argue that there is a reason to do so. Have you asked her why she has moved people?

She might not be aware of the impact she is having and might welcome the feedback if it is given contructively.

mandy1955 · 20 April 2018 at 10:18PM

hi, two of my colleagues were told they were being moved to support 2 new trainees coming out onto the floor, however the trainees have been told to buddy up with other colleagues, hence these two feel they were moved out of spite, as they were getting on really well as a team.
One of the guys in our office told us if we log in a minute early everyday for a year it amounts to £40 that we are not getting, also as our calls are so involved we can sometimes be late leaving after our shift for up to 20 minutes some nights for which we don't get paid.
One colleague used the word s**t in an offhand way when she dropped her phone, she got a letter of concern as she was overheard, another girl said the same word and her supervisor gave her a verbal warning.. no real consistency.

McKneff · 20 April 2018 at 10:35PM

Why are you worrying about logging in at 8.59.
The difference between 8.59 and 9.00am is literally 1 second

mandy1955 · 20 April 2018 at 10:38PM

some of us were pulled up for logging in at 9 and 3 seconds...that goes against us getting our bonus...but staying behind for 20 minutes on a call doesn't get us paid..

bspm1 · 20 April 2018 at 11:03PM

McKneff wrote: »

Why are you worrying about logging in at 8.59.
The difference between 8.59 and 9.00am is literally 1 second

Maths isn't your strong point is it.

Les79 · 20 April 2018 at 11:24PM

mandy1955 wrote: »

if she sees a team getting on really well she moves you to another team, for no other reason than what we believe is spite.

One immediate thing which springs to mind is that she is seeing an employee working well within a team, so decides to move them to a struggling team in the hopes that they can have a positive impact on it.

She is imposing strict rules on us, we are not to discuss work in our break room, we are not allowed to use any profanities in our break room or discuss anything done or said on a night out that she would deem inappropriate..one young lady was disciplined recently for telling her friends about her boozy night out, she was reported and received a verbal warning.

Seems a bit harsh like. But if those are the rules, just play the game.

we are not a call/contact centre as we order medicines and drugs for pharmacies so we need to be accurate and efficient but the addition of newly introduced stats are making life on the phones very stressful.

Well, if you spend a fair amount of time on phones then you can pretty much consider it a call centre. More of an outbound one.

The manager can introduce whatever stats they want. Your job is to do what they say/pay you to do. If they want you to complete calls based on some type of stats then you need to do it.

People are very upset at work as the atmosphere is very tense and even the younger ones are scared they will make mistakes because they are under such stress and as we send out drugs to pharmacies and hospitals we cannot make mistakes.

Sounds a bit crappy like.... But I would be eager to know to what extent the workload is unmanageable VS employee resistance to any sort of change.

The stats targets may be perfectly achievable for many people, it may just be that younger ones need to get up to speed a bit and some people are dragging their heels, or aren't *that* good at the job.

Then again, maybe speak to your manager about your concerns if you feel that the workload is genuinely unmanageable. At this stage I just see a boss who wants to do it their way/mark their territory, and not necessarily a boss who doesn't listen.

You got any outlets for further training/guidance on how to achieve the targets set out? Weekly/Monthly 1-1 meetings with your boss?

we log into to a phone system and she has recently brought up the fact that even if we log in dead on 9am we show up sometimes as 3 seconds late..yes SECONDS.. but if we get stuck on a call near home time that's no problem for her at all.
She wants us to log in at 8:59 everyday or we will show as late.

Seems a bit rubbish like, but then again I thought you said that you weren't at a call center?! If that is truly the case then there is NO HARM logging in at even 08:55! You aren't inbound so you won't be getting a call in that time. You can log in @ 08:55 and make your first outbound @ 09:05 etc.

Bit rubbish with the 3 seconds thing (sounds like the clocks aren't synced) but the simple solution is; Log in 3 seconds earlier. A strange, magical thing will happen if you decide to log in early..... SHE WILL STOP GETTING ON YOUR CASE!

I don't want to leave as I do love the job but she is making our lives miserable with her pettiness and many of the younger girls are job hunting so I know it's not just me. Does she have any rights over our break out room please?

sorry for the rant...

Surprised that you haven't learnt this lesson in the 60 years you've been on this planet (Double that of me!) but here goes;

Your manager in ANY job is absolute pot luck! You'll encounter all sorts, from competent, to absolutely useless. You can't choose your manager, but you can choose how much you let them affect you in your daily affairs.

So by all means job hunt, but don't automatically assume that it will be any better.

Les79 · 20 April 2018 at 11:41PM

mandy1955 wrote: »

hi, two of my colleagues were told they were being moved to support 2 new trainees coming out onto the floor, however the trainees have been told to buddy up with other colleagues, hence these two feel they were moved out of spite, as they were getting on really well as a team.

Can't really make sense of that. But I will say that there are possibilities OTHER THAN spite to explain why this happened.

One of the guys in our office told us if we log in a minute early everyday for a year it amounts to £40 that we are not getting, also as our calls are so involved we can sometimes be late leaving after our shift for up to 20 minutes some nights for which we don't get paid.

Well, I'm sure you can guess I used to supervise in a call centre by now....

This has never sat right with me to be fair, as agents should really be paid for the time worked. But this occurs across the board and is not just exclusive to your [STRIKE]call centre[/STRIKE] whatever you call it. It is probably the next big union thing, but until then just suck it up like most agents in most call centres do.

Oh and if you log in 1min early every day for a year, you work roughly 5 days in 7 (per week) across 52 weeks = 260 shifts.

Let's say you get paid above market rate (min wage) and so get £10 per hour, which is very generous unless you're in London.

260 shifts * (1/60) * £10 = £43

Take off tax (roughly multiply by 0.85) = £37 ish

Then again, if you log in 08:59 then do you also track the seconds? If not, your average log in time across the year will probably come out to be 08:59:30. This would mean that, on average, you are probably only working 30seconds of overtime.

So you are probably losing out on more like £18 a year.

Is it really worth making a fuss about for even £40 when you are set to make roughly £21,000 gross in the same period (on £10 an hour)?

One colleague used the word s**t in an offhand way when she dropped her phone, she got a letter of concern as she was overheard, another girl said the same word and her supervisor gave her a verbal warning.. no real consistency.

In my old place, we would have instantly dismissed the colleague had the client heard the word (or it was picked up on the call recording).

The second case you mention doesn't have context. Did it also happen on a call? Or was it said away from a phone?

Fireflyaway · 21 April 2018 at 7:46AM

I've seen the exact same thing happen in a contact centre i worked in. Strict virtually unachievable targets were imposed, you were watched all the time. I didn't achieve my targets because I logged in 21 seconds late. Didn't matter if was because the computer was being so slow. Never got thanks for all the times I was on a call after clocking off time and missed my bus! Horrible groups formed because certain people would side with the nasty manager just to protect themselves. It was like school! Everyone felt very unappreciated and just a number used to turn over as many calls as possible. We were asked to do more and more work with not even a thank you. Then they hired new people in on lower pay which caused more bad feelings!
Is this manager your direct manager? Could you mention the change to her? If that's too akward i would speak to hr. If there is a group of you even better. There are certainly different management styles but being too controlling will backfire. I bet the sickness absence will start to increase soon.

[Deleted User] · 21 April 2018 at 7:48AM

People are expected to multi task nowadays.

Even as the lowest of the low in Telesales I also do Credit Control and invoicing, it isn't a case of made a sale, that's it over. What was a 2+ men job last year is a one man this.

Stats are a way of life and for some they have to meet these in order to keep their job.

soolin · 21 April 2018 at 8:25AM

bspm1 wrote: »

Maths isn't your strong point is it.

If the clock in doesn't show seconds then the difference between logging in at 8.59 (8.59 and 59 seconds) and 9am is 1 second, so technically the difference between having a 8.59 and 9am log in could be as little as 1 second or as much as 59 seconds.

new manager making work unbearable.

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