Gizzajob (2.1)

It is obvious: I don’t have a job

I decided to play the unemployed game.  I did not want the government unemployment figures to be out by one so I signed on.  I actually signed up for Jobseekers allowance.  I will never get any of the other benefits as I’m rich (sic).  It turns out that I won’t get Jobseekers allowance as the rules are set against me.  However if I persist there might come a time when I will get it.  Though it is a long hard road.  At least for every week I am signed on I get NIC credits towards my state pension.  I think I am there but it does not hurt to have a few more going in.  If I were to get Jobseekers allowance it would represent an hourly rate of about £100 so it is worth having from that respect.  At the moment I am working for free.

I applied on-line and got a very quick response (in the post) telling me I was not going to get any money.  You have to have made enough NIC contributions over the last 2 years to qualify.  If you are working that is fine but if you are not then you have to have signed on in the gap.  I did not manage that for all the time.  I went on holiday so they signed me off.

I went to the Jobcentre+.  It used to be called the Jobcentre but has now gained a ‘+’.  Much as in my earlier comments on my last foray the only job element is that it employs a lot of people.  Beyond that it has nothing to do with jobs.

The treatment of applicants (supplicants) is as shoddy as last time.  I handed a form in and stood at a desk waiting to know what I should do.  A woman came to the desk and asked the person sitting there, who I had given the form to, what I was doing.  He said to the woman that he had told me to sit down.  I leant over him and asked him if he had thought why I had not moved.  I was considering a stand-up argument but instead settled for turning round and going to the waiting area just as he started talking to me.

The form I had filled in listed the top 10 job categories and asked me to mark which ones I wanted to be considered for.  Three typical ones were: retail sales, delivery driver, warehouseman.  I put ‘none of these’.  I did describe what I did.

I was called for my interview quite quickly.  The first problem was that they needed to classify my job against a list they had.  I rejected all the categories as being dangerously inaccurate.  She said that she had to enter something.  I suggested that she create a new category.  Alas, that was not allowed.  So I asked if she had to put something down or something accurate down.  She simply repeated that she had to put something down.  So I suggested Brain Surgeon.  She said that I had to treat this process seriously to which I replied that I would if she would.  I then did the silent close on her and it worked a treat: she filled the void and asked me if I had any suggestions.  I tried ‘Mercenary’ which I often describe myself as.  She did the silent close on me and I said what about ‘Other’.  She found it and clicked on it and the age of miracles is not past, up popped a box asking for a description.  We put one in.

She had by now taken to turning the screen to me so that I could help her with my bizarre answers.  I noticed that on many fields when she hit return a box popped up that said something inane and had an ‘OK’ button that she had to click.  I pointed out to her that instead of torturing her as she had to take her hand off the key board and move the mouse to the pop-up it ought to put the mouse over the ‘OK’ button or allow her to hit return.  We then had an enlightening discussion on-screen design and ergonomics.  She said after that she understood what I did for a living – no she didn’t.

Then we came to jobs and my refusal to be a warehouseman.  I thought this a little ironic as the person being interviewed at the desk next to me was a warehouseman who had just lost his job and was being pointed at anything other than warehouseman jobs.  I said that I didn’t have the necessary skills.  At this point we really did enter a surreal world.  She asked me what skills I didn’t have.  To which I replied that never having been one I didn’t know any.  She then asked me how I could say that I didn’t have the skills when I didn’t know what they were!  I said if she would tell me what they were I would confirm if I had them or not.  You can guess what she replied: I don’t know what those skills are.  We finished off that little roundabout with me asking her how she expected me to know what warehouseman skills were.

Then we moved on to delivery driver.  I said I was not allowed to.  To which she responded that I said I had a clean driving licence.   I confirmed that I had.  She said that I could drive a van then.  I replied that I was not allowed to.  She came to it then and asked me why.  I said I had medical condition.  Of course she had to ask what it was.  I stood up: let’s go to a private office to discuss medical condition.  She said we couldn’t do that.  I sat down and said that if she’d tell me her medical conditions I’d tell her mine.

She showed me an example of how to keep a job-seeking log, and how not to, bundled up a load of papers, told me my appointment was at 15:45 with Gareth on Tuesday got up from her desk and walked off.  Can’t wait.

It is obvious: I don’t have a job – still keeping busy though.