Some Are Workers, Some Are Not

Container Terminal (Cropped), Prij, 12/10/06

Aside from the many unfinished drafts I haven't finished, I was planning to get back into writing this month. To cut a long story short, in the words of Tony Hadley; I had to get a j*b. That was what I was going to write about on Tuesday, but put it off for a day. The roller-coaster is detailed herein:

On the Friday 8th I had to go to the Amazon.co.uk warehouse and apply for a temp job running through December. I think I overdressed for that. Having been accepted, I started on the 10th at 0600 (to 1400) - we were assured newbs are never normally trained on the that shift. We were assigned roles after a presentation, based on our performances in the 5 tests on the previous Friday. I was an 'RF Picker' - we carry handheld scanners, go round the floor collecting requested items, putting them on the library carts and returning them to Collate where the order slips are handed-out. It's considered better than packing, since you get to move around.

Because this is the busiest time of the year, Amazon runs 6-day weeks. Monday 11th to Saturday 16th I did the back shift 1400-2200. Coupled with the lack of daylight, and my training day making it a 7-day week, I was exhausted during my one day off on the Sunday - which filled in for my birthday, as I had to work through the 12th.

Shifts rotate each week, so I was on 0600-1400 for this week. Each shift has its advantages and disadvantages. Early shift allows you to experience more daylight. Time passes fast between breaks - 10 minute break at 0810/1610 and 20 minute meal at 1110/1910. The other 7.5 hours are spent dashing round the circuit from letter-area to the next as ordered by the computer. The lower legs take the brunt of it.

Wednesday morning was strangely quiet. None of the trolleys would scan, so we were told to go up to B-area and clean away empty boxes. At 0700 we were brought back down to Collate to get reassigned to single-pick, instead of the usual multi-pick/batch. Whilst I was up in B-28 at 1100, a message displayed on the handset:

MSG FROM GMACPHERSON
ALL TOTES RETURN TO COLLATE

I picked up and scanned the 3 copies of Clarkson's And Another Thing vol 2 and placed them onto the trolley before going back down to Collate. My agency rep Billy was there on his floor-compliant mobile. I'd been meaning to ask him about when the contract ended:

Me: Billy, Chris was going round the other day asking if we would come back after Christmas. Does our contract end on the 22nd?
Billy: No, it ends now.

Wah? We were all gathered into the auditorium where the 4 agency reps and the Amazon management representative all said the same thing, which sounded like they had written it out beforehand. Essentially, Amazon had more people than work available as hardly anyone was ordering items so close to Christmas, so they layed us off in accordance with "Amazon's needs". They threw in that week's perfect attendance bonus as a gesture of whatever. One guy got it exactly: We were told we were doing record performance and therefore completed our work early. We paid ourselves off. The reps continually denied that was what had happened and repeated their mantra.

I was in a nice rut there. Obviously it was only temporary, but I at least expected us to be there until our contract ended on the 22nd, with the possibility of returning until early January. Now I've got the nightmare of the Job Centre and its myriad of forms to go through. At least I get to keep the safety-knife we were issued to cut open boxes. I won't miss the canteen meals, though.

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