Skip The Budgie

So after three long months, they finally stick their necks out and say that they'll pay me all the money they owe me. I am not yet past caring, but continue to announce to any that will listen that I WILL delete the timetable if they don't sort it out. Of course I am effectively doing three jobs now, so it would be an easy mistake to make, I could just pretend to be one of those people who just clicks away without reading anything (What did it say? - I don't know, I just clicked OK). There is a timeline of sorts:

1. March 2007: Secondment to timetabling to cover maternity leave.
2. January 2008: Receive slight payrise due to the Pay Equality Project. The extra money they are paying me is NOT increased to the higher grade. I complain. A lot.
3. March 2008: Get letter from Payroll saying that they're going to stop paying me and bump me back down to the lower grade. There are no apparent plans for the future, so they reluctantly give me a new secondment at the same (higher) grade after making me do an interview.
4. The Timetabler (1st secondment) comes back and says she is pregnant again and will be off in 5 months.
5. Everyone panics and they wonder whether they will be able to just leave me where I am and give the new job to someone else. At a lower grade, of course. I speculate loudly about how staying in the timetabling position would be a dead-end job and maybe I should just go elsewhere.
6. Big Boss panics and tries to force me to stay in 1st secondment at lower grade.
7. I start new secondment anyway, am promised the higher grade at the PROPER pay.
8. End of March: They really do stop paying me the higher grade and don't start my new salary either, which adds a couple of weeks to the £££ they owe me already.
9. Everyone is fighting Big Boss who insists I will do the timetable for the rest of my life because it is the most important job in the Faculty!
10. *waits*
11. Three months after the Pay Equality Project, I am assured that the backpay and my new salary will be incorporated into my April paycheck. I assure them that if it isn't, I will be camping out down there until it is damn well sorted out.
12. I receive the letter...
13. Several furious phone calls later I am given a full break-down of exactly what they are going to pay me. Finally...

So I started my new job last week. I have a week off beforehand of course, which is spent building an awesome desk designed by the GF, as well as sanding and painting and filling skips and other such DIY delights.

The TEMP who I am replacing has made few friends, many enemies and generally been quite a nuisance. He keeps copying me into emails saying things like just to let you know; I'm a temp and my time here is almost up (was a surprise to me too) and my replacement is one of the perm staff, [Dash], to whom I've copied this, and I'm in the midst of having my job taken away from me to a secondment post, which has been won by [Dash]. Just so YOU know, he was a TEMP and the TEMPORARY contract was only TEMPORARY while they found some PERMANENT sucker to take it over from him! ...And relax. There is much consternation about this chap's penchant for being far to generous with the truth, sending references back saying We are not willing to discuss this student in any way, when it isn't even his place to say anything. My first task is to untangle the mess and sort everything out, starting with the terrible state of the filing. Oh joy.

Much time has spent re-writing procedures and re-labelling everything so that it makes sense again. I manage to get the cleaners to actually clean my new office and it is all tidy and bearable after four days. For some reason the previous occupants refused to let the cleaners in because it wasn't safe or something. But I'm in charge now and my colleagues are impressed. They have spent the last month or so in fear, preferring to whisper behind each other's backs and avoid the issue.

I have been here for nearly four years now. So forgive me if I laugh when I receive such enlightening handover notes as:

• Check Voicemail Daily
• Check Pigeonholes regularly.
• Chase job reference requests with the academics- I try to email them reminders at least once a week for anything outstanding, and attach a read receipt for each
• Try to do filing of stuff (like conferments sheets) weekly as a minimum, otherwise it can turn into a daunting heap
• Outstanding matters ...need to be thought about at least twice a week until they are rectified
• Try to batch up tasks for the archive, it is a pain to go up there, do whatever needs doing, come back 15 minutes later and then find that a fax just received means going back up there... I had a day the other week when I went up five times....

Any of this strike you as being bleedin' obvious? No? The other person I am in charge of has some sort of social interaction disorder, which drives him to varying levels of extreme rudeness and uncomfortable friendliness. My Colleagues are hoping that I will sort him out as they are now afraid of him and we can't sack him because it would be like putting someone with special needs out on the street. So why am I here again?

This week I am on my own, back in charge and steadily going through the filing, and the computer, deleting all the horrors that my predecessor left behind and emailing everybody he was dealing with to tell them that everything is okay after all.

There is a huge meeting with our new Vice Chancellor, in which the predominant theme is the proposed rebranding of the University, along with the slogan "Better Together". After listening to the cries of horror and general consensus that this is a load of crap, he says Well at the end of the day, I'm the Vice Chancellor and this is what we're having, end of discussion.

Aha! We think, one of THOSE sorts of years.