Being the most experienced person here at PoC able to comment on this matter, other than Thunderchicken and her hubby, I can only sum up my reaction with the word: surprised! Surprised that the contract company is making this drastic cut in route length. I mean, I was the newbie in September, dying tyring to get my routes done on time, or at least that day, I was cut no slack. Within two weeks, and a week of being very ill Thunderchicken came over and made me soup :) it was agreed that I should leave the company. After all, it was taking me an extra day per week, thus 6 day work weeks, to get my routes done. I just wasn't able to hack it as the new guy plus there was the new forced end-of-day at 4:00pm coming up too. Since everyone else got their routes done before that time anyway I was obviously not a desirable addition. I was not in the physical shape I needed to be to get my routes done on time, nor was I familiar with my routes to travese them properly in an efficient manner (... hey, I just noticed that broke the I-before-E-except-after-C rule...). The company employees knew it would take me a few months to build up the endurance and muscle to be on a par with them but that wasn't factored into the decision to cut me. And the boss was adamant, fearfully strict (and rightly so) on not falsifying meter reads, and doing your best to get at meters. Part of following his rules was what made my routes sluggish, but only in a minor way.

Lou succeeded where I could not and also put most other employees to shame. Not only did he get the routes done, but he worked his ass off getting others' done. If the routes were a little smaller, say by a quarter, or at most a third (perhaps for those 800+ houses) I am absolutely positively sure I could have done my job on time. Which leads us into the surprised state of the current situation.

I'm confuzzeled. If these people who have been doing their job for a year or so and longer, sometimes much longer, know their routes like the back of their hands, why oh why are they complaining so loudly as to get the routes cut in half?! Holy shit! A MONKEY could get 250 houses done a day! With no offense, Thunderchicken could get 250 houses done in a day. You're not paid by the hour, you're paid by how many houses you do. This job, aside from the primo shape you have to be in, is a pinch! You need ZERO customer service skills, ZERO computer knowledge, ZERO management knowledge, you don't even need a brain and you get paid a $1 for every 5 houses checked. Go look outside your window and count the number of houses in view. If you can do one house per minute, you're making $12 an hour. At a good clip, you can get 2 houses done per minute. I remember starting my day at a jog and being able to jog for an hour straight before getting really tired and getting 150 houses done once, by 8:00am. I made $30 that hour alone! After a few months, more than two and less than 7, your legs are in excellent condition to get houses at 100+ per hour, consistantly, no sweat. 500 houses now equals 5 hours of work and if you start at 7:00am, you're done at noon. Sweet deal no? Done at noon and $100 day is over. Maybe you'll strike one of those 900 house routes and be done at 4:00pm. This means you've worked your ass off all day long with no break, but think of the money you just made: $180. Compare that to my Safeway job working the same number of hours: $70 See the difference? I can see the difference. I bust my ass close to as hard as I did meter checking as I do at Safeway but get a shit load less. So maybe, just maybe, these people are sick of their job.

I know I got sick of the job. There was a grand total of ZERO people to talk to. You were repeating your movements every minute or less. It was not a mentally taxing job and still isn't. It never will be. Every day is the same but there are people who are marvelously suited for this type of job. Lou loves this job! Snipers' personalities tend to be introverted because they aren't required to do much with others and this makes them naturally suited to their profession. Yah Thunderchicken, I thought I'd throw that in there for Lou ;) Anyway, the job pays well for the right people and keeps you in great shape. You lose tons of fat. Hell, I lost 20 pound in two weeks -- a little unhealthy for sure but I was also traversing 125km+ per week. So what's there to complain about that I haven't already listed? I don't know.

So where does this company think cutting routes in half is a solution? The same number of houses still have to be read and they'll need to double their work force asap! Not too tricky, but now it's only as good as a part time job. The daily average income of say $120 is dropped to $60 and that's less than Safeway! That's minimum wage, or worse! Suddenly, the need for another job that will take you on for afternoons is required and this means turnover for meter readers will jump through the roof! Part of the package was the way people like me were weeded out! Lou is great for the job and I am not, therefore I do not work for the company. Which means you're left with the people who are well suited for the job and everything is peachy, right? Right! This solves nothing! This means I could get back in and make some money as part time job. It means I'd be thinking I could call in sick because there are so many other people who could take my shift if they wanted to. That means more administration overhead to deal with. It just opens up a whole new can of worms! What in the hell is going on?! I don't know, but that's my unfocsed ranting response, with love to Thunderchicken and her hubby Lou.