Behind the Scenes @ Work
 

Does anyone have any trade secrets for their line of work/employer that would shock and/or help the public if they knew? Any dirty little secrets you are willing to share? i think it would be helpful, there are so many loopholes in different areas of life, i like finding out tricks to making my life easier and my pockets fatter :)!

i can start...banks clear checks largest to smallest. for some reason while i was a teller, none of my customers knew that. for example, if you have $100 in the bank, and you write a $75 check and 4 $20 checks, the $75 is coming out first. why? because you are going to bounce more checks once they take the larger check out first...in this case they get to charge you for 3 bounced checks, instead of taking the 4 $20 ones and bouncing the one for $75. that will cost you almost $100 in bounced check fees, as opposed to the 1 charge. its all about money!

I worked for an insurance company last year...a few basics

1. a company purchases insurance as a 'package' the lower you are on the totem pole the crappier your coverage can be...if you are a grunt...u get some decent benefits...if you are the CEO, you are pretty much covered...and the coverage has to be compliant to that company

2. segue from number one a bit, read the fine print of what your insurance covers....some companies may not cover birth control...even if you are using it to take as a mestrual regulatory pill.

3. Companies also can pick in the insurance certain bits of preventive care that can or cannot be covered and when

for example - company A picks policy 1 - you can have XYZ screening as long are you are 40 years of age and up as part of your preventive screening

company B picks policy 2 - you can have XYZ screening as long are you are 35 years of age and up w/ no prior Hx as part of your preventive screening

and my personal fave....people thought that because thier last company covered and wondered why this changed:

company C picks policy 3 - you can have XYZ screening as longs are you plan on paying out of pocket.....because the screening is NOT a covered screening.

oh wow... dayum that's a mess.

i don't have any secrets specifically to what i do, but i can say that "processing fees" are BS - honestly, why are you having to pay $5.95, $10, $25, etc. for someone to do their job? i can tell you i probably only see like .50 of that fee, if that.

what else? when the secretary says said person is in a meeting, they don't want to talk to you. when she says "theyre in meetings all day," thet REALLY don't want to talk to you.

when something is supposed to take 3-5 business days (a phone call, sending something in the mail), it means said person is looking at it late in the 4th day and not really caring about it until that 5th day.

when said person is on the phone with you and they say "give me a second, my system is acting slow," that's total BS - it means theyre trying to minimize their facebook windows and actually getting into their work.







(hehehe i know because i've done it, and well, i know how to put 2 and 2 together)

lmao i can honestly say ive done it because i had GC up, or because i work at a TECHNICAL COLLEGE and my computer consists of some dixie cups, rubber bands, and a hamster on a wheel!

i worked for a credit card company that rhymes with Mapital Sun:D, and i tell you what, i will never have a card with them. ever. their "interest rate adjustment" was pay to us depending on how low we could go and keep the customer without giving them the 2.99 they probably deserved. also, they can jack your rate up to as much as 28.99% WITHOUT TELLING YOU, AND WITHOUT YOU MAKING A MISTAKE. read the fine print people, its all there...

I bartend weekends for extra money. If you complain your drink is too weak, all we're doing is dribbling a few drops of straight liquor down the straw so you think its super strong...We're certainly not pouring a whole 'nother shot into your drink. It costs usmoney. Order a double if its too weak, we are almost never shorting you on the amount of liquor you're paying for!

At Pappasito’s a medium quesadilla is the same amount of food as a large quesadilla; there just cut differently.

I used to work in retail over 10 years ago at a major department store. I once had to cover in the fine jewelry department and learned from the manager of that department that when fine jewelry goes on sale, it really doesn't.
What they do is put price tags on the jewelry that's considerably more expensive than what the piece is actually worth. Then they "mark it down" by 25%, 30%, etc. and claim they are giving you a huge discount when in reality, with that supposed discount, you're paying the actual price of the piece of jewelry.

This is just a practical observation about how to maybe get something done easier, not any insight into how stuff is supposed to work.

If you want your kid moved out of a teacher's class, come up with a different reason for it than anything negative about that teacher. When you go in with a list of grievances about teacher A, the school is going to often feel that they have to address the problems but they'll probably still want to support the teacher and moving your kid will often be regarded as undermining the teacher.

However if you go in with a "we've always hoped to have teacher B because we've heard blabity, blah, blah good stuff about teacher B," you can get what you want and the school can feel good about it.

This is of course trickier to pull off mid-year, but not impossible if you can come up with something impersonal to base it on. "We've heard teacher B does a fantastic history project in the spring that little Johnny has always wanted to do."

If you own or manage a business, and use a service company (plumbing, electrical, roofing, etc) and you consistantly pay them late, they WILL stick it to you when they write up your bill. We don't do much service work, but when we do, and the person is a notoriously late payer, it gets marked up an extra 25% or so.

I have heard stories about bar tending and since you bartend on the weekends, maybe you can help me out.

Is it true that bars will use cheap liquors and put them into expensive brand bottles? For example putting Burnetts or Aristocrat into a Grey Goose bottle, or Jose Cuervo into a Patron Bottle, etc....

that is WACK but knowing my greedy self i would order the large.

yeah, my LS worked for a jewelry store and the "manager's special" was never more than like 5% off what it would actually be worth retail. hell, HER employee discount was 25% but really, that would just make whatever item she wanted...regular price huh?



ooh! i got another one. when you're being put on hold... if you're a pain in the @ss, you'll definitely be put on hold longer. we may even forward you to someone who could two craps about your situation... or maybe we'll just "drop" the call. so if you ever call somewhere back and say "oh, i mustve got disconnected..." yeah you probably did!

i dont know my liquors all that well, but isnt cuervo WAY darker than patron? ou really couldnt pass that off!


and to foodservice people: when someone sends back food to the kitchen, or doesnt finish it, does it go on the next person's plate?

But if you have a small business, and have another small business do some service (plumbing, electrical, roofing, etc), and offer to pay cash up front, you can usually save at least 20%.

Well Im sure the Gold tequilas are alot different in color, but I was referring to the silver tequilas (Jose Cuervo Clasico Silver in a Gran Patron or Silver Patron bottle) That wouldnt be hard to mask because they are clear.

On a related subject, would they put Silver Patron in a Gran Bottle. I mean the price difference is amazing, silver is approx $55 per 5th versus $200 for the 5th of Gran Patron and not that much difference in taste

It's actually illegal to do that, the LCC can pull your liquor license over it as well.