Sooo, the Jobcentre. Or 'Jobcentre Plus', as it appears to be calling itself these days.
Plus what, I'm not entirely sure.
I rolled up at about ten to nine for my 9am appointment, only to discover that they didn't open until 9am anway. Oh well. Queued with everyone else to get in, then queued again to be handed a pack which I was instructed to hand in upstairs.
Oh, and fill this form in, read and sign this one, go upstairs.
Righto.
Upstairs I went, ticked all the little boxes to say that yes, I was able to work, and yes, I was looking for work, and yes, my CV was fine, thankyouverymuch.
Sat around for twenty minutes whilst the staff sorted out their mugs of tea, had a bit of a chat, then spoke to a nice lady about my claim. She photocopied various things, we discussed what I had to do to be eligible for the money (do at least three things a week to look for work), chatted about how I'd done more than those three things whilst sat waiting this morning, signed various documents and trundled out.
Realised that my sign-on time is monday at 2:30pm, which is hugely inconvenient in terms of picking LB up from school, so phoned back to ask for an earlier/different appointment.
Hmm. *that* went down well.
I now have to turn up earlier on monday and see if they have any other appointments that day.
Could I not, perhaps, arrange this by phone?
No.
So I could turn up at 9am only to find out the only available appointment is at noon?
Yes.
Could you not check to see if there is another one that day? What happens if I turn up at 9am only to find out that there are *no* other appointments?
*sigh*
Someone give us a job?
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