I'm so angry I'm dizzy (work related-- oh, and way too fucking long)

The BBQ Pit
41

Ah, another concierge! Let me ask you, do you pronounce it “con see yearGe”, or “Con see year”? I like to enunciate it the former way, drawing out the G as to make it sound as haughty and pretensious as humanely possible.

Also, is it me, or do a lot of people like to take a moment at your desk just to say “Ahh, the concierge”?

It is very refreshing to get another perspective from someone else in the industry. I appreciate you taking a moment to respond to my thread. I’d not thought of my companies decisions as being unethical, but they did raise a few red flags with me even with them quoting insurance as their reason for committing themselves to contracts. Though there might still be something to it. My new manager told me that the taxi thing is a big deal to her personally because in her 15 years of managment she’s encountered three cases in which someone attempted to sue us because of a taxi accident. All three were thrown out of court, but it’s enough to make anyone nervous.

She told me she uses the one we have a contract with, but also another one who uses the same amount of insurance as the one we officially endorse now. She told me the first time we had the “I’m your new manager” chat that she can’t really punish me for things she doesn’t know about, nor can she really control what I do, but not to break the rules in front of her.

I am curious, why do you say accepting cash for restuarant referrals is unethical? I typically use programs where I get gift certificates since there’s a handful all under the same Marketing company that are extremely tasty and reliable. But if someone is asking for a good Thai place or a Brazillian steakhouse and the best ones I can think of offer cash, why turn it down? Why is accepting kickbacks from a restuarant different than accepting a kickback from anywhere else?

42

I have been in the OP’s position, though in a different environment entirely.

I have also been ‘slapped down’ more than once.

What I found out is that most higher ups WILL be supportive of new ideas if you give them a chance and time. There are some that won’t…but less than you think.

The problem, after I was able to jump through the hoop and became known as an valid ‘idea guy’ is that they REALLY don’t know you. All they know is that you are some grunt. You don’t have real experience beyond being a grunt and almost all grunts are…honestly…well…grunts.

What you need to do is ‘sell’ something to upper management. Starting with your boss is a start…but your boss is not going to really push it. This is not a negative statement about your boss…but he won’t love it like you do. Go to the upper management and pitch it.

Now, when you do this, you will run into things you don’t know about. Like legal liability for example. Try to work WITH this rather than against. Show willingness to overcome their objections rather than treat them as blockers. Yes, they want to share in the success…but this isn’t a horrible thing. Unless they are complete jerks, they will not take credit for your idea…they will take credit for recognising the idea and nuturing it. Is this so bad?

The first success is the hardest. Once you have success, future success becomes easier and easier (my experience). You have distinquished yourself from the masses and so have some cred.

Now, it is possible that the higher ups consider your position to be more grunt than it actually is and want to rein you all in rather than support you. If that is the case, you do need a new position more inline with your skills. I would think that your book would be an EXCELLENT sales tool for you to use in interviews to show them you are damned good at your job.

43

Second, third, and fourth this. Retrieve your original, and get it notarized, or whatever you need to do to establish that YOU did it, and WHEN.

Ten bucks says that they are going to try to spiffy your book up a bit and sell it to the other agencies as training materials.

44

Okay, while the company may not have an automatic copyright on his work, that does not mean that Joe can get a copyright on it.

You still have to deal with agency law. By any model of authority (actual, implied, inherent, etc.), a concierge is an agent[sup]1[/sup] of the hotel. He is therefore in a fiduciary relationship with regards to his employment. If, because of this relationship, he gains a profit, he must render that profit to his principal[sup]2[/sup]. There are very few exceptions to this, and they’re mostly about accepting tips. This situation is a perfect example of an agent/principal fiduciary duty. Joe was put in the position to write this book because of his agency - so he owes any profits from it to the hotel[sup]3[/sup]. This is not to say that Joe has come to this thread even contemplating selling his book. I just wanted to disabuse people of the “sue those bastards!” idea.

[sup]1[/sup] Well, to put it in the correct nomenclature, he is a “servant” to the hotel’s “master.”
[sup]2[/sup] See restatement (second) of agency § 388: “Duty to account for profits arising out of employment”
[sup]3[/sup] See the classic (and hilarious) case Reading v. Regem, 2 KB 268 (1948).

45

We have a (very much smaller, I suspect) thing like your book where I work. It’s an EXCEL file with loads of miscellaneous crap, mainly phone numbers and procedures, that you’d otherwise have to bother someone else for.
Only 2 or 3 people can edit it and one person has overall responsibility for vetting it.
Could you not do something like this? Also, you could call it “miscellaneous useful stuff” instead of The Big Book of How To Do Things" and get it in under the radar?

Many years ago, I believed that if I had an idea which might prove of benefit to the company I would be trampled in the crush of people hastening over to hear it. Ah, to be young again.

46

Dumb question I’ve been wanting to ask…

Are we supposed to tip you when we stay in a hotel, assuming we’ve worked with you? What’s considered standard?

47

I appreciated your post, there was lots of good advice in there. I like to have the perspective of someone a little bit more seasoned in these kind of affairs.

Ah, I’d rather not. There would be way too much information for me to want to transcribe it all into a new format. If Head Honcho decided this was just me trying to side step a rule he put down I’d probably go crazy for having done all the work.

I guess the lesson here is that bringing about any worthwhile change isn’t easy. Even if, by all means, it should be. Which is pretty…bleak

That’s actually a very good and I’m glad to ask.

Answer: It’s up to your discretion. If you just have a couple questions, we won’t think less of you for not tipping us. If you spend a lot of money with us, we’ll be gratefull just for that. If I spend between around fifteen or twenty minutes telling you how to save money all over the city, reserve seats at restuarants for you, reserve a rental car for you, fill you in on cool free stuff to do around the city, give you driving directions, print out maps and other stuff for you, advise you about what businesses not spend money on and so on and so forth…Well, a little tip would be nice. I’ll help someone out even if I don’t think there will be anything in it for me, but a tip can go along way in increasing my job satisfaction when I feel like it’s been well earned :slight_smile: .

48

Have you asked for it back?

Many companies do not appreciate “advice” from the “peons”. They figure if your advice was really worth anything you wouldn’t be a peon. Especially a young peon without a degree.

And, no, you should not accept cash kick-backs.

49

Why does someone always come by and mention the sex of a poster as if it matters? Does it matter? No. Do we care. No.

50

Why are you bitching at someone for a comment made five days ago, particularly when that comment was made simply to correct someone who had inadvertently reverted to the OP as a she? How do you know that person wouldn’t want to be corrected?

51

What you do,Joe, is keep doing what you’ve been doing to make your job easier, but you don’t tell anyone, ever. As you’ve learned, companies never seem to appreciate workers taking initiative and making things efficient. I can see why this has infuriated you, but chalk it up to a learning experience which will serve you well in the future.

I also agree that you should ask to be the company trainer for this type of reference - the company response will tell you just about all you need to know for your future with this company.

52

From my manager, yes.

Apparently that does seem to be the case. I feel like they’re looking more at my profile rather than the actual reference guide I’ve put in front of them. It seems like they’re looking for problems inside an answer.

Alright, new thread rule: If you’re going to say I should not accept cash kickbacks you have to explain why. Just telling me it’s wrong and leaving it that really doesn’t contribute anything to my perspective of things. Maybe I haven’t fleshed out my own reasoning very well, so here it is:

When you come to my city, the amount you pay for a dinner, rental car, or tee time reservation does not increase when I help you make plans. It often does however, DECREASE. Outside companies give us what’s known as “referral cards”. Referral cards usually have on them an intencentive for the guest for turning them in. This can be a free cocktail for every member of a dining party, a 10% discount on a purchase, a free gift, priority seating, $5 off a purchase, a glass of wine, a free appetizer with the purchase of an entree…whatever. I write my name or an ID number on the card, the guest turns it in, I get a referral bonus. Most restuarants around here have SOMETHING going on for us concierges. In conclusion…

– The guest has an opportunity to save money or get free stuff at a location I reccomended for it’s ability to meet the guest’s needs.
– If I rejected the cash kickback for whatever reason and gave the guest the referral card anyways, they’d pay the same amount of money they would have had I not rejected the cash kickback.
– Since most companies have kickbacks for us, there’s little if any incentive to choose one company over another. I base my decision on what makes my guests the happiest.
– My company does officially sponsor some of these programs.
– I make money from them.

As far as rental cars go, I typically call multiple rental agencies to find the best price. If I find a good price with a company I don’t like, I call another company and see if they can’t price match. The guest gets the best deal and someone to look for it for him, and I get paid a cash commission for it.

So where does the unethical part come in? It looks win-win to me.

What Asimovian said.

I forgot to mention in my last post that I responded to Head Honcho’s email. As far as I could tell, there was no traces of anger in it. I took the approach of someone eager to work with him on my reference workbook as soon as next week, and told him what days I had available for it. I explained that I regreted I hadn’t taken the time to present it to him myself so that I could tell him exactly what it was, where the idea had come from, how useful it had been to myself and my coworker, the interest my other coworkers had expressed in owning one, the book’s versatility, the value of the information inside of it, and how’s it’s not a training manual. I told him that I’d like to speak with him so we could go over the book, talk about what is and isn’t appropriate to refer people to, and how using the reference guide we can keep people in the know regarding that information so that no one else is confused.

That was sent out yesterday. Hopefully I’ll see a proper response before too long.

53

Maybe kickback is too strong a word? Perhaps referral fee would be better.

It sounds like you’re going to do what’s best for your customers, regardless of how much you get from who. But I could see the system being abused, with someone referring them to a crappy restaurant just because that restaurant pays a higher “referral fee.”

Does your employer have safeguards in place to prevent such things?

54

With regards to kickbacks: in many places it’s illegal. And mostly for good reasons. Most people are not moral paragons of virtue, they will preferentially refer others to businesses that give them money.

I realize that you, personally, try to uphold a strong ethical standard, but I find it hard to believe that the lure of money has no hold on you whatsoever. It’s just human nature to feel better about people who give you money than people who don’t, and feeling better about a business will influence how you remember them. Even if it’s not conscious, people make excuses for people they like (“Well, that one cab driver got into a fight with my client, but the client was a dick and I think this is an exceptional circumstance” vs. “Damn, that driver got into a fight with my client, and this confirms my inner feeling that it’s a shitty cab company”).

I’m in the biomedical field, and anyone who has ANY financial connection with anything they’re investigating (i.e. the efficacy of a new drug) has to declare it in the papers they write. Most biologists are very ethical, and I think only a vanishingly small percentage would knowingly falsify results to increase the value of their stock portfolio, but the reality is that wanting something to succeed changes your perception of whether or not it has succeeded.

I’m not saying that you provide your clients with poor service - I’m sure you don’t - but you may not be aware of your own biases.

mischievous

55

No. Refer posts #8 and #9. Agreements with other organisations and liability are valid, not just “problems”.

Oh, to be 22 again…seeing as that’s the only thing that’s going to save you from a good sacking here.

56

That was my first impression, too - to be young and enthusiastic and think that everyone is actually trying to do the right thing and make things better.