What's the lamest/most miserly way you've seen a business try to save a buck?

In My Humble Opinion
161

Our office is paperless now, but before we made the transition, the company disabled the printers from all the computers for employees working in production. Any time we needed to print a document, we’d have to call a supervisor who would have to print it for us (which was about every half hour per employee). In contrast, the highest paid manager that works in my building earns $4 million per year.

When I worked in fast food, my manager would make us clock out for a half hour for our lunch break even if it was too busy for us to actually take a break. She also had us punch out exactly 30 minutes after the restaurant closed, even though it would take us more than an hour to clean up and close everything down. And, of course, I was paid $5.15 per hour, because it was against the law to pay me anything less.

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Re: your #3.

I worked for Centrust Savings in south Florida back in the 80s. On the same day that an article in the paper detailing CEO/company assets raper David Paul’s purchase of a new $3M + yacht came out, I got a 1.2% pay raise. :eek:

VCNJ~

[QUOTE=Vinyl Turnip]
Ah, Thailand. Where a “toilet” in an upscale mall consists of a squatting hole in a concrete floor in the middle of a wide-open room. Hope you remembered to buy your five sheets of toilet paper (the transparent kind that disintegrates upon human contact) from the vending machine on the way in, farang. Oh, and pity about the traveler’s diarrhea…

Examples? I have several!

I delivered pizzas for several years in my teens and twenties for a large chain whose name I won’t mention, but it rhymes with “Pizza Hut.” They initially had a nice system of monetary rewards for delivery drivers based on the number of “accident-free hours” worked—starting with $50 or so (IIRC) and gradually working up into the hundreds and even thousands of dollars for the long-timers. After a few years they announced that the reward system was being revised—for example, where a driver might’ve once received $200, the award would now be a special Pizza Hut hat with an embroidered logo. Instead of $1000 cash, now you’d be the proud owner of a very cheap no-name plastic camera. Et cetera. What irritated me wasn’t that they did it—I’d long thought the cash award thing was too good to last—but that it was spun as the company’s response to employee complaints that they wanted awards that were more “visible.” I defied my manager to find, anywhere, a delivery driver who actually said “you know, this $500 is nice, but I’d really rather have a $30 Pizza Hut sweatshirt instead!”

Example #2: I had a horrible short-term temp job with the credit collection department for a large retailer. Almost my entire job consisted of pulling up credit reports on delinquent customers—taking a long list of Social Security Numbers printed from one of their computer systems and manually typing them into another system, which would print out hard copies of the reports. Why they didn’t find a way to interface the two systems, I have no idea; the entire department I worked in seemed to be one simple script away from obsolescence. (Strangely, nobody there really seemed interested when I asked about it.) This was the mid-1990’s and they were using groaning, clattering dot matrix printers that were at least ten years old. When one of them needed its ribbon changed, I asked where I could get a replacement. Oh no, I was told: this had to be authorized. They called a manager (wielding a key to the supply closet) who inspected the faint print on the paper and declared that it wasn’t quite ready to be changed. The policy was that “barely legible” was still good enough—the print head had to literally be making no blemish on the page before it was time for a new cartridge. (Which, of course, meant that one or more reports would need to be reprinted, would be out of order, and would need manual rearranging to be in sequence.)

Example #3: My (now former) employer recently announced, via email, that they were discontinuing the free coffee supplied in the breakroom (which had long been a very cheap nameless brand and one of the last niceties they still provided us) and replacing the equipment with coin-operated coffee machines. The same day, they also announced that the company had exceeded its quarterly profit expectations in stellar fashion, and congratulated us on a job well done.
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[QUOTE=Vinyl Turnip]
Example #3: My (now former) employer recently announced, via email, that they were discontinuing the free coffee supplied in the breakroom (which had long been a very cheap nameless brand and one of the last niceties they still provided us) and replacing the equipment with coin-operated coffee machines. The same day, they also announced that the company had exceeded its quarterly profit expectations in stellar fashion, and congratulated us on a job well done.
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While still providing basic coffee, my current job provides no condiments for it. You like sweetener or milk? There’s the store. Paper towels rotate in such an unusual type and rare availability (“…but that roll is 2 feet long and 2 feet wide and weighs 15 lbs…”) that I have to assume they have been stolen from other companies and brought in by employees. I loved that the training video showed courteous employees cleaning up messes they see in break room, even when the mess wasn’t their own. Oh Yeah, clean up? With What???

I also love that it takes 3 people 15 minutes to get authorization & the key to the supply closet for a pen. People, 3 x 0.25 x hourly rate = PL (Production Lost) CP = Cheap Pens. PL > CP, you Fumb Ducks!!!

164

My mother was also having trouble with pens at her company. Apparently, the powers that be decided that you needed to turn in the empty pen in order to get a new pen. Unfortunately, they did not tell the little people this rule beforehand, so when they used up pens, they would of course throw them away. Mom ended up asking everyone to go through their purses and find dead pens–whether they came from the company or not. Now, she has a rule that everyone is required to turn in their dead pens to her so that she can then go up and turn them in for a new box.

I’ve never worked for a company that provided coffee to employees. We have a vending machine, and I prefer that solution to the one at my old company, where people were supposed to donate coffee, creamer, and sugar (and of course some people never did) and there were arguments over which people made the coffee, so usually there was none and you would have been better off stopping off at Starbucks. The only problem with the vending machine is that the coffee is crap and therefore I never drink it.

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[QUOTE=SaintCad]
I see you work for LAUSD too.
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DISD. But there are parallels.

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What is it with companies not wanting to buy pens? The insurance company that used to be next to my parents’ business did buy pens–but only the cheap Bic ones. If they wanted anything better they had to provide it themselves. Occasionally one of the ladies working there would stop in on my parents to snag a bunch of the free pens they gave out to customers.

I’m mildly amused that the free pens were better than the cheap ones the company paid for.

167

[QUOTE=Maastricht]
Also, the telephone menus where you start paying as soon as you hear: “Good morning, this is company X. Please press " one” to start our lenghty telephone menu and still be put on hold after you reach the end of it. On your own dime. "
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The IT desk phone line at our school district requires you to press 1 to continue, at the outset. You’re not actually choosing anything at all, you’re just continuing. Now, if I wanted NOT to continue, wouldn’t I just hang up? OF COURSE I WANT TO CONTINUE, that’s why I called!

I also don’t really get this idea of sending computer/ISP call centers to India.

“You’ve never HEARD of iTunes?? Seriously?”

Another conversation with another company:

“No, Apple Computer would definitely make sure that their million-dollar-a-day music downloader were compatible with all wireless cards. iTunes (which you’ve never heard of) is not crashing my wifi card.”

168

This isn’t miserly with money, but with courtesy, which reading all these have brought back to memory:

My (white) friend went with his parents and his wife to a car lot, intent on buying a car very, very soon. The (white) salesman shook everyone’s hand but his wife’s. I and they can only assume it’s because this particular Texan really was a racist pig who wouldn’t touch no Chinks. She was very upset, and they left. The dealer who did sell to them said, “Yeah, we hear those stories a lot about those guys.”
And in the opposite direction, how can these schools and colleges stand to have their doors open when the air conditioning has the temperature difference at about 15F? They really don’t seem to care that they’re trying to cool the whole world.

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[QUOTE=Cardinal]
The (white) salesman shook everyone’s hand but his wife’s. I and they can only assume it’s because this particular Texan really was a racist pig who wouldn’t touch no Chinks.
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(Not that any of this necessarily applies here …)

In social situations in the United States between equals the lady offers her hand to the gentleman. She indicates the manner in which she prefers her hand handled by the orientation in which she offers it; horizontally indicates she prefers a gentle pressure to the fingers, vertically that she prefers a standard hand shake.

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  1. You don’t “get” why they have call centers in India? You know wages are lower in India, right? What is there to not get?

  2. You “assume” that the car salesman is a racist pig because he didn’t shake the wife’s hand? Seriously? Look, I would probably have shaken her hand, and the wimmin’folk that I run with tend to not mind it, but it isn’t always given that women generally want the same handshake that men do. Maybe the guy just wasn’t sure what the appropriate courtesy was and simply refrained? In addition, it is common for car salesmen to go for the person they see as being the main decision maker in a sale, and this is often the husband. This may not be very nice, but it’s hardly racist.

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[QUOTE=Cardinal]
The IT desk phone line at our school district requires you to press 1 to continue, at the outset. You’re not actually choosing anything at all, you’re just continuing. Now, if I wanted NOT to continue, wouldn’t I just hang up? OF COURSE I WANT TO CONTINUE, that’s why I called!
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My company makes you press * for the same reason when you call our main number. It is so stupid. A co-worker of mine is so afraid that people calling her will get frustrated with that that she includes the * as part of the extension number (instead of saying “extension 9999”, she says, “extension star 9999 and you do need to dial the star.”) Yet more time wasted.

You even need the star to reach the company operator. If you are having trouble with the stupid system or were for some reason calling from a rotary phone, I don’t think there’s any way to reach a live person anymore.

172

I think I came upon a new one yesterday. We went out to a brew pub yesterday and were given used coasters! All eight of them were quite obviously stained from previous drinks and one even had been colored on by some industrious kid. I don’t know if they’re trying to be cheap or green (keep the coasters out of the landfill as long as possible) but it was definitely a weird thing to see.

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[QUOTE=Tikki]
I think I came upon a new one yesterday. We went out to a brew pub yesterday and were given used coasters! All eight of them were quite obviously stained from previous drinks and one even had been colored on by some industrious kid. I don’t know if they’re trying to be cheap or green (keep the coasters out of the landfill as long as possible) but it was definitely a weird thing to see.
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Seriously? You guys get new coasters every drink? I’ve never ever HEARD of such a thing! ALL the bars reuse coasters around me.

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In my area, you are not given a new coaster for each drink, but rather for each customer. I would be surprised to be given a used coaster (at least, if it is one of the thin cardboard ones that easily get soggy and gross).

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[QUOTE=Missy2U]
Seriously? You guys get new coasters every drink? I’ve never ever HEARD of such a thing! ALL the bars reuse coasters around me.
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That’s why I said I thought I came upon a new one. I’m not a drinker and don’t frequent pubs or bars much but in my limited experience, I’ve never encountered this before. I’d been to this particular one several times, however, because they have a killer blue cheese and bacon burger. It’s not some dive, either, but a hip, happenin’ place and I don’t recall getting used coasters previously. It doesn’t really bother me but maybe next time if it happens, I’ll ask about it.

And I wouldn’t expect a new coaster every time I ordered a drink anyway; just a fresh one with the first order. It’s just weird getting used ones right off the bat. They were cardboard ones, like fluiddruid mentioned but they’d at least been dried between uses.

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Coasters? Y’all get coasters with your drink? 'Round these parts, you’ll be lucky to get a paper napkin.

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[QUOTE=sturmhauke]
Definitely illegal, but also endemic in fast food. Management figures the minimum wage drones are too scared of losing their jobs to complain, despite the presence of the giant, federally mandated poster that lays out all the rules about wages and hours.
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I should add that

(1) this was in the early 1970s;

(2) the Dairy Queen had no time clock; there was simply a posted schedule listing everyone’s assigned hours, which never went past 9 p.m., and the payroll was prepared from that;

(3) several different managers worked there during that year and they all did this, so it was at least a regional or local policy, if not a corporate policy;

(4) we (the teenage wage slaves) definitely knew it was wrong but were scared shitless; somehow the sheer brazenness of management’s actions made us assume we’d be fired on the spot if we complained;

(5) we were worried about getting a decent reference for the next wage slave job (having minimal or no job references is a matter of considerable anxiety at that age);

(6) we were actually paid less than minimum wage, which was allowed because we were a food service business; presumably this loophole in the law assumed we’d have income from tips, which generally don’t exist in the fast-food world; and

(7) there were absolutely no posters describing employee rights or anything that sort.

I didn’t go back into a Dairy Queen for decades after this experience. I only go in there now because my wife likes those dipped cones.

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My son’s experience with Subway (see post #157) was this past summer. I’m sure it goes on more than we think, especially if the kids are too young and scared to question it or if they don’t tell their parents (Ivylad ended up going down to the Subway and confronting the manager about his illegal employment practices in front of a store full of customers.)

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[QUOTE=ivylass]
My son’s experience with Subway (see post #157) was this past summer. I’m sure it goes on more than we think, especially if the kids are too young and scared to question it or if they don’t tell their parents (Ivylad ended up going down to the Subway and confronting the manager about his illegal employment practices in front of a store full of customers.)
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When I worked at a Wendy’s in high school (general decent employer, as far as fast-food goes) if we happened to be “closers” (3-4 employees to shut down the store after it closed for the night), we had an hour to do it. If it took longer, well, too bad. We got paid for the hour.

As with other stories, we didn’t know any better.

Your tale of “stick around, clock in if we need you” is startling but I fear not that rare :frowning:

180

In high school my sister worked at Wendy’s. When she’d been there a year, she got a raise.

Of one penny.
I’m wondering if you find these sort of practices more at franchise owned stores…where the managers are under extreme pressure to keep costs down yet increase sales. At Subway, the manager also had my son relabel expired veggies so they could keep using them.

I don’t think I’ll be eating at a Subway any time soon.