Reed.co.uk

In early June I handed in my last University assignment for the year, but my joy and sense of freedom was short lived – I had to find a job for the summer.

So, having dedicated a day to updating my CV (or perhaps two, these things can’t be rushed… well, that’s the excuse I gave my husband, anyway) it was on the following Monday that I actually got around to contacting any agencies in my search for work. My original plan was to dress ...
...half decent agency in the area for the next few days… It was only on the offchance that I thought I’d check out a job website or two first. www.reed.co.uk was one of the first that I came across, and I found it easy to register online, their search facility was straight forward and I could refine my search to a very local area. I’d soon sent off my CV for three jobs that’d caught my eye. I didn’t stop here, though, I visited the websites of all of ... more

In early June I handed in my last University assignment for the year, but my joy and sense of freedom was short lived – I had to find a job for the summer.

So, having dedicated a day to updating my CV (or perhaps two, these things can’t be rushed… well, that’s the excuse I gave my husband, anyway) it was on the following Monday that I actually got around to contacting any agencies in my search for work. My original plan was to dress smartly, grab a handful of CVs and trek around every half decent agency in the area for the next few days… It was only on the offchance that I thought I’d check out a job website or two first. www.reed.co.uk was one of the first that I came across, and I found it easy to register online, their search facility was straight forward and I could refine my search to a very local area. I’d soon sent off my CV for three jobs that’d caught my eye. I didn’t stop here, though, I visited the websites of all of the usual suspects, Blue Arrow, Brook Street, Premiere, and lots more – I found jobs that I was interested in on most sites and sent my CV off into cyberspace on each occasion.

Imagine my surprise – I was still on the computer, applying for jobs, when the phone began ringing. It was Reed – they’d received my application for a job and would like to invite me in for their test and interview process. Unfortunately, I hadn’t realised that the job was permanent, so obviously no good for little old student me! Still, I was impressed with their speed in contacting me. I was also happy to note that they were actually advertising ‘real’ jobs on the internet, not just ‘pretend’ jobs, or positions that have already been filled, just to entice people to register with them.

It was only about an hour later that the phone rang again. This time, the interview was for a temporary job – in the evenings in fact, so it would fit in perfectly with my studies if I decided to keep the job up into the next University year. ‘Great’, I thought, as less than three hours after applying I was actually sat in the branch taking their tests and filling in their forms. It took a couple of hours to run through everything, the tests and forms and face to face interview, etc. But this is normal for most agencies. However, they offered me the job on the spot (and yes, I am a little smug about that!) So, just to clarify what happened here – I sent my CV off in the morning – Reed rang before lunchtime to invite me for an interview – they offered me the job at around 16:30 in the afternoon. Result!

When I commented on their speed and efficiency (I WAS pretty pleased at the time) I was reminded of the Reed motto – ‘where the right job looks for you’. I’ve always considered these things to be more a case of advertising than actual company policy, but in this case it turned out to be true… At this point I still hadn’t heard from any of the other agencies I’d applied to, and I’d contacted around about half a dozen so far! In fact, it was several days before any of the other agencies got in touch with me, and one particular agency took over two weeks to contact me for the first time!

Of course, there was one drawback to my marvellous new job – it didn’t start immediately. My new best friend at Reed warned me that it might take anything up to a month before I could start my new job. Shame… Actually, I was pretty ecstatic that hubby couldn’t complain that I hadn’t found a job – but I’d still get a few weeks off. It wasn’t MY fault that my job hadn’t started yet, after all!

I should’ve known that these things never work out how you expect them to. The very next day, Reed rang to offer me some temping work stuffing envelopes for the large telecommunications company which is right opposite my house… The two days work originally planned turned into a couple of weeks of soul-destroying envelope stuffing. It wasn’t so much the boredom of the job that got to me, I’ve done worse jobs, it’s what I was stuffing into the envelopes that caused me such pain! You see, the telecommunications company that I was working at was running an enormous competition at the time in conjunction with Metro – giving away trips to Euro 2004… Can you imagine how soul-destroying it was for a football fan who’d have given their right eye to have been at Euro 2004 to be stuffing other peoples tickets into envelopes all day every day? The temptation to stick a couple in my pocket was immense, it’s just lucky I’m such an honest person!

Still, the envelope stuffing lasted nicely until my start date in my ‘proper’ job. That’s not to say that it was without it’s problems, however. I received my first time sheet and faxed it off without a problem, so my first weeks wages was paid into my bank on time. However, since that point I never received another timesheet, despite numerous phone calls to Reed, so didn’t get paid for weeks afterwards. Nice when I eventually got paid a lump sum, of course, but not so good when you’re relying on the money just to get by.

In my initial interview I’d been handed a booklet to read about my new job – it was pretty frightening stuff, actually, listing all of the things that would get me fired if I did them! It seemed like every paragraph ended in ‘this could result in termination of your contract’. Still, I tried not to let it put me off, and I’m happy in my job now – two months later. Of course, not every contract is the same, some are better than others, but mine is fine.

However, this opinion is about Reed itself, not my placement, so I’ll get back to that. The branch that I work for is at St Albans in Hertfordshire. When I first visited the branch I was impressed at how pleasant and friendly the staff were, and that’s continued. Every time I call they know exactly who I am as soon as I give my name. I like that friendly service, and it makes me feel like it isn’t a problem for me to ring and ask them anything I need clarification on. In fact, it really isn’t a problem at all, the staff at Reed have never been anything less than totally friendly and helpful to me. I feel like I matter to them, as a person, which is something that I’ve found very rarely in employment agencies before.

That’s not to say that my employment has passed without a hitch! Timesheets have been an almost continuous problem. Either I didn’t receive them in the first place, couldn’t get them signed off or Reed didn’t receive them when I faxed them over. I think I was probably only actually paid on time two or three times when I was using paper time sheets. However, I have now switched over to their internet based timesheet system, which is far, far superior. So long as I complete my timesheet in time, I just need to pass it to my supervisor, who authorises it and passes it to Reed, and the jobs done. No faxes to go astray, or chasing to make sure they’ve received it. Marvellous!

Still, I have to say that even when I was having problems getting paid, Reed have never been any less than helpful when I’ve called them. This even involved sending one of their own staff into the telecommunications company I’d been working at to get my timesheet signed, once I’d finished working there. This really was above and beyond the call of duty, especially as I only live across the road, but I’ve always found that Reed will go out of their way like that for their temps.

The time sheets themselves are a little confusing, however. The part where you fill in your hours is very straightforward – that’s not the problem at all. However, there’s a couple of boxes above this where you can fill in how many days you needed to buy lunch at work, and how many miles you travelled to get to work and back. This wasn’t explained to me, so I just ignored it to start with, however, I soon found that if you fill in these sections it has a very positive effect on your pay. I’m not sure exactly how it works, but Reed have in place a system where you can get a tax rebate, or something similar, for travel and subsistence. Therefore, if you fill in this section (truthfully, of course) you’ll get more money!

Every problem I’ve ever come across has been sorted out with the minimum of fuss on the part of Reed, and the minimum of effort for me. I only recently noticed that I was on the emergency tax code (it took me several weeks to figure this out) which I shouldn’t be as a student. It was only a day or two after contacting Reed that I received the relevant forms, and less than a week after sending them back that I got my tax rebate, and full pay (without emergency tax code). Now that’s what I call efficiency – I know how much trouble I’ve had getting tax codes sorted out in the past, but Reed just got on with it.

Of course, no working relationship can be totally without friction. Personally, I was annoyed to discover that the other trainee who started on the same day as me, to do the same job as me, was getting paid significantly more than me. I complained to Reed, who contacted the HR department at my assignment to ask for more money for me. This was refused, as I don’t have the same past work experience as my colleague. I couldn’t dispute this – so basically decided to lump it and carry on working there.

As a temp working for Reed you’re entitled to holiday pay, maternity pay and sick pay, after a qualifying period. Basically, you have to earn it before you’re allowed to claim it! However, booking holiday, calling in sick and requesting holiday pay are all extremely straight forward and usually accomplished with a single phone call.

But, I’m sure there’s just one thing that you’re really interested in, isn’t there? What about the money? Well, I can tell you that the usual rate in this area for envelope stuffing is £6 ph. Not great money, especially when you consider that you can get paid more than that for cleaning in Hertfordshire. I’m on a pay rate which is very slightly higher than that for the accounting-type job that I’m doing at the moment, but not much! Unfortunately, my contract stipulates that I’m not allowed to discuss my wages (I got into trouble for that when I found out what my fellow trainee was being paid) so I can’t tell you exactly what I’m paid at the moment. Still, it’s enough for me to get by on, and it’s certainly not a bad wage for a temp in this area.

When it comes down to it, I’m happy in my job and I’m happy with Reed. Yes, there’ve been a few hiccups along the way, but all in all I’m happy to recommend Reed as an employer. They’ve been pretty good to me!

 

...less