Diary Friday 27th March 2015

March 29, 2015 | Posted in AUTHOR BLOGS, MUSIC, NON-FICTION, ORCHESTRAL MUSIC | By Arthur Chappell

Diary Friday 27^th March 2015

Further obstacles to my own writing and reviewing activity, though I made some time later for reading plays to review here as well. Today was a nightmare day of follow ups to my job broker’s imposed interview pursuits. I ended up making several expensive phone calls – the kind where you are put on hold; listening to Vivaldi while the people at the other end of the line do everything they can to ignore you. I love Vivaldi, but not when he helps run up my phone bills. I had to follow up queries from a potential employer who is demanding even more proof of my identity, work history and security status, even after I thought I’d provided everything required from me already.

A few weeks ago I was sent on a compulsory interview for a role at the Manchester Airport food tray preparation centre, in Trafford – though the work itself is easy, the hours offered are horrendous and badly paid – literally the minimum national wage with lots of my money taken up in travelling their and back.

As the role involves loading / unloading trolleys for commercial aircraft (though I won’t see the planes themselves), security checks and vetting are horrendous. I have had to provide my birth certificate, which they disliked as it is an old one and doesn’t fit on an A4 paper photocopier. I had to take my passport though I am not leaving the country. This is just to prove again my identity. Unfortunately, my passport is out of date – to fly I’d need to renew it and I haven’t due to not being able to afford to go abroad.

My passport was therefore rejected and I was ordered to go back to the interviewer with recent utility bills, full bank statements and a complete five year checkable work history since 2010.

I got my welfare officers to release my five year work history, except it stops a few months short of the date the employers need covering. They now need a deeper record of my work history and I have had to request that too, though it could take weeks to send it to me.

You would think the employers would just think my application was too complicated to pursue but they are tenaciously holding on – the job role directed at me doesn’t feel as much like a job offer as conscription. They are determined to get me. I have a third interview to attend with them when they are finally happy with the paperwork. Free time for my play-writing and pursuing work I might actually want to do could well soon be in serious jeopardy.

Arthur Chappell