[Escapee]

Originally Posted by JustAnotherN00b

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Yes ntl is still overstaffed in some areas, the department I left had no work and that situation three years on is still the same. There are other departments running in very similar circumstances and its a delicate balance because paying people to do nothing is sometimes the best option because their skills could be needed in the future. Some people have built up skills in certain areas over a number of years and getting rid of these people will cause a big headache further down the line.

yes again, I do know people in ntl who are very negative. There was a big move in the networks department in my old region a few years before the planning for growth fiasco when the company lost some good employees in the networks department. We cant generalise on the ones that are left in the department but I can say morale has over the last 12 months or so spiralled downwards. I know two technicians that were both exceptionally keen (I really mean that) they were very thorough and could always be counted on to work awkward hours when there was an emergency.
Both these employees are now off work with stress as a result of treatment by a manager who has no understanding of handling people and quite frankle held the position of "Storeman" in ntl not to many years ago.

The field operation managers are controlled by a guy who was previously a switch technician, I never ha dto work with the guy myself but everyone complained about his lazyness and unhelpful attitude. This guy was on a disciplinary for not carrying out a task that caused ntl a lot of money in lost revenue, as a result he went sick with stress. He returned to work and was given a supervisors position when one became available.

its just ironic that this same person is hounding technicians and has actually been warned for listening in on technicians phone calls whilst they clear them with the faults department. his latest idea is apparently to get the headend technicians out into the field working on faults, this will only result in the increase of time to clear headend faults as they have to travel back from the network. He has taken this decision because of the amount of network technicians off work with stress/sickness, perhaps if he had the sense to treat them a bit better he wouldn't be in this situation.

The company has trodden the network/service departments into the ground, they have slowly removed perks such as Fuel, Cars, use of phone, decent bonus and forcing lower grade technicians onto callout with the threat of disciplinary procedures even though their contract says different. The company has used bully boy tactics because they know in the current climate there are very few oppertunities for these technicians to go elsewhere. Some of these guys are approaching retirement age and are just riding it out, others have asked for redundancy but there were too many on the list asking for it when the last redundancies were carried out.

Yes, I did leave ntl for a job with more money. I also found it funny whilst bumping into some ntl people who were having a leaving drink one night, one of these was a former HR person and for once an HR person was telling the truth as we all knew.

I could of stuck it out, I wasn't in the slightest worried about redundancy but more worried about ending up working for some pr** of a manager as the one mentioned above. I was listed on three organisational charts and decided I had no intention of working under 2 of the people listed. I'm sure if I had stayed, I would of been demoted and ended up back out on the network where I started because of a skills shortage due to very few suitably experienced engineers.

I think its much different in the forward support roles to office based, I guess one callcentre or tech support job is the same as the next no matter what company. The guys on the networks these days are not getting the support of their managers, the managers are just jumping on them at every opportunity.

PS: I understand the one tech who has recently gone sick with stress in my old region, did so because his manager boll****d him for still being in the headend after 9.30am when the guy was actually working on a faulty piece of equipment in the building. I understand he was told there was no exception to the rule! Do we expect a storeman to understand the technicians job!