I've had a crap day

[Butter]

So, I'm on my way to work and I get a flat. Not a huge deal. I was only about 4 miles from the office (I commute about 43 miles each way every day)... which sucks. I pull off the Interstate, and proceed to get the jack out... then I realize, this is a new jack, and it does not have a lugnut wrench. I have inadvertently discarded my old lugnut wrench.

So, I call a friend from work, and he agrees to come. Traffic's heavy, so it takes him nearly a half hour. He shows up, we get the lugnuts off. Tire won't budge. I have not seen this before... this car has had flats before, but I've never been unable to remove the tire. The thing just will not budge. We try pulling and hitting it as much as possible. No dice.

The Sheriff's dept. shows up, and he tries to hit it and pull it. Luckily, I have AAA, so after another 15 minutes or so, the Sheriff calls AAA for me, and I tell him I'll be fine, and tell my friend to head back to the office, I'd be fine waiting on the tow truck. The tow truck comes... HE tries to pull the tire off for 10 minutes. It doesn't work. The car gets loaded on the back of the wrecker, and we make for a close-by service station. Of course, it is raining off and on this whole time, but fortunately I did bring my waterproof jacket.

We get to the service station, they unload the car and get it into a garage bay. I go in, they recommend I replace the other rear tire as well (which is fine, my tires WERE getting iffy). Then they also want to give me an alignment, balance my tires, replace my belts... to the tune of something like $300. I tell the guy just put my spare on, I'll go somewhere else. He decides to give me just the 2 tires for $100, plus like $20 for the balancing, plus some incidentals for "tire disposal" and whatnot. So, I avoid getting totally screwed.

Then I get to work (2 1/2 hours late). I open up my e-mail, and there is an e-mail from my CFO. Turns out, the raise I thought I was getting to go along with my promotion is not as great as I thought. 3 weeks ago when the CFO first approached me, he told me I would be getting a 10% raise, and would get paid regular time for any hours worked over 40. Fine, not a huge raise, but good enough. Yesterday, he comes into my office and like we'd never talked before, actually cuts my raise by $500 a year (not a big deal) and leaves it at that.

When I get a confirmation e-mail from HR, I ask about keeping track of hours over 40. Then, the CFO e-mails me and says "oh, you'll be salary now, so you don't get paid for any hours over 40." I e-mail him and tell him we need to talk about this, because I don't want to do it over e-mail. He tells me "you need to think about whether this is going to affect you taking the position". WTF? What am I supposed to do with this? I can make about as much as the raise will be giving me just by working another 4-5 hours of OT every 2 weeks (which I do at times). I understand that salary is salary, but if that were the case, he shouldn't have told me 3 weeks ago that I would be getting paid for any hours over 40, and that once I got a few raises, THEN I could expect to not be paid for any time over 40 hours any more. I guess there's not much I can do about this if he doesn't remember that conversation.

Then I finish 4th in the Music Draft. Crap!

[Drake]

Ugh. I hit a pot hole on Sunday night and blew out my passenger side tire. My rim had frozen to the axle (plus all of my lugnuts were frozen). Took me 40 minutes to change the tire by the time it was all said and done.

To that extent, I'm feeling your pain.

[Daimyo]

Always get things like that in writing... I actually try to do conversations like that over email whenever possible because it leaves a paper trail. Guys like the CFO are not out to help you... you really can't trust anything verbal.

[Butter]

Originally Posted by Drake

Ugh. I hit a pot hole on Sunday night and blew out my passenger side tire. My rim had frozen to the axle (plus all of my lugnuts were frozen). Took me 40 minutes to change the tire by the time it was all said and done.

To that extent, I'm feeling your pain.

Yeah, I am EXTREMELY glad this didn't happen during any of the last 3 weeks... below zero, snow and ice everywhere. It would've been a friggin' disaster. So I guess I am somewhat lucky the tire waited to fail until now.

[Butter]

Originally Posted by Daimyo

Always get things like that in writing... I actually try to do conversations like that over email whenever possible because it leaves a paper trail. Guys like the CFO are not out to help you... you really can't trust anything verbal.

Every other time we've had money stuff come up with my job, he told me what was going to happen, then it happened. Never had to worry about it before. I guess that's why this pisses me off. It shouldn't, because they've been more than fair with me with pay several times in the past... but it does.

[Toddzilla]

I've found that jumping headfirst into some POL threads really improves my mood - give it a try!

[Dr. Sak]

I had something ilke this happen to me and I blame myself entirely for it. In December I turned in my letter of resignation to my boss. I thanked him for everything the past 6 years and told him I enjoyed my experience here but it was time for me to move on. So we talk more and he asks me why I am leaving and I told him that the money at the other job plus promotion was too good to pass up.

Well he tells me that if I will listen they will give me a counter-offer, so I say sure what the heck. Well after they did their "study" they found everyone they hired in the same 2 to 3 year period was "behind the curve" due to their lack of merit plan. So what they did was do a little adjustment to get everyone where they should be and the specifically told us that it would have no effect on our raises come March. I was happy with what they gave me (more than the other company) and they told me that they couldn't give me the promotion at that time, but it would be easy to push through come evaluation time.

Well fast forward two months. Everyone that got that "adjustment" has been told not to expect a good raise because they already helped us out. Plus I was told that my chance at the promotion was very slim. The reason being (this was not told to me but I figured it out) if they promote me it pushes me into a bracket where I am in the bottom of the pay scale. Which means with my evaluation they will have to give me a higher raise than they want to.

So I blame myself for not demanding it at that time. I should've got everything in writing. It's situations like these that companies just brush under the table. Then they wonder why they have problems keeping people.

[Butter]

Originally Posted by Toddzilla

I've found that jumping headfirst into some POL threads really improves my mood - give it a try!

I can't see it doing anything but worsening mine, to be honest. Unless I was being a complete troll.

[BrianD]

Originally Posted by Daimyo

Always get things like that in writing... I actually try to do conversations like that over email whenever possible because it leaves a paper trail. Guys like the CFO are not out to help you... you really can't trust anything verbal.

You have to be a little bit careful demanding things like this in writing. In a current job where they don't have to give you a promotion or a great raise, you don't have much recourse if the raise doesn't come through properly. Would it really be worth your time and effort to argue about the promised raise? You may get the raise, but you lose a lot of goodwill. Is that an acceptable trade? I think it is good to get this stuff in writing before taking a new job, but maybe not in this situation.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Sorry to hear that, Butterman. I hope things turn around.

Since misery loves company, everytime I read the title of this thread that horrible "You had a bad day" song starts playing in my head. It's not good.

[st.cronin]

feel better big boy

[Daimyo]

Originally Posted by BrianD

You have to be a little bit careful demanding things like this in writing. In a current job where they don't have to give you a promotion or a great raise, you don't have much recourse if the raise doesn't come through properly. Would it really be worth your time and effort to argue about the promised raise? You may get the raise, but you lose a lot of goodwill. Is that an acceptable trade? I think it is good to get this stuff in writing before taking a new job, but maybe not in this situation.

How much goodwill do you have if they promise you a raise and then don't give it to you? At that point you basically either have to accept that you work for a poor company/manager that you can no longer trust or find a new job. At least if you get it in writing you have something to show the manager... you might at least get a bump in salary while you look for that new job.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by st.cronin

feel better big boy

Noop's girlfriend!

[BrianD]

Originally Posted by Daimyo

How much goodwill do you have if they promise you a raise and then don't give it to you? At that point you basically either have to accept that you work for a poor company/manager that you can no longer trust or find a new job. At least if you get it in writing you have something to show the manager... you might at least get a bump in salary while you look for that new job.

It would be nice to know why the raise didn't happen. There could be a reasonable explanation or it could be a crappy manager. If you pursue damages, employment could be over. If you don't pursue damages, there might be better opportunities in other areas of the company. Risk vs. reward.

[terpkristin]

I sympathize, Butter. My day has been horrible for all sorts of OTHER reasons, but I agree that today = not a good day.

/tk

[stevew]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

Sorry to hear that, Butterman. I hope things turn around.

Since misery loves company, everytime I read the title of this thread that horrible "You had a bad day" song starts playing in my head. It's not good.

Yeah, got that annoying ass song in my head too.

[M GO BLUE!!!]

Ouch... Hopefully, the new job works out better than it looks right now.

My worst tire-changing story was when a friend of my sister's called me to help her change the tire. She was cute & really dumb, so I went to help. A lug nut was on so tight I broke the wrench attempting to get the nut off, and I had so much pressure on the wrench it sent me flying when it broke, through a ton of snow and slush... I was soaked, dirty and just nasty. I drove her home, thinking maybe I could get "payment" after I get cleaned up... All I got was a couple hours of her complaining how her married boyfriend won't leave his wife "until the time is right." Some women are just too dumb to even bother with.

[Easy Mac]

It could have been worse