Return to the Insanity Factory

One of the reasons I call my place of work, an insanity factory is my actual job. It is one of the most mind numbing purposeless jobs I have ever had in my long and checkered career.Boorrring with a capital B. In a nutshell my job is to walk around a warehouse with a scanner, scanning barcodes on packages to see if they can be released to be shipped to our customers. To explain a little further, the warehouse I work at is a major entry point into the dominion of Canada from the US. Due to the fact that the packages cross a border they are subject to having a duty put on them. Therefore packages of a certain value are taken of the moving belt and put on shelves so they can be evalulated and customs can take their pound of flesh. The other packages that are below that value are loaded on other trucks to be sent to the centre of the universe(Toronto). From there they are distributed to all are waiting customers. My advice to you who are shipping from the US to Canada is to always undervalue your packages on your declaration of value or write gift on your declaration. Gifts are usually let throught with no tax, unless they are something of high value over $100 or more,thats if you do not want to take it in the kidney from our federal government. I believe we pay enough fees and taxes, so they can get their money somewhere else like the outrageous pensions payed to MPS or the money wasted on official bilingualism.

The problem with my job is once I scan the warehouse I am expected to keep scanning until the shift is over, but most of the time the boxes have not been processed or made it throught the computer yet, in other words they can not be released until all the paperwork has been done. So I just keep scanning the same boxes over and over again with no result. I guess they believe that if you keep scanning a particular package, it will get pissed off and release it's self. Sometimes there are a few releases, but usually after the intial scan there are not many. To make my job even more boring around 10 am they send two workers from the office to help us scan. Great hades there is not even enough boxes to scan for one person, never mind four. So as a result after the place is scanned you have to start all over again on the boxes that you have just scanned, Insanity! I feel like the ancient Corinthian king: Sisyphus. He was condemned by the gods to push a boulder up a hill only to have it roll down again each time he reached the top. My job is mind f*#king and numbing beyond belief.

I feel I could help in other areas after I am done my scanning and return to it periodically to get the few releases that do come up. I told the blind idiot gods this but they disagree. They say that the job is essential, because we have to find those releases to get them out. I know the real reason that they will not change their small minds. It is all about my fellow scanner who is disabled, unfortunately this is about the only job she can do, so you see it is basically a make work project. I believe that if they let me go my merry way that she may become upset that I am being treated differently. They can not do this to her, because she is the shining example to the world about how swell my company is. She fills two quota areas, being a disabled female. They can hold her up as an example about how they employ a diverse group of people, are they not good corporate citizens or what? The cockles of my heart are warmed just thinking about their genuine care and consideration. Let me tell you they sure have the moron quota filled up in the management ranks.

Another extremely idiotic and annoying aspect of my job is the fact that the scanner has two modes. The mode I use most often is one that identifies packages that can be released. The second mode identifies in the warehouse where a box is located and if it can be released. This process is done by scanning barcodes on the shelves than scanning the boxes on that shelf. So each shelf has an identifying number or barcode. As a result the package can now be located in the building if need be. The problem is these two modes do not agree sometimes. So if I started scanning on one mode and it says the boxes is a release, the next time I scan the box it is a nonrelease on the other mode. Sometimes a package handler will get to that box before I am back to it and put it on the belt to be loaded. This box that is a nonrelease with be scanned by the outbound scanner, who will have to take it off the belt and put it aside, because it is a hold. What a bloody waste of time for all the people involved. All the other shifts only scan once per shift using the location scan that seems to be the most reliable, but due to the feel good make work aspect of my shift we have to suffer with the annoying and inefficient two mode process and just keep scanning. What a load of BULLOCKS!
I should say to clarify what happens at my place of work further. The trucks from US are unloaded and put on a moving belt. the packages are than moved down the belt to be loaded into trucks waiting to go to Toronto. The packages that are of a certain value are taken off the belt between these two stations to be proceesed. Also any packages that have problems with values or addresses, etc are taken off at a special station to be fixed. They can not catch everything, so remember always undervalue your packages. I also have a small pet peeve with my customers. At my company a sticker is produced with the contact, shipper and barcode info. Some customers use their sticker to seal their boxes. Please do not do this dude, due to the fact that it sometimes distorts the barcode. As a result I have to punch in the number manually, because it will not scan properly. It would make my grim job easier, because it is hard to read those small numbers in the stygian darkness of the warehouse and if the package is heavy and I have to pick it up to read it, not fun. So please do not use the sticker as a seal. This evil sign of the beast barcode also allows the customer to track their package. You can just go on the website and enter your number and it should tell you what city your package is in. I hope this paragraph made it a little clearer about what happens where I am stationed.

Another thing I wanted to tell you about is what happen at christmas. Boy O Boy what a great company I work for, it is just like being in a Frank Capra movie. For christmas we were all given turkeys. I think they are the noble fowl, but they seem to be more the size of pigeons. I heard a rurmor that illegal immigrants from central america are hired to hunt them with BB guns at our california facilities. Talk about killing two birds with one stone, they rid themselves of these pests and feed their employees. Who says the spirit of enterprise is gone from the americas. The other gift all us men received was a portable male urinal. Man how thoughtful, now we do not have to leave the warehouse floor to relief ourselves, how thoughtful of the blind idiot gods(management), nothing says happy holidays like a male urinal.. I do not know what the women received, but I hope it is just as practical as our gift.