The rant of a SW local office worker

geem

Hi it is terrible to hear about staff in public offices being abused and spat on, there is no excuse for that.

However it is one it should be recognised that there are people in real despair out there and sometimes the system brings them even closer to the edge of reason.
I signed for JSB on in February and was told all my documents were correct and I would hear in a couple of weeks.
I didn't hear anything and I waited patiently knowing that unemployment increases were causing backlogs etc.
A month ago I tried ringing the office I signed on in. No answer - ever.
I rang info in Dublin who put me through directly to the local office. Officer there told me she needed one more document. I supplied this in person imediately and same officer told me I would here within 7 days.
I have heard nothing since.
I am not in a desperate situation therefore can afford to be patient, however my heart goes out to people who are.
I do have a lot of sympathy for the pressures on SW officers at the moment but how much patience do people have?

If a SW officer is annoyed about people crying in front of them it implies a certain lack of sympathy, people can sense and perceive these attitudes and this only increases their frustration.

I have a relation who works in SW and she tells me she is rarely on the end of abuse but that other members of staff frequently are - this is because their attitude comes across the counter.

like clockwork!

It's interesting to see how grown men and women turn into blabbering eejits and angry bastards once the Celtic Tiger illusion of wealth is stolen from them.

Now they're nothing; they have no jobs, they cant pay back their debts, their children are ashamed of them, they've gotten accustomed to a standard of living they may never be able to afford again. Bet they never thought they would end up in a dole office<snip>. All because they got sucked into the frenzy and kept trying to "keep up with the joneses". To be honest OP, I'd take pleasure in seeing them cry.

I've been on the dole myself for the last few months and when signing on I can point out the regulars from the pricks who think they are too worthy of human beings to be there. Architects and marketing people I'd guess

who what when

like clockwork! wrote: »

It's interesting to see how grown men and women turn into blabbering eejits and angry bastards once the Celtic Tiger illusion of wealth is stolen from them.

Now they're nothing; they have no jobs, they cant pay back their debts, their children are ashamed of them, they've gotten accustomed to a standard of living they may never be able to afford again. Bet they never thought they would end up in a dole office with the scum who make it a lifestyle choice. All because they got sucked into the frenzy and kept trying to "keep up with the joneses". To be honest OP, I'd take pleasure in seeing them cry.

I've been on the dole myself for the last few months and when signing on I can point out the regulars from the pricks who think they are too worthy of human beings to be there. Architects and marketing people I'd guess

Given the way you wrote the first 2 paragraphs i thought you might be coming from some postion of authority on the subject. Seems not.

Personally im an architect who has been reduced to 3 working days and i can safely say i cant i dont fit into your view of 'professionals' nor do most of my colleagues.

You however sound like a very bitter person who has probably been bitten very firmly in the arse by the celtic tiger collapse. I have no sympathy for you sir/madam!

like clockwork!

who what when wrote: »

Given the way you wrote the first 2 paragraphs i thought you might be coming from some postion of authority on the subject. Seems not.

Personally im an architect who has been reduced to 3 working days and i can safely say i cant i dont fit into your view of 'professionals' nor do most of my colleagues.

You however sound like a very bitter person who has probably been bitten very firmly in the arse by the celtic tiger collapse. I have no sympathy for you sir/madam!

I can assure that is not the case! Not bitter, just fueled with contempt for all the idiots who thought they were owed a good life. Not everybody can have good lives.

Morlar

Lapa Champion wrote: »

I work in a social welfare office and...... we have to deal with, the personal insults, people blatently ripping the system of and our hands being tied,

It sounds like you have your work cut out for you. And I dont see the queues getting any smaller in the immediate short term. Could I just ask the OP why are your hands tied when it comes to dealing with benefit fraud ?

IT Loser

Listen, we all have very high opinions of ourselves. Who doesnt have pride? I stayed out of the loop until it became impossible to function without State Assistance. As soon as my claim comes through, I will take my place on the dole line with the rest of you, and I wont care what anyone says to me about any of it. I am not ashamed to queue. I am not ashamed- after all my parents and siblings are paying the taxes, right? My brother is crucified on tax when he does overtime in the factory. Too right I should collect.

IT Loser

Morlar wrote: »

It sounds like you have your work cut out for you. And I dont see the queues getting any smaller in the immediate short term. Could I just ask the OP why are your hands tied when it comes to dealing with benefit fraud ?

Politics is my guess. Politics of ALL sorts.

First and foremost, the purpose of the local SW office is to administer and execute claims for SW benefits.

Fraud is a matter for the judiciary and the police. The question of jurisdiction comes into the argument. Technically, the office can stop your payments, but do they have the investigative resources to even know, and I mean "Know" in the legal sense, who is doing just what? Probably not. Besides, if the dole gets stopped, are the fraudsters going to confront the Police? No. Head Office? Noooo. They are going to march down to their local and cause a scene. So where is the upside for the local?

Secondly, think about the bigger political picture. Long hot Summer. A lot, and I do mean a lot, of anger against the Government because of the bust. Why would they make it even worse by giving the go ahead for wholescale stoppages of the dole?? Local elections coming up too. Makes no sense, politically.

Morlar

IT Loser wrote: »

Politics is my guess. Politics of ALL sorts.

First and foremost, the purpose of the local SW office is to administer and execute claims for SW benefits.

Fraud is a matter for the judiciary and the police. The question of jurisdiction comes into the argument. Technically, the office can stop your payments, but do they have the investigative resources to even know, and I mean "Know" in the legal sense, who is doing just what? Probably not. Besides, if the dole gets stopped, are the fraudsters going to confront the Police? No. Head Office? Noooo. They are going to march down to their local and cause a scene. So where is the upside for the local?

Secondly, think about the bigger political picture. Long hot Summer. A lot, and I do mean a lot, of anger against the Government because of the bust. Why would they make it even worse by giving the go ahead for wholescale stoppages of the dole?? Local elections coming up too. Makes no sense, politically.

There is no political gain in allowing widespread social welfare fraud to continue. There is political gain in wiping it out. Aside from the financial impact it undermines the integrity of the system - and when it is percieved (as in my view it seems to be) to be higher proportionally among non nationals it can lead to the kind of hatred that any amount 'multiculturalism is great!!' types of events/articles/rte programmes etc wont get rid of.

If a person working in a social welfare office witnesses, or suspects fraud they should report it. This seems straightforward to me. I am genuinely curious why someone working there would do nothing about it, or even feel that they are not going to be encouraged to do anything about it. I am not being judgemental here just trying to work out why they would not do anything about it. If it is down to some kind of a jobsworth attitude of 'its not my specifically my job' or 'if I report this scumbag they might not like it' then that would be unacceptable in my view.

BostonB

Morlar wrote: »

... If it is down to some kind of a jobsworth attitude of 'its not my specifically my job' or 'if I report this scumbag they might not like it' then that would be unacceptable in my view.

Where did you get that from?

From the post I read, it seems difficult to prove, especially with limited resources and all the aggro comes back to the officer. Its just human nature to avoid aggro especially if its as nasty as described above.

Thats said I would have assumed theres people dedicated to rooting out welfare fraud, that SW staff could refer clients they have a query with.

Have to say my own limited experience of SW offices in the past was very poor. Seemed like theres a lot of staff who lack empathy and basic people skills. Perhaps they get a hard neck after years in the job. On the flip side I would imagine its a very tough, stressful job, personally I don't think I could hack it for long. I would just lose the rag with people.

Morlar

BostonB wrote: »

Where did you get that from?

The post before gave those 2 options as possible reasons. I am not expecting a counter worker to start a private investigation or prove anything in a court of law but . . . . . . . .

BostonB wrote: »

Thats said I would have assumed theres people dedicated to rooting out welfare fraud, that SW staff could refer clients they have a query with.

BostonB

Then its quite an (unfair) stretch suggesting a jobsworth.

Morlar

BostonB wrote: »

Then its quite an (unfair) stretch suggesting a jobsworth.

The comment I responded to said :

First and foremost, the purpose of the local SW office is to administer and execute claims for SW benefits.

Fraud is a matter for the judiciary and the police. The question of jurisdiction comes into the argument.

I responded to that by saying

"If it is down to some kind of a jobsworth attitude of 'its not my specifically my job' or..."

Characterising the 1st comment as that of a jobsworth fits in my view. Essentially saying ; well it is not specifically my job, someone else can take care of that etc.

All of which discussion ignores the fact that my post in this thread was asking the op were there specific reasons for a social welfare office worker ignoring instances of fraud.

BostonB

I would suspect its more useful to do the job they are paid to do, rather than moonlighting at other jobs, (fraud detective) especially when theres 3 hour queues of people in desperate need, and when the moonlighting achieves no useful result.

(bad analogy alert) If your a plumber, sometimes its a bad idea to play electrician.

Morlar

BostonB wrote: »

I would suspect its more useful to do the job they are paid to do, rather than moonlighting at other jobs, (fraud detective) especially when theres 3 hour queues of people in desperate need, and when the moonlighting achieves no useful result.

(bad analogy alert) If your a plumber, sometimes its a bad idea to play electrician.

If you work in a social welfare office and witness (or believe you witness) fraud of the system by claimants then in my opinion you should do something about it.

It's childish and a bit disingenous to compare 'doing something about it' to be akin to 'moonlighting as a fraud detective'.

There should be a mechanism where a social welfare office worker can report suspected fraud up the chain to the correct department where it can be properly assessed and then properly investigated and the guilty people properly punished.

If there are reasons why a social welfare office worker should do nothing I would be curious about what those reasons might be.

BostonB

I got the impression from previous posts hat nothing is being done when it is reported. Usually its exploiting a loophole in the system, and you could probably pattern match that with clients details and cross checking with other departments etc. Simple stuff like if someone gets a driving licence posted to one address and SW paid to another, should flag a risk warning. Things like that.

I doubt its like the 80's where people got dropped off in builder vans to collect the dole, or there were a lot of taxi's parked up outside.

Perhaps Lapa Champion could clarify why their hands are tied.

Nolanger

That dept is full of 'nice' people- the kind who wouldn't do much to tackle welfare fraud. It's all about 'customer service' and 'if in doubt pay out'. They do have inspectors who call out to places to see if someone signing on is working. But there's not much they can do to get back any money paid out. What happens is they're brought to court (which takes months) and then the judge orders the person to pay back €20 a week for a few years! Then there's the 'lone parents' who live with their partner. How can this fraud be detected? Also, there's not much interaction between ordinary welfare staff and the inspectors so every suspected fraud doesn't get reported.

TheBeach

amacachi wrote: »

Only thing I've heard people giving out about on sign-on day is the fact that one of the people they usually send down to the two hatches types with one bloody finger. :mad:

Again it's the upper levels where the problem is. Getting people signed on isn't a training-intensive job, a mate who was in school with me did it within a week of starting to cover someone's maternity leave and seemed to do it quicker than anyone else. Course they had to put a stop to that.

Have to say I wouldn't fancy the face-to-face stuff when it comes to people making their claims, don't envy that job too much. Well, depending on the pay.

The OP specified that she has been working there 11 months, so her net take home pay would be roughly 399euro per week. I don't think anyone should have to put up with abuse like that for any money.

Nolanger

Maybe not - got the impression she's at a higher grade SO/EO?

stepbar

axel rose wrote: »

So are you basing all SW workers on your own standards when working for SW?

Im confused on one hand you say that the while on the other hand you want the

I suggest you make up your mind.

Ah sure the OP was just making it all up so...........:rolleyes:

Yep, a few hard working young ones. Newbies preferably. The ould fogies call the shots in the local SW office and should be cleared out.

Where did I say she was making things up?

An SW office is not a nice place to work. I remember one particular experience where a scumbag threatened that he would get me outside when I was leaving. The cnut put his foot through a door on the way out. I had to get a lift home that eve.

Even back when I was working in the SW, the claims would be let pile up. Those processing same didn't give a fcuk. And we had full employment then. All they wanted was a bit of O/T.

If things were functioning normally it should take 3 days to put a claim up on the system from start to finish. The "real" processing time would be less than an hour (minutes actually) and there still would be 4-5 different people involved in the process. Why the hell does it take 3 bloody days never mind 9-10 weeks as it is at the moment!!!

Claims officers are not subject to any SLA's, minimum processing times or anything of the like which is a joke in itself. The system is mainly paper based and there is a proposterous amount of duplication. Every claim is kept in a file and filed in alphabetical order. Nothing is scanned meaning that for each claim, a person has to physically get up and search for a case file, read same and then start processing an application.

The solution would be some sort of workflow system ( Filenet, produce a program called P8 which would be ideal in this suitation). Having worked for same company in the past, the implementation of such a system would be p1ss easy. Every thing would be scanned and accessable using a pps no. Claim processers would be subject to minimum processing times. I could go on.

Having wrote an extensive disssertation on the IT system in the SW and having worked in the same org I think I would have enough experience to have an opinion. The system is the problem, as is the motivation of the workers in the very same system.

axel rose

Where did I say she was making things up?

[QUOTEthe notion that a sw officer is overworked is laughable][/QUOTE]

Seeing that the post is about the stresses of working in SW office Id say that your second quote was questioning the OP.

steof1984

This thread is in Today’s Evening Herald.

Talk about Lazy Journalism

senordingdong

I had a moan at a clerk in my SW office.
In my defence, she was **** with a serious attitude problem.

Since then I've only been seen to by nice helpful staff who agree, that the system is whack.

Xiney

the way it's written, the OP is multiple people at once!

quite the talent :P

http://www.herald.ie/national-news/dole-office-staff-spat-at-and-abused-as-jobless-total-soars-1763141.html

snubbleste

Xiney wrote: »

http://www.herald.ie/national-news/dole-office-staff-spat-at-and-abused-as-jobless-total-soars-1763141.html

A true journo never reveals their sources eh Claire Murphy ?

Nolanger

That's women for you - no genuine journalistic talent.

Xiney

Nolanger, you are out of order.

Nolanger

Hope this gets printed in tomorrow's Evening Herald.

The_Conductor

I'd just like to commend the OP for having the balls to tell people what its actually like. I have no idea where they are working, or in what capacity- all I can say is no matter how bad a day I might have on occasion- I thank God I don't work in a social welfare local office. Perhaps the Evening Herald might grace a few local offices with their presence- rather than riffling through Boards.ie to regurgitate a story? There are EH editors who are long standing members of boards on here after all.......

IT Loser

BostonB wrote: »

I would suspect its more useful to do the job they are paid to do, rather than moonlighting at other jobs, (fraud detective) especially when theres 3 hour queues of people in desperate need, and when the moonlighting achieves no useful result.

(bad analogy alert) If your a plumber, sometimes its a bad idea to play electrician.

Precisely. Hence my use of the word "Politics".

Office politics manadates that we deal with the queue first, and then deal with "Other stuff" later.

IT Loser

Morlar wrote: »

If there are reasons why a social welfare office worker should do nothing I would be curious about what those reasons might be.

Politics. For office-politics reasons, they do nothing. The impetus is not behind detection.