My state allows us to switch power companies easily. I’ve done it a few times, and I always get a lower bill and often a “new user” $100 gift card, AirPods, Nintendo Switch, etc. It takes about ten minutes.

New Company Salesman: “Sign up here, and get $100, plus a 10% guaranteed discount off of anyone else’s price!”

Me: “Sounds great!”

I sign up.

My old company calls me and explains that I now owe a $200 service cancellation fee. I call [New Company], and I find that they are more expensive than they claimed. They also claim that they never made such guarantees.

Me: “I’d like to cancel the policy I just started. Can I do that without a fee? The $200 cancellation fee at [Old Company] is more than I’d save with you in two years.”

New Company: “Hi, I’m Aubrey! Oh, don’t worry about those! They never sue. It’s really hard for them to take you to court, and they can’t repossess your equipment, not for $200! Legally, it’s actually not a crime; you never need to pay those silly cancellation fees. You never, ever have to pay a cancellation fee, no matter what a silly power company says. You’re unlikely to be arrested or go to court or need a lawyer.”

Me: “Great, but… word of advice: it’s a $5 to $10 discount offer, and you’ve mentioned lawyers, lawsuits, and court seven times. Maybe… don’t bring up lawyers and the police so many times when trying to sell someone on a $5 discount?”

New Company: “Oh, okay. Thanks.”

I call my old company and mention this. They are willing to waive the cancellation fee, give me a lower rate, and send a welcome gift. 

I call [New Company] again and end up speaking to Aubrey from customer service.

New Company: “Oh, you’re canceling? I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to pay our mandatory $100 fee; it’s required.”

Me: “Oh, sorry, Aubrey. A nice woman from customer service named Aubrey told me fifteen minutes ago ‘on a recorded line’ that those are optional, not a law, that no company will ever sue you for it, and not to worry, ever, no matter what a silly power company says. Let Aubrey know that’s valuable information, Aubrey!”

I later somehow got both welcome gifts anyway: Gen 2 Airpods and a $150 Visa gift card.

My friend and I work at the local waste management facility — the dump. They don’t treat us well or pay us what we’re worth, but the worst has been how my friend is treated.

Most people in our area are pickers/sorters; we stand at a conveyor belt grabbing paper, recyclables, hazardous material, etc., out of the garbage. It’s hard work, and some areas are fast-paced, but we can’t really fall behind because the belt doesn’t stop.

My friend has a different job, where he has to sort through all the cans and other random metal that gets picked up by a magnet, and also sort buckets of recyclables one of the picker groups grabs because their area goes too fast for them to sort them manually. If he finishes both of those tasks, he’s expected to join us in our areas and help until he’s needed again.

[Friend] is doing a two-person job, literally. When he takes a day off, they need one fully dedicated worker and one person who switches between picking and helping them. Everyone he’s trained who tried to do it alone has said that it’s a two-person job and nobody should be expected to do it alone, but [Friend] is because he’s capable of keeping up.

The guy who had the job before him couldn’t even keep up; he would dump half his buckets back on the conveyor belt if he got behind, which meant the pickers in other areas had to sort them and we’d get hit with a wave of stuff that made us rush. In the year since he started, [Friend] hasn’t dumped a bucket once. They even closed up the hole that the last guy used to do that.

We also have deep cleaning days once a month, where we don’t run anything and just clean everywhere. For months, [Friend] (and I, once I got hired) was the only one volunteering to do one of the hardest, most back-breaking, most boiling-hot-in-the-summer jobs, which was also super important because if it wasn’t done, the machines would break down.

Despite all of that, [Friend] hasn’t received any raises or bonuses. When he brought up that other people worked far less and made more, he was told, “They’ve been here longer,” and, “You’re young, so you can just do more than them,” and, “Everyone finds their own pace.” He didn’t mind the pace or amount of work — he likes going fast — he just wanted to be recognized and rewarded for it.

So, he tried to stop doing the extra work he’d been doing, going into our work areas to help us when he was done with his own tasks. Instead, he would use that time to watch movies on his phone; he had enough free time to watch an entire two-hour movie on most days. But the big bosses noticed it on the cameras, and he was told he wasn’t allowed to do that anymore. He also got reprimanded and had a performance bonus removed because he would wear an earbud while he worked, even though he was one of the only people without a radio to listen to.

During cleaning days, both of us started getting in trouble for not cleaning — after we spent three-quarters of the shift working our butts off, while other people swept the same pile of dirt for an hour or “supervised”, aka stood around in groups while one or two people actually cleaned. The two of us could finish a job in two hours which used to take twelve people four hours.

On one cleaning day, [Friend] got in trouble for goofing off by shooting a few people with a water gun. Sure, it wasn’t exactly professional, but it was all in good fun, and the only reason the incident was even noticed was that someone else sprayed a guy who [Friend] knew to avoid. That guy retaliated by spraying two people in the face with a bottle of concentrated sanitizer. Both of them got the same punishment.

So now, we’ve slowed down on cleaning days and get less done, and we find easier jobs to do to take up our time. And [Friend] no longer does the extra work because he’s too busy standing at his spot waiting for one can to drop every minute. He’s finally “found his pace”.

I’m sitting in the call center, doing my work, when I get a call in. An anonymous number? Odd…

Me: “This is [Electrical Company], billing department. How can I help you?”

The caller sounds like a woman trying to disguise her voice.

Customer: “Hi. I want to know my current debt?”

Me: “Your current outstanding bills? Of course. Can I have a customer or contract number, or a name or address, please?”

She gives me her contract number. I now notice a warning. It’s big fat error message that says, “Debt sold to collections. Do NOT edit case! -Legal Dept.”

Customer: “Hello?”

Me: “Oh, sorry about that! I was just surprised by a message that I got. I’m afraid I can’t access your case since your debt with us has been sold to a collections agency. But this means that your debt exceeded five thousand, at least.”

Customer: “You sold my debt?!”

Me: “The recovery department of [Electrical Company] did, yes—”

Customer: “So, I don’t owe you any more money?!”

Me: “Not to us, no, but you do owe the debt coll—”

Customer: “I DON’T HAVE TO PAY YOU S*** ANYMORE! WHOOOOOO!”

Me: “Ma’am—”

The customer hangs up. My coworker looks at me.

Coworker: “Was she happy that her debt was sold?”

Me: “Yep. Won’t be so happy when the collections agency shows up at her door.”

Coworker: “Does she think her debt would suddenly disappear?”

For at least the last year — since I went back to this job, but likely before — everyone has been complaining and asking the manager about raises. Due to minimum wage increases, we’ve gone from making $3.25 above minimum wage to $0.25 in just three years. A few employees from a temp agency who were long past their trial period did finally get hired properly and got a small raise, bringing us to $0.75 above minimum wage, but it was still far below what the job was worth.

Then, one day in December, the manager started calling people to the office in small groups. Apparently, the company was selling branded clothing for us workers, and he was pitching them and taking orders. The cheapest thing on the list was a hat that would cost $18, and the next one up was a $44 sweater.

I quietly and politely listened to the entire spiel — I was on the clock after all — until he asked me if I was interested in ordering anything.

Me: “I don’t get paid enough to afford these.”

I am working at an internal corporate help desk. A call starts with the “Can’t log in” conversation. Okay, password reset. No worries. I reset the password and ask him to type it in.

Employee: “No, I can’t. The screen is blank.”

Blank — nothing at all? I have him check all the lights, the monitor, and the desktop, all out. Okay, check the power.

It’s at this point that I look closely at his profile and see which office he is in.

Me: “Aren’t you guys experiencing a power outage at the moment?”

Employee: “Yeah..? Ohhhh. Never mind.” *Click*

The kicker? It was a power company.