This last week, I've been temping for a building facilities management company. It's not accounts - the closest I come to invoicing is filing them - but the girls in the office are lovely and it's experience of a sort.
Yesterday, I was sorting out the event files for one of the larger clients. What happens is the client emails up with a job - an event - and we assign an engineer, usually one of the resident engineers. The jobs vary, but are usually small - from unblocking toilets to adjusting the aircon. They come in cycles: in summer people are too hot, and in winter too cold. Christmas brings requests for PAT (Portable Appliance Test - an annual electrical test on everything that plugs into the wall) tests on christmas lights and radios.
Some things I've noticed: every job has a priority, and some people's idea of priority is skewed - adjusting the aircon tends to get top (1-2 hours) priority, whereas fixing a flickering light above an epileptic can wait a day or two. The person typing the emails is in love with the word 'within' - a typical job description is 'Within prepayments it is too cold - please check' instead of 'Please check prepayments as it's too cold'.
And spare a thought for poor Amrit. One day he rang in because of a draught above his desk. A couple of days later, he complained of being too hot.
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