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AIBU?

To think this isn't on and I have no choice but to leave

136 replies

CakeAndTea1 · 16/10/2018 07:49

I work in a firm of a solicitors handling conveyancing matters.

My company around a year ago introduced a phone system which to me is just completely ridiculous.

Essentially they have scrapped direct dials and put us all in a pool where all calls just bounce to various people in the office.

Very rarely these calls relate to a matter you are personally dealing with however we are expected to assist by looking on the system at whichever matter the caller is asking about which interrupts your own matters.

At first it was manageable. However, they have expanded so rapidly that I am taking nearly 70 calls a day on matters which have nothing to do with me.

It's not about feeling that this is below me or anything like that. But I find it really hard to work on my own things whilst being constantly interrupted to deal with other people's matters. Add to that the fact we are now absolutely berated if we don't answer all calls to our phone and have even started receiving emails to say 'CakeandTea you have been away from your desk for 15 minutes can you explain why and go back in the phone pool please'.

I am trying to run my own cases and manage my own clients expectations and do actual legal work which takes concentration. I'm making mistakes and missing things because of this and it's causing me stress.

However, they will not see it. There has been a surge of people handing in their notices recently and one of the management essentially told another member of staff that they will happily 'manage people out if they don't like how we do things'.

AIBU to think this is not an efficient way to run a business or a fair way to treat your staff. I've been loyal to this place for a long time but I feel like they have changed their attitude towards us so drastically recently.

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CheungS255 · 02/11/2018 22:46

thats strange. i recently bought a house and when i call, it goes to a call handler who then pass my call to my case handler. worth checking what your portfolio is but if you stir up too much fuss, you might end up badly

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CakeAndTea1 · 19/10/2018 07:13

Lillyringlet no, not bought out. And I did think was it something like that except they recently sent round a copy of a business news paper article about how our profits have gone up by X percent etc... recently.

I find it funny because about a year and a half ago, before all this went on, we took part in the 'best companies to work for' survey done by one of the major newspapers. We actually got well within the top 100 and they put it on all our email sign offs. It's not the same place at all though now.

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Beanstalkk · 19/10/2018 07:10

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Lillyringlet · 18/10/2018 19:29

Honest question but has the firm been recently bought out? Sounds like what they have done in purpose to make people leave in a bid to not pay redundancy... Two years is generally the time line is seen for this play and it is awful

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Cutietips · 18/10/2018 07:45

The thing is though it seems like it’s not really related to allowing anyone at the same level to pick up each other’s calls. If that were the case, you wouldn’t be getting more calls than before, you’d just be getting unfamiliar calls. To me it sounds like they have got rid of a layer of administrative/call centre staff and passed that work onto you. I never get this idea that you get rid of cheaper admin people and then pass the work onto more expensive professional staff; but then it wouldn’t give management gurus scope to introduce efficiencies and appear to reduce headcount magically. No wonder productivity in the UK is so poor with these ridiculous working practices.

I’d look for another job in a smaller, more traditional firm. You’ll burn out eventually.

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CakeAndTea1 · 18/10/2018 06:38

Funnily enough, to the person that asked, I did start in the post room straight out of school. That was at another firm though and I was well into conveyancing when I joined this place. I assisted a fee earner when I first started here and then progressed from there.

Thanks Bluntness. That's interesting and very true it seems. It is practically impossible to do the job. Unless you do overtime and take the work home of a weekend which I think is what they hope for. My supervisor must be extremely stressed as she also has her own matters but has to pretty much assist everyone else on our team now too.

I need to locate my contract and have a read though tbh I'm steering towards just getting my CV out.

There's just one hour for lunch but you often end up not taking it to get things done. No other breaks in the day.

The head set is just a plain one I think. Nothing fancy. You just press a key on the handset to answer. I did sneakily ring my own mobile once so it looked like I was on the phone so I could get on with something but they told us they were starting listening in to random calls so I was too nervous to do it again haha.

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RenoSusan · 17/10/2018 23:22

What kind of headset do you have? Is it a quick disconnect? If so don't put anyone on hold-just ask them to hold and disconnect so the computer reads it as on line.

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ShalomJackie · 17/10/2018 22:22

Bluntness100 - although there may be lunch breaks in a law firm there are no other breaks!

In most "factory" style firms whether it is conveyancing/plot sales or personal claims it is very much a pool/claim centre set up and done at cheap fixed fees (as driven by public demand) and consequently the service is shocking and also the highest amount of negligence claims arise on property matters.

I would leave before the firm gets the reputation of being one of those type firms and get into a regular conveyancing department.

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Gwenhwyfar · 17/10/2018 22:21

"not being rude but you are really just an office worker so answering calls will be part of your work."

She's already said that she's a conveyancer not an admin person. However, a normal admin role doesn't include 70 calls that are meant for various people the admin worker has no connection to and outside their department. That sounds more like a call centre, or possibly reception.

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emmakc1977 · 17/10/2018 21:57

Are u a legal exec or a paralegal and did u start off as legal sec at the firm? If you were then it sounds like the powers that be are having trouble accepting that you are now a fee earner and if this is the case I would leave and start a fresh where you have only been known as few earner. Ive seen this happen a lot and it’s very unfair

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Bluntness100 · 17/10/2018 21:53

I think they have changed your role without your permission or agreement op. And as such there is a legal case to answer to. Which is odd for a legal firm.

You say you are a conveyancer, but right now on thr stats quoted you spend on average six hours a day answering the phone. If you then factor in a one hour lunch break and two fifteen min shorter breaks this means you work for approx 30 mins per day on actual conveyancing. If you add loo breaks in, then it's less than 30 mins.

They even state you work in the phone pool. In addition they treat you like you work in a call centre inc monitoring the way you handle calls.

As such I do think there is a grievance here because this is not a conveyancers role you now have, you are a first line call handler in the phone pool.

Can you speak to acas? What does your contract say? This is not advocating tasks, this is basically your whole job now.

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Mixedbags · 17/10/2018 21:37

I feel for you. I am in a similar situation that is I suspect is about to get worse (new telephone system sold as the holy grail-it sounds sh**!)! These people bring these ideas in and don’t actually do the jobs to see if it’s workable. It’s madness. I work in a sensitive type of job role too! I think my situation is very similar to McDonalds fast food computer system. It does not work! In my opinion the old system at McDonalds worked so much better! A lot of A/E departments seem to be like this. One person can only do one job but you need 3 jobs doing and it takes forever for the other 2 people to appear. Why can’t the one person do the 3 jobs? (Which is what used to happen)? Rant over! 🙄

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stressedoutpa · 17/10/2018 21:23

Totally impossible situation.

This was one of many problems in my last job. Calls for everyone (bar a couple of people) were routed through me. Reception would also call to advise me visitors were in Reception for people I didn't even work directly for because it was my job.

Most companies have binned their staff because 'admin is easy' and 'anyone can do it'. No appreciation of how complex things can be or time consuming. Ho hum.... I'm out of it now.....

We binned my parents' estate agent because calls went through to a call centre. It was an utter nightmare trying to speak to the same person twice. This approach might improve cost efficiencies but it does not improve customer loyalty.

I would look for another job pronto.

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MsMotherOfDragons · 17/10/2018 21:23

It sounds dreadful!

Quite apart from the terrible working practices, I'd be alarmed by the total lack of response to employee feedback and determination to push on with an organisational 'strategy' regardless of the true cost in client (dis)satisfction and employee burnout!

And I mean, if they were having a problem with staff not returning client calls, surely they could just have managed those staff properly to sort out the problem?! Rather than burdening everyone else with this ridiculously inefficient and stressful system...

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lolalilo · 17/10/2018 21:11

Sounds awful to me, and I'm a legal recruiter working across the south of the UK.

I can't imagine any of my candidates being happy with that environment.

If you fancy a change, message me, seriously!

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LouH1981 · 17/10/2018 20:50

I’m a criminal defence solicitor and thus sounds ridiculous! It is not an efficient use of a fee earners time. Is it effecting your time recording/billing?
Doesn’t sound like the clients are getting the consistent/personal approach that is expected these days either.
How do the other few earners feel?
If enough of you agree, it might be worth having a meeting with your head of dept. At the end of the day, if you end up not meeting your target because you are fielding calls then it’s not good for you or them.
I’m totally with you and don’t understand why anyone would think this is a good idea!
And as for the chasing email...you are practising law not working in a call centre! Granted I’m not in the same area as you but this would def wind me up!

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ToftyAC · 17/10/2018 20:46

OP the problem is the Upper echelons of solicitors’ practices. I’ve worked in several different legal firms over the past 20 years and, although this is more extreme, tbh all firms have some sort of policy quirk that is almost unbearable. However, this is an utterly ridiculous- and a bit dangerous - policy and in your shoes I’d be off to somewhere slightly more sensible

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Keepingthingsinteresting · 17/10/2018 20:45

Unfortunately this is the way conveyancing is going (except v high end/high value) - the margins are too low. I’m not normally one to take things lying down, but in reality keeping notes, pushing back isn’t going to change it. Protect yourself as best you can & get another job asap

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Jux · 17/10/2018 20:37

Gosh, I used to work (briefly) in a press office of a firm very much on the front page every day at the time. We got that many calls a day and there were 3 of us fielding them. We couldn't have done a serious job on top of it, simply impossible to concentrate.

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maddiemookins16mum · 17/10/2018 20:14

Blimey, 70 a day!! I receive some inbound calls at work (not a call centre) and the average time per call is SIX minutes by the time you’ve looked, logged it, spoken to the customer, typed up any notes etc etc.
Are you first on the loop - that can sometimes be an issue as it goes to you first then to the next person.

YANBU.

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GeorgeTheHippo · 17/10/2018 20:09

I'm a solicitor, though not in private practice any longer. I think you need to leave.

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GabsAlot · 17/10/2018 20:09

if this has beenhappening for a year id say get out whats the point of trying to permanently catch up with work and being stressed

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pteradactyl · 17/10/2018 20:04

Yanbu. I used to get between 40 and 80 calls a day and be expected to do a large amount of work, but it was impossible. Silly errors were being made which were making management shout people down in the office and the whole thing made me feel ill. I left and I've never looked back. My "new" job is a million times better, the people are nicer, the hours are better, the wages are higher...dont regret my decision even a tiny bit

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grumiosmum · 17/10/2018 19:59

70 calls a day is one every 6 minutes. If each call is, say 90 seconds long, I can see that it would be impossible to do any proper work!

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NewPapaGuinea · 17/10/2018 19:35

So they implemented an entirely new system on the basis that too many calls were going to answerphone? Did they look at why this was the case and try and address that problem before they threw this debacle in? I can guess they did not! Very poor management as the original problem still exists, but in a different (worse) manner.

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