A rewarding move
When I moved away from the City Centre
site of the Company I worked for, to another of their factories,
I'd been there 20 years and in a further 5 years I would have
been entitled to £50 for long service.
A colleague who also moved at the same
time had been there 2 or 3 years longer.
We arrived at the Southern Outpost which
was part of the same business and discovered they operated under
a local set of rules. There, you had to work for 21 years to
qualify for their long service award.
After waiting something under a year,
I was duly informed that I had qualified for an award, not £50
but £500!
My colleague rang Personnel.
"When do I get my £500?",
he asked. "You don't", was the response, "you
have to be here at the anniversary of your 21 years service and
you weren't". He was really fed up. He'd missed his £50
and now he'd missed the £500.
One didn't get cash however.
From some long since forgotten deal,
each qualifying employee had to go to London and visit Harrods,
where you picked out £500 pounds worth of goodies.
Usually, overcome with the occasion
people usually picked out a daft thing like a glass bowl costing
a small fortune so they could stand it on their sideboard and
fill it with paperclips, nuts left over from Christmas and important
bits of stuff that might come in useful one day.
I didn't fancy a glass bowl so I picked
out really interesting things:-
a Philips communications receiver
an espresso coffee machine
a yoghurt maker
a set of rechargeable batteries (for
the radio)
a practical manual on computer hacking
and a new bike
Eventually, after waiting ages, all
the bits arrived at "Inwards Goods" and I was asked
to collect them.
The bike had to be assembled as its
pedals were loose and tied on with string and its handlebars
twisted round for transport.
I wheeled it back to the office, borrowed
a spanner and fixed it all up.
Next, I had to get it home.
This was a problem because bikes weren't
allowed on site so I decided to leave at the usual knocking-off
time and slip out un-noticed in the rush at 5 o'clock.
The main gate was open for the egress
of Company cars so I pedalled furiously towards the gate and
thought I'd made it but at the last moment a chap in uniform
with sergeants stripes on the sleeves leapt out of the guardroom,
sprinted across the road and grabbed my handlebars.
"You can't bring bikes on-site",
he roared.
"I didn't", I said, a Harrods
van brought it this afternoon.
"I don't care how it got here",
he said, "you're not allowed on site with it, next time
put it in the bike shed outside".
I did.
Philips Model D2935 bought from Harrods in 1986
For a description of this receiver click
on its picture.
