Welcome to the Real World and Happy Thanksgiving

It's been quite the week. I guess I owe you an explanation for my infrequent blogs.

Looking for a new car.

A new job.

A trip to the Dr.

Possible food poisoning. (Before Thanksgiving. Not because of it.)

Thanksgiving.

So I've decided to make this one post in a series to catch up with the stories I should have told you. Since I've already related some of my car searching woes, I'll start with my job.

TIPS FROM THE MAIL ROOM

I arrived at the county tax office 10 min. early on Monday to make sure I knew where to go in the building. Upon entering, I asked the security guard if he knew where to find the woman who's name I'd been given as my contact. Annoyed, he told me he couldn't possibly know everyone that worked in the building. Great start. So I just sat in front of the tax office and waited until they opened, hoping that the woman I was supposed to meet was located there.

With my brown sack lunch in hand, I found where to go. Though my name wasn't on the list of temps. starting that day, they didn't seem phased and went on with the tour and orientation. There were 4 new people, including myself, to help with the surge of property tax season. Next Monday I think we acquire 4 more temps. We'll have over 250,000 pieces of mail to open and process this season. That many receipts to fold, stuff and sort. A bit on the dull side, but the women are all nice. I'm a spring chicken in the mail room. Of all the women there, the next youngest to me has 3 kids in High School. The oldest is probably in her 80's and is retired but works the tax season for extra travel money so she can go on road trips with one of her friends. Most of the ladies are in their 50's-60's and have been looking for full time work for about 1-1 1/2 years. The job pool here is pretty dry. And I thought Provo was bad.

I was in violation of the dress code 4 times over on my 3rd day there. I'd not seen their dress code, so I hadn't known I was a delinquent until my supervisor said, "Don't let Mr. Maun see you in those shoes..." (Some really cute brown suede shoes. I wouldn't consider them tennis shoes, but apparently they do.) After telling my friends in the mail room not to wear those shoes if they had any similar, they said, "Oh yeah. They're really picky here. Jan (another temp. that wasn't there that day) got jumped for wearing jeans one day and those crop pants another day. You can't wear either of those." My supervisor later brought around the official dress code, and after reading it I noticed I'd violated it not just once for the shoes, but also my pants (a nice dark brown cord--it has stitched on pockets that make them illegal), my shirt (technically it was a T-shirt, fitted though it may have been, it was of a cotton jersey blend and therefore illegal), my sweater (It was a very cute brown wintry looking sweater. But it had a zipper and a hood and was also illegal.) So, now I know it's more business than casual in the business-casual department. I'm going to have to go shopping. To work in a mail room. Where no one sees me but the ladies I work with.

Ah well. A good excuse to buy clothes and not feel guilty about it, right?

Now for the tips.

1. When paying your property taxes, please send it in the envelope sent with your statement. Also include the statement stub. Without this we have to manually enter in your account information. With this we can just scan.
   
2. Write your account number on your check's memo line. If you don't, I have to. If I miss it, I get in trouble for it.
3. Write a check for the correct amount, both numerically and alpha-numerically. The bank technically goes by what you write out in long hand, not by the numbers you write in the box. So make sure those two numbers match. If not I have to put you in a problem pile with a sticky note on it. My boss hates stickies.
4. We will send you a receipt after processing your payment. Please don't send us an envelope to send you a receipt. Unless it has pre-paid postage you won't be seeing that receipt any sooner than anyone else. Sending your own envelope may actually make it slower for you.
5. Please don't post-date checks. It's illegal and we don't have to wait until the date written to deposit them. (I received a $5000+ check post-dated for Dec. 28!). There's no guarantee I'll even see that you've post-dated it because I'm going through a huge stack as quickly as possible. Since the date is no longer mandatory by banks, it's not on my check list of things to look for.
6. If you have multiple accounts with multiple statement stubs, please include every single stub and a check for each stub. Unless you have a lot of stubs. Then you can do 1 check. But PLEASE make sure it's the correct amount when adding them all together.
7. Lady, if your ex-husband's on the statement and you're the one having to pay it, please don't take it out on us if we send a receipt made out to both of you. I know you don't like the scumbag's name touching anything you do, but it's just a piece of paper. Don't freak out.
8. It's handier if you send your payments in a long envelope rather than a short letter sized envelope.
   

I guess that's it. I hope this was helpful for any of you with property taxes coming up. Help your local mail room worker by following my advice.

Next episode: Dr.'s Appointment-a couple questions answered