It's not going to take much for me to get used to this semi-retirement thing. Between SS and the part time income, we get along nicely. Ain't gonna die rich, but we ain't going hungry either. I'm supposedly working two days a week now, but during the most recent meeting the manager had a few things to say to the new guys about padding their time. Also about response time. He was pointing out how the wait time the customer experiences affect the reviews on-line. Privately, earlier today, he let me know one of the reasons he really wants to let one guy go. He told me this guy has really been hitting up the company on overtime. It appears that not all of it is ligit. I was told he spent five hours on a re-key job. Now that is all I was told. But I know this, if you are re-keying a lock, with no key so you have to pick it first and have only experience to go by in selecting pins, a single lock should take no more than 30 minutes tops. How many locks was he doing? No clue. Without better information I won't venture a judgement. However, I was also asked if I could pick up an extra shift on Friday, just so the guy racking up overtime doesn't get the chance to run up any more.
The funny thing is as it always was. You never know what's going to happen. I was working last Sunday and Monday. On Sunday I had four calls. All house lockouts. Two of them I picked the lock and got them in. One I used the air bag method of getting them in. The fourth, well some days The Good Lord just smiles on you. The guy had a glass door that was locked over the front door, which had both the doorknob and the dead bolt locked. So I've got to pick three locks to get in. I look to my left and the window next to the front door isn't locked. I told the customer that the way it is designed the screen is supposed to be removed from the inside, but if I bend it a bit, I can get it out, open the window, crawl through and open the door. He tells me, "Go ahead." Once the screen is out and the window open I ask if he wants to crawl though or should I and he says,
"I've got someone smaller."
He signals his girlfriend and she gets out of the car, runs over and goes inside. Everyone is happy and I got the screen back in place with almost no sign it was ever removed.
Sunday was a bit different. Only two jobs, but each one had a big price tag one it. It the first one a lady was just fed up with her key-pad deadbolt. She and her husband had recently put fresh batteries in it, but the thing just refused to work right. They couldn't even turn the handle on the inside to lock it. I opened it up as I was removing it and the problem was right there in front of me. At some point in the past the batteries had been forgotten. They had started to corrode before they were replaced and the corrosion had gotten into the electronics. No wonder the thing didn't act right.
Batteries are a locks worst friend. As long as they don't get a chance to corrode or to run down, they are great. But once either of those things happen, all bets are off. I once had to get a lady into her house because of dead batteries. I had to drill the lock to get it off the door. (Smart Key) When the part on the inside hit the floor, it started working. The stupid thing just sat there and buzzed and the handle turned, but being on the floor it couldn't unlock the door. Don't ask me why it didn't want to work before hitting the floor, but it didn't. And then again a large part of the inside of the battery compartment was a most obvious shade of green.
The second job was one that you don't see to often, but it happens. I guy decided he was going to remove a messed up doorknob, take it to the store, find a replacement, and then bring it home and install it himself. Did I mention the knob was messed up? The reason he wanted to replace it was because he could no longer open the front door. The latch had died, so the door didn't come open. He got the knob off with no problem. But those latches are made to be installed from the edge of the door. They don't come out through the hole where the doorknob is. By the time I got there he had ripped out about 70% of the latch and then given up before causing any serious damage. It took a couple of minutes to get the latch open and then replace the whole thing. I guess I worked about 30 or 40 minutes total and made close to $500 for the company. I guess that's why he wants to keep me around.