1st Jobs - the best, the worst and the daftest

tcfreer

tcfreer

tcfreer

Associate
Joined
2 May 2014
Posts
1,444
Location
Manchester
Not including like Paper Boy etc, but your first real job.

Let's have some basic's set out

What was it -
Company -
Start age -

So for me

Car Sales
Alfa Romeo
17 years 6 months

Went in a scruffy 17 years old in a old banger dropped Cv was promptly interviewed by the Dealer Principle on the spot looking as I did.
Offered the job went home in 147 GTA as my demo rofl. Yeah I bragged hard to my dad and friends.
 
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We need to know more about the floor your were rolling on with laughter when you drove home in an Alfa.



Assistant heating installation engineer (apprenticeship).

Schermer BV (Holland)

17 years.

Worked there for about four years before getting the sack due to being a young idiot doing what kids in Holland do at that age. One of my biggest regrets in life was blowing that, the company was amazing and the boss I worked for was almost a father figure to me.
 
Sports Soccer, 16 years old. Bog standard retail work to compliment my college days, weekends during term time and then more during summer. Naturally hated it, but could have been much worse.
 
What was it - Rifleman
Company - The British Army
Start age - 16

Infantry work, supplemented by training as a mortar gunner and sharpshooter.
I got to shoot stuff and blow stuff up. Best job ever!!!!!
 
What was it - Software developer
Company - A pensions administration company, based in Farringdon
Start age - 17

£10 an hour, back when that was a lot of money (1989). Writing Lotus 1-2-3 macros to calculate projected pension value and benefit statements.
 
What was it - Warehouse Operative
Company - Screwfix Direct
Start age - 17

Worked there on and off alongside studying.
 
What was it - Bank Clerk £48pm (1972)
Company - Lloyds Bank Ltd.
Start age - 20

Lasted for six months then I was variously, lathe operator, farm labourer, van driver, tree planter then I started a proper career in Civil Engineering.
 
Sold computers at John Lewis when I was 16 back in 2003. Did 6 hours every Sunday, got paid double time for it and was treated well.
 
What: Waiting, bar work, hotel work, event setup, basically anything hospitality
Company: Compass catering
Start age: 16

Did that for around 2 & 1/2 years whilst studying, mostly 8 - 10 hour shifts, at times very pressured and demanding. Went in with no training at all. Learnt a lot, but wouldn't go back :p
 
Job: Retail Sales Assistant
Company: Le Creuset
Age: 15

I had no luck finding a decent placement for the "work experience" everyone in my school had to go through, so I asked my Mum if she could arrange for me to do it where she worked, as a manager in the store. She did, and I stayed on after the work experience. I never did work with her, as she moved up to head office as a regional manager. It was good. I put off plenty of customers during my long hair phase, I'm sure.

Time and a half on Sundays :cool:
 
Job - Burger flipper
Company - McD's
Age - 16

Flipped burgers through the summer to help with spending money for college. Was pretty good back then '02. I was earning £6.50ph, working 40h per week. I was offered a "trainee supervisors" role fulltime, but chose college and kept working part time for another year.

Easy job was easy, so were most of the young ladies working there.
 
JOSH86 said:
Job - Burger flipper
Company - McD's
Age - 16

Flipped burgers through the summer to help with spending money for college. Was pretty good back then '02. I was earning £6.50ph, working 40h per week. I was offered a "trainee supervisors" role fulltime, but chose college and kept working part time for another year.

Easy job was easy, so were most of the young ladies working there.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that.
 
Job - Dogsbody
Company - John Menzies (basically WH Smiths)
Age - 16 (interviewed when 15)

Stock room orc given stuff to move, count and stack. When they did let me out I'd usually end up running the stationary/book side of the shop at weekends. Good little earner but as with most retail jobs it was pretty thankless and dull.

Fortunately most of my co-workers were attractive females around my age though :)
 
Zefan said:
A lot of retail jobs have ditched any kind of double time/time and a half, so count yourself lucky.
Click to expand...

Yeah - few years back was a big issue with some people where I worked when they pulled Sunday's enhanced rate - some of them had been working for like 20 years specifically choosing to work Sundays on their rota due to the extra pay and now refusing to do Sundays without the enhanced rate. Never did find out how that panned out.

Most places have slashed out of hours and overtime rates as well :S while I'm sort of salaried certain additional hours used to be paid at 1.5x or 2x as an incentive to do them due to no one wanting to and now only 1.3x.
 
Installation Technician
A Telecoms company in London
16. Paid about 8K or so to start. This was in the 90's.

One of the best jobs I've had until things started changing within the company. I did day release college for BTEC qualifications which the company paid for. Basically the job was cabling & termination, racking, building and configuring the systems on customer sites.

After a few years I ended up doing a lot of work with 3rd line and got some trips to the US for training but the company changed quite a bit so moved on after 5 years and had a mahoosive pay rise working for a sister company.

So yeah, my teen years after school were pretty great. :)
 
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