Car Dealership
I don't often get ripped off, but when I do, it's pretty big rip off...

I worked at a car dealership for a few months. I needed to find a new job damn quick, and thought I'd give it a shot.

I was given training by an "outside consultant" who told us (a class of about eight blokes), halfway through the first day, that the training would cost $600.

Not to worry - I managed to work a deal with them whereby $300 would be deducted on my first two pay days.

We were bombarded with a load of promises: excellent pay plan - a quarter of the gross profit on each car, plus decent bonuses and spiffs.

Trouble is, you can't pay a percentage of a negative number. That's right, folks - they were taking a loss on pretty much every new car (and some used, too) and paying the salesmen "minis". The spiffs stopped the week I got there. And the bonuses were damn near impossible to achieve.

Did I mention the sixty-to-seventy-hour weeks? Oh, and the fact that you had to fight like a bastard to get ANYTHING sorted out ("A scratch on the door? Oh, I'll deal with it...later...")? And that no one's pay was right? I think I had one paycheck that was correct, and I was one of the lucky few.

There was a change of management while I was there, and that was only four months. The longest-serving salesman had been there just under one year, and he had seen a staggering FOUR management changes.

I worked out that, during four months of working my balls off, I had made less per hour than someone working on the counter at WalMart.
(Nardis, Thu 22 Feb 2007, 14:24, Reply)