There are those little behind the scenes secrets. every workplace has The facts the public doesn't know or need to know about. These little things help the people who are trained to do the jobs do them. Usually, these things aren't anything that dramatic, but the secrets in the following stories aren't so innocent.
A Disaster Movie Plot Waiting To Happen
“I’m in structural engineering and the East Coast is probably way more in danger in the long run as far as earthquakes go than the West Coast.
The reason is that until the advent of national seismic codes in the last century, designing for earthquakes pretty much stops when the people building stuff no longer remember that there are earthquakes in their region.
We know from history that many parts of the East Coast experienced some major earthquakes on several hundred year cycles – maybe longer. A seismic risk map of the East Coast actually requires modern structures to have some degree of earthquake load resistance against a moderate quake and it is not uncommon anymore for bridges and buildings in places like New York City or Boston to have seismic loads govern (meaning that’s the highest load a piece is designed for) the design. I’ve worked on multiple Boston area projects where seismic retrofits were being applied to existing bridges, some major ones. Its all very routine and gets little attention. So what’s the problem?
Look at a picture of New York City, Philly, Boston – 80% of those buildings are unreinforced masonry. All those mid-level buildings and refurbished industrial and commercial spaces built before 1950 or so, were built by people with generally no regard for earthquakes. If reinforcement or steel framing was used it was not designed with seismic loads in mind. Know what kind of structure gets flattened in even small earthquakes? Mid height, unreinforced, masonry structures.
This means that when New York City or Boston eventually gets a moderate earthquake again, vast, vast sections of these cities are going to be completely flattened. The major infrastructure and newer buildings will be largely fine, but 70-80% of these cities are buildings that are 100 plus-years-old. We’re talking millions and millions of people homeless with an enormous death toll. Sure, some buildings are brought up to code, but most are not because they are grandfathered with all but the most major of structural renovations.
With bridges it depends. Old bridges that still sit on masonry piers from the 1800’s are in big trouble, but we do retrofit them with just about every rehab job and most get rebuilt on 50-75-year cycles.
And no, the damage can’t be compared to San Francisco because as bad as some recent quakes were, the frequency has meant almost all buildings were built with an earthquake in mind. Not so in Hartford, CT or Springfield, MA.”
Making Money At The Cost Of The People
“Bank managers actually have meetings to try and ‘find new ways to get more fees from our customers.’ I remember a meeting where overdrafts on debit cards were reshuffled larger to smaller purchases. The scenario proposed was this:
The customer has a balance of $100. She deposits a check for $100 and the bank credit the account. Unfortunately, there is a problem with the check! The person who wrote it didn’t have $100, so we charge our customer a $20 return check fee but don’t notify the customer. The customer then goes to the mall the next day to do shop for stocking stuffers, believing she has $200 not realizing the account is now $180. We then automatically resubmit the check, it still doesn’t clear, we now hit OUR customer with another $20 returned check fee, and remove the $100 credit from the deposit. A letter is mailed to the customer to notify. The customer is now walking into the mall, not with the $200 she believes she has, but $60. This was already the policy in place. The customer then goes to a store, buys some candy for $5, then another store where she buys a candle for $10. Then another store where she buys a teddy bear for $15 and gets some fast food for another $10. Having spent $40 and thinking she has another $160 in the bank, she treats herself to some gloves for $75. She has now spent $115 and her account only had $60 in it, so she triggers her overdraft protection. The transaction goes through (as opposed to being rejected at the counter, and she gets a letter sent and another $20 fee. Under the proposed procedure, the transactions would be processed not in the order they were received but at night when End of Day was run, in order from highest to lowest. Therefore, under the new process, she walks into the mall thinking she has $200, but she only has $60.
The first transaction to process is the $75 gloves. BAM, the account -$15 overdraft kicks in. A $20 charge, a letter is sent in the mail.
Next transaction is $15 teddy bear. The account is -$30. A $20 fee, a letter sent home.
Next transaction $10 fast food. -$40. A $20 fee, a letter sent home.
Next transaction $10 candle. -$50. A $20 fee, a letter sent home.
Next transaction $5 candy. -$55. A $20 fee, a letter sent home.
Now, under the existing process, a customer deposits a $100 that she never knew was bad resulted in $40 returned check fees and a $20 overdraft fee, for $60 in fees.
Under the proposed procedure, the customer would deposit a $100 check she never knew was bad and it would result in $40 in returned check fees, and $100 in overdraft fees, for a total of $140 in fees for a $100 check she never knew was bad, and never knew anything was wrong.
The bank adopted the policy and I quit shortly thereafter out of disgust. They weren’t doing this because of ‘increased costs’. It doesn’t cost more than a few pennies to process a check, there is no need to charge dozens of dollars, no need to submit it twice. They just want to make a profit, and will happily go over their own customer base to squeeze every dime they can out of them they can get away with.”
The Gross Reality
“The fast-food industry has way higher standards of cleanliness than fancy restaurants do. I’ve seen stuff happen in the back of expensive restaurants that’d get the whole kitchen staff fired in a food court or McDonald’s.
some examples: I was asked to re-deep-fry and serve a large and arduous appetizer tray to ‘make it better’ after being dropped on the floor. This yielded burnt AND unsanitary food that I just trashed when the boss left.
An unfireable dishwasher friend of the owners who refused to scrub ANY dishes – he’d only run them through the dishwasher, which just sanitizes and removes some solids and liquids. Anything like gravy or pieces of crud stuck on the plates and the pots were eternally filthy. Servers would often do his job for him, and the chef had to plan dishes around him. They sent him home the weeks they knew the food inspector would be visiting.
Reusing barely touched food because the cooks are too busy or too lazy or tipsy to make more.
Designing dishes to use up meat because the meat freezer broke a day or two ago. Or farm-to-table restaurants that use up visibly moulding produce first because they don’t know when they’ll get a new batch of tomatoes in.
Fast food places are rigorous about marking dates and throwing food out when they should- these losses are already factored in their budgets. I’ve seen a food court go DEFCON 50 because they realized someone was using milk a couple days past expiry.
Oh, and forget about gloves and cross-contamination. James cut himself while prepping a tomato soup? What, are we just gonna throw out 10 gallons of tomato soup? Fuggedaboudit! Blood’s red and salty too. He SAYS he didn’t get any in it, it’ll be fine, there’s not even any blood on the knife. It did LOOK fine, and he was wearing gloves that seemed to contain it, but geez.
I was picking up the odd shift under the table here, cause I needed the money- but they stopped asking me to come in after I pitched a fit about this.
It’s an accountability issue. Fast food is a business. The managers of fancy restaurants are usually cut-rate businessmen with an obsession and delusions of grandeur. They’re often in bed with the local food inspectors and can’t afford to fire bad employees (or exclusive employ their friends).”
The Brewery Business Is A Dirty One (Literally)
“I work in the draft beverage industry. Depending on where you live in the country, you might be appalled at how many of your favorite drinking spots have never cleaned or changed their liquid lines in the 5, 10, 20 years they’ve been open and pouring from the same draft system. I have pulled stuff out of lines that would probably make you gag. Some states actually regulate it as a part of the state health code (which they totally should – this is food we’re talking about here), but many states do not, thus a vast majority of restaurants and bars in those states do nothing to clean them, either out of ignorance that bacteria, biofilm, and yeast build up over time and affect the taste and pour of the drink, or simply because they see pouring it out to run cleaning solution through the lines as wasteful. The irony of that is that it is far more wasteful to have a dirty line than it is to clean one. Dirty lines foam up because agitation occurs when the liquid runs over that gunky stuff.
So, next time you are at your favorite drinking spot that has a draft system, ask the bartender when the last time the lines were cleaned. If he/she says, ‘What?’ or, ‘I’m not sure…’, don’t drink from that system. All companies that service lines keep logs with the bars/restaurants they clean.”
In Pharmaceuticals, Cents Can Turn Into Dollars Real Quick
“Pharmaceutical companies have found a loophole about certain products that have been used for decades to treat certain diseases effectively, but that the products were never actually FDA-approved for that particular indication.
The most controversial case in point is colchicine, which has been used for decades to help people with flares of a painful and disabling condition called gout. A company did a simple and inexpensive study recently that showed statistical significance that colchicine helps people with acute gout flares – something all prescribers have known (again, for decades). So they achieve FDA approval and now have the rights to re-brand it – colchicine is now ONLY available under the trade name Colcrys and sells for about $5 per pill – when it was produced generically it only cost a few pennies per pill.
Problem is that the pharmaceutical companies are being supported by the US FDA, and people who now can’t afford the new product are suffering needlessly.”
More Brains Than Brawn
“The worst Corrections Officer’s are the ones you see in movies/TV shows: the big, juiced-up roid monkeys that bully inmates all day long or are pricks because they get off on it. They will heat up a unit resulting in headaches for their coworkers and are hated more-so by fellow Corrections Officers than inmates themselves. The best are the ones that are emotionally mature, thick-skinned, temper-controlled who can talk to an inmate first and act IF (keyword: if) they have to do so. In other words, they have respect from inmates because of that which will defuse a situation before any words are said. Being physically built has little to do with anything but RESPECT will go a hundred miles and another if needed.
I’m a 150-pound guy with glasses who reads comic books and plays video games on his days off. I get called ‘Harry Potter’ by inmates but am able to tell someone to lock-up while looking them in the eyes and passed my physical training with flying colors. Oh, and talking about comic book movies with fellow nerds in prison is a highlight of my job.”
ER Doctors Are Struggling To Stay Upright
“Emergency Department Doctors are remarkably good actors. We’re often pretty scared of screwing up, we just hide it well. A little fear is important, makes us remember that someone’s life is at stake if we get things wrong. Referring to other specialities is all confidence. Give exactly the same information and confidently ask them to take over care and it’ll work ten times more often than a jumbled, grovelling story. When you start talking about your pets, your family members or give a lengthy account of an ultimately irrelevant and unrelated medical procedure you had 25 years ago I’m not listening. I’m working out what’s wrong with you and planning how to investigate/treat it. (Yet somehow I always get good feedback on my empathy). We manage to keep a straight face for the time-wasters. We’ve often not eaten, drank, urinated, or even sat down for the last 10 hours, and we’re often guilt-tripped into being at work despite having minor illnesses. It takes a lot of effort to pretend to care about your ingrowing toenail or your cold you’ve decided needs emergency antibiotics.”
These Are Just Examples Of What A Review Might Look Like
“How much gaming is done with regards to TripAdvisor and other review sites? From offering customers discounts if they upload a favorable review, to posting fake disparaging reviews for competitors or having friends/family/whoever write fake positive reviews, there are a lot of ways to game the system.
But more so, the average person doesn’t realize how challenging it is to get a phoney review taken off your TripAdvisor page and it’s not unheard of (luckily I’ve never had this issue) for customers to threaten a negative review if you don’t side with them in an argument.
That’s not to say TripAdvisor isn’t valuable. It’s very valuable – and when I go on vacation I absolutely check the reviews for hotels, restaurants (less so for restaurants as I tend to just find places on the go), activity vendors and so on – but I am more likely to be able to read between the lines and gauge which reviews are sincere and which have another ‘story’ behind the scenes.”
Roadies -The Backbone Of The Concert Industry
“Most people assume roadies are dummies living the life on the road, getting chicks for the band etc, but in reality, a good chunk of them are technically trained (audio, lighting, theater etc,) professionals who work locally only and may never see that band again after the one gig.
As a live audio engineer, most of the work available to me is poorly paid ‘pub’ gigs. Anywhere from $15 an hour to $35 an hour (if I’m lucky).
As a roadie, I get from $30 an hour to $50 an hour and at times that’s just to push road-cases about.
I’ll still do live engineering for giggles, or for certain companies that I like working with, for less money at times.”
The Money’s Not Good
“Not that this is secret, but people don’t know. I’m a social worker. On Long Island, New York. One of the most expensive places to live in the United States. Guess what we generously (compared to a number of states) give to welfare recipients? Food stamps: a max of $180 a person a month. Public assistance: $150 a month. Rental assistance (unchanged since 1976): $450 a month per family. A single room apartment around here goes for at least $1,200, by the way. That’s it. That’s all. I can’t stand people complaining about people getting rich off welfare. Honestly, anyone who puts tons of effort into defrauding the system isn’t gonna get much.”
Who Better To Give Advice To Me, Than Me!
“I used to work for a magazine years ago and I wrote the advice column which was funny enough since I was about 23 and had zero qualifications to be giving anyone any advice about anything. What makes it even funnier (to me) is that I also wrote the letters asking for advice. Who has a problem and sits around thinking, ‘I know, I will write a letter to some magazine and ask them for help!’ – The answer is no one.”
The Legend Of The Back Room
“I’m a retail worker and If something isn’t on the shelf, unless it’s in an ad or there’s a special coupon for it, there’s a 90% chance that we don’t have any in the back.
And if you ask us to look in the back, there’s an 80% chance that we’ll go back there, stand around, talk with other coworkers for a few minutes, only to come back out and say, ‘Oh my God I’m so sorry but we’re completely out of that.'”
Aeroplanes Are Terrifying
“I was an aviation electrician for ten years. All it takes to cause a catastrophic failure in an aircraft is a piece of debris smaller than a penny. There’s a reason that people from the aviation industry tend to be absolutely anal retentive when it comes to tools and machine cleanliness.”
Teaching Isn’t All Shining Faces And Polished Apples
“I’m a Teacher. It always surprises people that 90% of my job has nothing to do with kids and more to do with paperwork, and dealing with other bureaucratic absurdity. I seriously considering leaving the profession because after several years of teaching, I can say that that part of the job gets worse each year.”
The Zoo Golden Hour
“I work for a zoo in the summer, the best time to see the animals is before it even opens (ours opens at 9:30 AM -10 AM) I get there at 8 AM and they’re all running around playing, swimming, and being awesome. As soon as people start to arrive though they start laying around and not doing much of anything. All of my best animal interactions happened before it opens. If you ever get a chance to go to a zoo early in the morning, take it.”
The Revolving Door Of The Justice System
“A lot of criminal defendants come into the public defender’s office thinking they’ll receive quality, personal assistance. When in fact, the system is overloaded and the attorneys are just trying to sort through cases as quickly as possible. The defence, district attorney, and judge are in constant contact with each other to make the process go as fast as possible.
All those TV shows that dramatize rivalry in the courtroom are exaggerating. Defense attorneys and prosecutors are usually very friendly with each other because of all the time they spend collaborating.”
Don’t Worry, The Pilot’s Got This
“Pilots really don’t care about your connection, and getting in on time is secondary next to safety. We’re just concerned about getting there safely. If there’s weather, something not right, etc, we’d rather delay the flight and fix it than try to get there on time and risk the lives of everyone onboard just so you can make your business meeting, or so you can catch your connecting flight to Hawaii. True, no one likes delays, and we’re suffering as much as you are, but I’ll take a delay rather than being in the air and wishing I’d given the time to fix the issue.”
The Evil Geniuses At Pringle HQ
“During the height of the early 2000s carb craze, Pringles wanted to formulate a healthier, ‘light’ version of the popular snack. They worked hard to use less fat and shortening but it just didn’t work – without those binding agents, the Pringles just wouldn’t hold their shape. They were ready to give up when a marketing guy came up with a solution that was equal parts sinister and genius.
‘Why don’t we just make them unhealthier?’ He asked. And that was it. The original formulation was sold as a ‘light’ version, and they purposefully made a less healthy version that was marketed as “regular” Pringles.”
Child Protective Services Is A Rollercoaster Of A Job
“I used to work in state government (specifically Child Protective Services) and it really REALLY matters who your ‘worker’ is when you get referred for services. It’s all about the people. Whether it be economic services or social services, it doesn’t matter. I’ve seen absolutely horrible service due to workers who didn’t care, or who had their own biases they brought into the job. I’ve also seen and worked with people who were like angels on earth, sacrificing their time and energy to help people who desperately needed to catch a break.
In our self-service, automated, voice-activated world, it’s easy to forget that the really important decisions are still made by a person. It’s quite a sobering thought to realize that your economic security or the status of your family’s well-being could rest in the hands of a randomly assigned state employee, but that’s exactly what some people face. Specifically, when talking about Child Protective Services, you’re making decisions that directly impact a child’s (and the rest of the family’s) well-being, and the cavalier attitude that some workers had when doing the job made me sick to my stomach sometimes.”
(Stories edited for clarity)