Guess what, more calls from Michelle. She found a B&B where we could
live, but no kitchen. Didn't seem to care that it wouldn't be livable
for me, since I'm not their client, Kate is. Kate also asked her about
tax, and was told to call the inland revenue herself. So much for the
'help' they give us over here. The brocures we had from Australia
promised a lot of things that weren't being delivered.
At this point I should point out that despite the dry factual treatment
I'm giving of the dealings with Select, we were both really stressed
here. All our plans were based around Kate working the full time we were
in the UK - the reason she chose Select was the 'Guaranteed Work
System[tm]' - which we were being told didn't exist except in major
centres - and the promise that working in York would be fine. It turns
out Select don't have contracts with many schools in York, and don't
have a clue about travelling times and possibilities between areas
within the Hull office's domain. We couldn't commit to anything, because
we didn't know where we'd have to move to. Even at the hostel we were
paying almost twice what we would have paid on the weekly rather than
daily rate.
In an attempt to get something done, I wrote a long email to Select,
detailing all the problems we'd had. It was addressed to Michelle, but
copied to the people in Australia, and also to Michelle's manager in
Hull. The response was a call from the manager's assistant, promising me
a call first thing Monday morning from the manager.
Went to a nice vegetarian restaurant to celebrate the fact that we
finally had someone dealing with our troubles, and could actually go out
and see things! Very nice food, and good organic wine.
Stayed up late to call Kate's parents.
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