We Don' T Need Reputable, We Need Cheap, He Says

Business, Ethics.

Proof that cheap doesn't always pay - after leaving school, i was quite desperate to get myself into work and took this secretarial job as a fill in. I' m still churning out letters from our antiquated printer that only works if you thump it six inches in from the back and for which Mr Parker will only buy cheap ink cartridges.

Five years on and I' m still here. - cheap ink cartridges are all very well if you get them from a reputable company but not mr parker. Cheap office equipment, cheap paper that, cheap office furniture rips most of the time when it' s making a desperate bid to be free of the printer and, of course cheap ink cartridges. We don' t need reputable, we need cheap, he says. I' ve tried pointing out to Mr Parker that we can still get cheap ink cartridges from a decent, trustworthy company but he panics that no one can match the cheap that he gets from his dodgy dealer that comes round selling things from the back of his grimy old Morris Minor. It extends to my wage packet and the supermarket carnations he sends me out for on his wife' s birthday.

I' ve let things drift along for too long now and to be honest Mr Parkers meanness gets me down. - how he manages to keep his business running is beyond me. Not that mean, but he has, you may think an agenda. In fact, I think he knows how dire things have got because whenever he needs to see clients he always takes them to a restaurant. He lulls them into thinking they' re getting a top class service by treating them to a slap up lunch but they don' t realise that he and the restaurant owner have a deal. It' s a sort of' you scratch my back and I' ll scratch yours' type of arrangement but in a seedy, mean way.

Mr Parker gets the meal cheap, and I type, of course up his letters, with cheap ink on cheap paper, of course. - to see the two of them scheming makes my teeth itch. He adds it on to the clients' final bill so he wins all round. Mr Parker gets his money back from the meal of course. The client has not only received a cheap meal and a cheap service but he ends up paying over the odds for it and very rarely do they muster up the nerve to complain due to Mr Parkers oily, smooth talking ways. I have been applying for other local jobs and dared to take a sick day to attend interviews. Another anniversary of my time with the company comes and goes and still I receive no pay rise, no advancement on my original school leaving wage and I am heartily sick of it.

For this I received a written warning, on that cheap tatty paper with smudged print from the cheap ink cartridge! - two weeks later and i receive the call i have been praying for. This man knows no decency! My interview with the office in town has been successful and I am to start in two weeks time. I realise the cheap ink cartridge and cheap paper has jammed the printer, yet again and I make my way over to release it. While Mr Parker is at another of his cheap lunches, I take great delight in typing out my resignation.

With one foot on the edge of the desk, I' m tugging at the paper when Mr Parker walks back into the office and startles me. - one broken ankle, a new suit and a compensation claim to cover my loss of dignity in front of the client as well as the injuries and mr parker is about to find out that not everything in life is cheap. Taking my eye off the job in hand for a split second, I slip on the cheap nylon carpet, my foot goes through the cheap chipboard desk, the paper frees from the jam and I fly backwards into a heap bringing ink from the cheap ink cartridge spilling all over my suit.