Seemed as though longer-term Readers could work leisurely but if you're new, you'll need to run for several hours straight, destroying your body to meet their kpi's.The good things-M-F, flexible start time between 7am and 9am, comfortable uniform provided, being outdoors, fresh air, various locations, flexible unpaid 30 min lunch break, permitted to skip properties with dogs present, km's reimbursement.
-It could be an o.k bread & butter job if it weren't for the challenges.
-In the interview they'll promote it as a 'be your own boss', 'choose your hours' cruisey gig. Your first week probably will be. Walk leisurely doing reads for 5-6 hours but from week 2 they'll expect you to work faster and faster. Monitoring your progress and call your personal mobile to check on you and question reads/reasonings you've provided.
The challengesSeemed that the routes, estimated completion times, rules, kpi's etc. were designed by a different company using poor data. Service Stream have been contracted to complete the work; and must meet the other company's kpi's to keep the contract. $$
-Unrealistic expectations. Each day you could be assigned x2 routes, several km's apart comprising of 270-ish meters with estimated completion times of 3 hours. (Kpi is a minimum of 80 reads per hour).
-Tripping hazards, Dog P**, expectation to work in all weather conditions.
-Unclear, abbreviated instructions to locate meters.
-Hidden meters in retail shops, medical clinics, churches, sporting clubs, schools.
-Poor sequencing of routes resulting in back tracking, inevitably arousing suspicion from general public, obstructed meters, daily check in phone calls, getting questioned about why you skipped/couldn't read a meter, being warned you might need to travel back to an address to correct/re-attempt a read, being told you're working too slowly.
-They'll say there's usually Public Loo's enroute but there's not. High likelihood you'll relieve yourself in bottles/behind bushes/in vacant lots.
-Fortnightly pay
-To get paid properly, you have to manually record all your day's work. And outside work hours, type it into a timesheet and send to payroll.
-All this for casual work $1 above Minimum Wage