Have a well paid job but be bored, a less well paid job but be busy, have a better paid job & be busy?
Reason I'm wondering is this, my stepson is well on his way to his final assessment as a train driver (freight) but he's already finding it really boring. He's always been money oriented & he'll be on 45K ish in a year or so, plus overtime.
He's got a degree in business & economics & now he's on about giving up the driving to do accountancy. He knows he's not going to walk into a corporate accountants office, be offered a job & be on 100K without starting at the bottom & be on peanuts to start with. He had an office job with a company dealing in stocks & shares before he started driving but said that was boring as well!
He's not a big mixer & doesn't have any hobbies either which doesn't help.
Any accountants in to give some insight?
To be bored and paid well must be pretty much at the top of the tree of jobs if you've little/no ambition.
'Accountant' is a term covering lots of roles and tbh most Accountants I've known haven't actually worked as Accountants...
Stick with the driving, and get a life?
Just about all businesses need someone to do their accounts - so that gives you an infinite range of possibilities.
You can also earn almost anything.
If you drive a train your qualified to drive a train.
For me the one that pays me tonnes of cash but boring.
Your stepson looks like he is already out before he is in as train driver. He is there because something or someone put him there but his heart is never there.
Well, I lasted four months on a graduate management accountancy scheme before I ran for the hills.
It was with a FTSE100 travel firm with big holiday perks and I still couldn't hack it, which might help emphasise how dull it really was.
Sounds like maybe he just isn't ready for work yet though? I got on a different graduate scheme when I first finished my undergrad degree, hated it (and was very bad at my job as a result), went to do further study for a few years instead and now I'm basically in the same sort of role but enjoying it much more.
There are a lot worse things than being bored at work.
I guess as a train driver he can't sit on STW when he is bored though?
I guess I am not in a position to comment or suggest as I am always looking for the next potential move - haven't found it yet though. Teaching is a mixture of poor salary and being busy and the holidays don't cut it as it is very frustrating not being able to book when you actually need time off (unless exceptional circumstances).
Anyway I would rather be bored and well paid personally.
^ +1 I've just applied to be a train driver. Doubt I'll get past the first round, but I can dream. Current job is boring, stressful, insecure and poorly paid so I've nothing to lose. Plus I'd get to be hated by millions of people for no good reason. And not care.
Train drivers jobs are quite sought after..... 13000 applicants in a week for 100 scotrail jobs. (Possibly all the ex-offshore workers)
brassneck - Member
There are a lot worse things than being bored at work.
This ^
My last job was "Very Exciting" indeed so much so I ended up reporting my boss for harassment and took a settlement to leave quietly.
My current job is mostly dull and quite predictable and I will moan about it, but I sleep well every night and don't have to keep looking over my shoulder.
I quite like my boring, but well paid job! Mind you, if they cut off internet access, I'd probably only last a couple of weeks.....
Depends if you live to work or work to live. If the latter then you need that work/life balance. You want to earn enough cash to live, but don't want to be workig every hour god sends to earn that cash. If work is a means to an end and you accept that then it is easier to tolerate a boring job, because you're doing it for a higher purpose.
My last job was "Very Exciting" indeed so much so I ended up reporting my boss for harassment and took a settlement to leave quietly.
Likewise (ish, not as bad as your example) - a very pressured high intensity highly technical environment where one moment you'd be being hauled up for not following process or getting change board approval, in the next being told to JFDI. Everyone there was divorced, on their way to divorce or single and working most weekends & evenings.
Luckily my previous employer realised their terrible mistake (:-))and came back for me 9 months later with an improved offer, and back to a European consensus driven culture that suits me way better.
Your stepson looks like he is already out before he is in as train driver. He is there because something or someone put him there but his heart is never there.
Partially true. His mate drives for a passenger company & quite enjoys it but he's kept busier cos there's more stops!
Sounds like maybe he just isn't ready for work yet though?
Bloody should do, he's 27.
Anyway, how does he go about making engine shed loads of money in accountancy??
As a trainee accountant he will earn a less than a train driver, probably be expected to do unpaid overtime and probably spend a lot of his time bored out his skull - but busy staring at a screen. EVENTUALLY his earnings could overtake the train driver if he is any good, sticks at it and plays the game right. Train driving pays well because (a) the job is not that great - odd hours, not very interesting or social etc (b) the unions have done a very good job in a relatively monopolistic (is that a word?) market. Accountancy is not unionised and highly competitive - so it pays quite well because the employers will squeeze every last drop of life out of you.
my stepson is well on his way to his final assessment as a train driver (freight) but he's already finding it really boring.
I would advise that he finish the training and assessments, and then get at least a year possibly 2 under his belt before leaving. He can then see what the job is really like, as training can sometimes give a false impression of what the real job is like, He can build up a fund so If he does decide to become an accountant the first few years on what will be shite pay will be a bit easier and if he does not like being an accountant, he has a couple of years experience as a driver under his belt.
esselgruntfuttock......Sorry about not getting in touch for that ride I was on about, I am just a bit useless ( and away a lot )
I think you have to leave him to find his own path.
I know my parents tried to steer me towards a job or two and really it failed to motivate me. I always went my own way. Now in my 40's with a well paid and boring job... only boring because I've done it for so long its like breathing, just natural. I now take more pleasure from stuff outside work and am considering setting up a couple of more interesting projects of my own, things that motivate and excite me.
My brother is a freight driver. He neither hates or enjoys his job. He only works an average of 35 hours a week though and the money is good so he is no rush to find something else.
I know a guy who left a relatively interesting job (relatively - for a lawyer) in corporate law for an unbelievably well-paid job as an in-house lawyer for an american investment bank.
He finds it utterly dull and completely soul-destroying and it has affected his outlook on life and his marriage but he's now accustomed to that salary and feels he can't leave.
Yes, he's loaded, but he's also utterly miserable.
All about the person's outlook on life innit.
[url= http://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Get-Love-2015-2016-Edition/dp/0077164091 ]How to get a job you'll love[/url]
Buy him a copy of this and get him to work through it...
Better to think about what you love and you're good at, and go out and find a job which ticks those boxes, than trying out random jobs he's not bothered about in the hope it turns out to be his vocation...
Some jobs are dull or exciting, some well paid or under paid. If you don't like the one you have you will love the ability to change jobs.
Being a train driver will limit your ability to change jobs.
Doing accounts will not limit your ability to change jobs.
Life is about being in the right place at the right time as well as making choices - don't limit your chance to make choices - ensure you have that option.
If you make a bad choice, choose again. Don't go down a dead end.
I've done accounts for motor racing teams, charities, software companies, start ups, failures, global companies, tiny company's, manufacturing companies - loads of choice.
Choose choice.
Job satisfaction is a very desirable thing but given a choice between £45k and a boring job vs £25-30k and an unknown job I'd take the former. Also you can be busy and bored (assembly line jobs etc.). I'm not really sure why anyone choose accountancy as a job though, that just seems to ask for a boredom (but likely combined with stress), I know our finance dept are stretched in general and near breaking point at month & year ends.
I'd hate to be unhappy or bored at work. Then again my job even my new role isn't a boring job so I've not been use to it. I have been unhappy but I did something about that.
45k is great money for a job he finds easy, has no office politics, ongoing projects etc
It's more than an airline pilot will earn for the first few years of his/her career.
I agree with righog. Tell him to suck it up for a few years and decide what he wants to do in his free time. Buy him a bike!
Prison officer - they make loads of money smuggling in 'snout' and thousand year old copies of 'readers wives'
EVENTUALLY his earnings could overtake the train driver if he is any good, sticks at it and plays the game right.
poly +1
He may wish to consider earnings and job [i]potential[/i].
I don't know any train drivers earning more than £100k and I don't work with any accountants earning less than that...and the the ones I work with definitely aren't bored. Not the norm, but it most definitely can be done.
There are a great deal of paths that he could go down in the finance sector, with varying degrees of interest, remuneration and stress.
All that said, I can't understand why anyone would choose to be an accountant 😉
Just out of interest, how did he get the trainee driver job in the first place ?
Poly +2
The £100K accountants have sacrificed a lot to get to that and will have put in many more hours than any train driver to get there. It will have also have been stressful too. Accountancy still has one have the highest levels of heart attacks. Unless he really applies himself and socialises to get the clients he will most likely be an employee with the life being squeezed from him as Poly put it.
I've done accountancy for the last 20 years or so in large organisation, which is very different to small business accounts so can only comment on large organisations.
He will have to go in at a basic level ie doing Accounts Payable/Credit Control etc, and earn £15k ish. He will need to get in a company that develops staff, or he will get no where. He will work with staff who are not interested in their work, its just money and managers who are performance driven.
Once part qualified he may be able to move in to Financial Accounts/Management Accounts and earn £20-£30k. This will be more enjoyable work, but still no strategic (interesting input)
Once qualified he will be able to get late £30's early £40's. At this stage he will have no life, the company will expect him to work 20hrs a day etc, and put a lot of responsibility/blame on his shoulders.
Eventually if he can still hack it and make it through that period, if he's any good earning potential is very high. One of my Finance Directors used to earn approx. £1.4m a year in a FTSE 100 Co. 😯
However a lot of qualified accountants get stuck in a pigeon hole and then never come out of it.
Me - Work life balance is more important, and I haven't sold my soul to the devil.
If he wants a rewarding/interesting career, why doesn't he become a doctors? ....but then he would because they pay less well that being a train driver 🙄
i quite like the idea of being a train driver...
travelling through the countryside. no-one to have to listen to. Radio 4.
a well paid, safe secure job with set hours is better than unpaid overtime, stress and office bollocks..... but then again, i value my time more than the money i earn....
I'd have a bash at being a train driver if they'd have me. I hate working with other people (an advantage of my current job) and being stuck on my own in a train cab for hours on end sounds great to me.
Accountancy? WTF?! I assume accountants get paid decent money and accountants are probably money/material things orientated as I honestly couldn't think of a less appealing job.
I'm an accountant but I've never driven trains, so half of this will be much better informed than the other...
Accountancy is likely boring at first but can, depending on where you take it, get more interesting the more experienced you get, and handily enough also better paid.
I suspect that driving a train doesn't get any more or less boring the longer you've been doing it.
Accountancy? WTF?! I assume accountants get paid decent money and accountants are probably money/material things orientated as I honestly couldn't think of a less appealing job.
Big assumption. Me? I work for a charity and earn just about the same as I did ten years ago in the private sector. I'm now in a senior position where I don't spend much time "book keeping" but spend a lot of time on strategy type stuff (including, but not limited to, financial strategy). A few years ago I did accountancy in the film / tv business and had all the 'glamour' of 90 hour working weeks, handing over brown envelopes of cash to farmers in remote locations, and, you know, hanging around famous showbiz types, going to wrap parties with free booze and 'celebs' there, appearing on the credits of movies and telly shows and all the other trappipngs. That wasn't particularly dull (to me). I also spent six months as a mid-ranking management accountant at a power station reconciling fuel stock accounts. That was (to me) very dull indeed. Others are happy to make a career of it. Or you can go down the self-employed practice route, for those that fancy it. I suspect there aren't that many self-employed freelance train drivers, but again, not everyone wants to be self-employed.
I guess what I'm saying is accountancy covers a lot of different things, some really dull, some really interesting and what one person thinks is dull will be someone else's exciting opportunity. Train driving, I suspect, is more binary - it is one thing and you either find that interesting enough, or you don't. My brother in law grew up wanting to be a train driver, became a train driver and is still a train driver. He never wants to do anything different. I struggle to imagine anything I'd find more dull. I wouldn't be surprised at all if he felt the same way about what I do.
My advice is simply: if he doesn't want to be a train driver, don't be a train driver. What other people think of the relative attractions of driving trains and accountancy really aren;t remotely relevant to that decision.
Will he be replaced by a Robot...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-34066941
[i]Likelihood of automation?
It's fairly likely (68%)[/i]
...take the job, earn a shed load for 5 or 10 years. Then move on to an interesting job when he's financially sorted?
So your son has the choice of sitting behind a desk messing around with figures or driving a freight train.
Driving. A. Freight. Train.
Is there even a decision to make? Especially on 45k a year - sod the potential to be earning 100k and be sat behind a desk in a suit when he's older. Driving a train...
[says I from behind a desk in front of a PC whilst earning more than 45k but less than 100k. But I am colour blind and apparently you're not allowed to drive trains packed with loads of people if you can't tell the difference between green and red]
Train driver all day long.
There's tonnes of jobs which involve sitting behind a desk with random folk but probably not many with the opportunity for new scenery every day.
Maybe he could combine the two and do a bit of train driving, study accountancy in the evenings then become chief accounting officer for DB Schenker and live it up over in Berlin or something similar.
I'd rather be doing a fun job for 15k a year than a dull one for 100k.
Although if I were the only breadwinner I don't think the wife would give me that choice.
Depends on the hours.
40 hours a week in a "fun" job for £15k (who actually has as much fun in any job as they would outside of work? I think what you mean is "relatively enjoyable")
40 hours a week in a dull job for £100k
I'll take the £100k and add a bit more excitement to my life outside those 40 hours thanks, plus a more comfortable retirement 🙂
I'd just spend the hours I'm not in work dreading going back into work. No amount of wages would offset that.
It would just make me miserable. The money wouldn't cheer me up much. But each to their own.
My wife is a project manager. To me it seems like utter utter hell. But for some reason she loves it. Going into an office or other formal environment just feels like prison.
Might also be worth considering the long-term future of train drivers.
At 27, he's got 38 years ahead of him before retirement....
Google driverless cars have already driven 1 million miles on public roads and they expect to release them as a product you can buy within the next 5 years.
Nothing's definite when it comes to predicting the future, but I wouldn't bet against the majority of trains being automated within the next 20 years and probably much sooner than that, given that automating a train seems like a much simpler proposition than a car (the DLR is already automated).
If he's already having doubts, it's probably not the best career to get into.
Railway infrastructure in this country is so far away from being able to support widespread driverless trains its off the scale.
I'm no expert on trains, but Google's cars don't require any infrastructure changes - they drive on regular roads surrounded by regular drivers, pedestrians and cyclists.
Anyway, just my thought on the matter. I'm sure automation will happen one day, it's just a question of when, and 38 years is a long time.
Show him this...
Well, er, yes Mr Anchovy, but you see your report here says that you are an extremely dull person. You see, our experts describe you as an appallingly dull fellow, unimaginative, timid, lacking in initiative, spineless, easily dominated, no sense of humour, tedious company and irrepressibly drab and awful. And whereas in most professions these would be considerable drawbacks, in chartered accountancy they are a positive boon.
Goods train, surely? Freight trains are what hobos ride in Jack Kerouac novels.
I would advise that he finish the training and assessments, and then get at least a year possibly 2 under his belt before leaving. He can then see what the job is really like, as training can sometimes give a false impression of what the real job is like, He can build up a fund so If he does decide to become an accountant the first few years on what will be shite pay will be a bit easier and if he does not like being an accountant, he has a couple of years experience as a driver under his belt.esselgruntfuttock......Sorry about not getting in touch for that ride I was on about, I am just a bit useless ( and away a lot )
More or less what I said to him, try it properly & see. (I think he'llbe on a 5 year contract after final assessment anyway) then if he still hates it, try something else.
(Don't worry about the ride Paul, I'm crap as well & we'll catch up sometime.)
Prison officer - they make loads of money smuggling in 'snout' and thousand year old copies of 'readers wives'
Not all do! (not me anyway)
Just out of interest, how did he get the trainee driver job in the first place ?
Just kept an eye on various sites, he saw that Freightliner were advertising & just put in for it. (I think there was 1500 apps for 10 places) I know personally of 6 prison officers at our place who applied, including a Custodial Manager, & none even got an interview!
Maybe he could combine the two and do a bit of train driving, study accountancy in the evenings then become chief accounting officer for DB Schenker and live it up over in Berlin or something similar.
Yet another thing we've said! Rail companies have accountants too.
Thanks for all the interest fellas, keep it up!
[i]Once qualified he will be able to get late £30's early £40's. At this stage he will have no life, the company will expect him to work 20hrs a day etc, and put a lot of responsibility/blame on his shoulders.[/i]
She doesn't do 20hrs per day and manages a 'bit of life', but my wife is in that ballpark, and I'd bet she'd jump at the chance to earn the same money on half the hours in a job outside the financial industry. I bet train drivers don't have to be checking their emails of an evening!
[i]Nothing's definite when it comes to predicting the future, but I wouldn't bet against the majority of trains being automated within the next 20 years and probably much sooner than that, given that automating a train seems like a much simpler proposition than a car (the DLR is already automated).[/i]
General accounting is getting outsourced like call centres were. For the job to stay in the UK it has to be tied to the UK, so working for a utility company, transport/logistics, or customer facing. And you can't automate that.
I worked in an Accountancy Firm for 2 and a bit years, I drop in and out of them now with my current job. Not as an Accountant though, sod that.
I'd rather drive the trains, at least the scenery changes - yeah it doesn't sound as good at 'dinner parties' but there's probably a lot more money in train driving for a LOOOOOOOOOONG time after starting.
I suppose I shouldn't tar all firms with the same brush, but I've worked in a lot of them and they are the MOST corporate, have the MOST outrageous 'office politics' they are the MOST elitist within their own organisation - and I should add to that I worked in Corporate for RBS for 10 years and I thought that was bad.
Like John Lennon (supposedly) said when he was asked as a child what he wanted to be when he grew up "happy". I have never seen any joy in Accountancy - but I do know a very happy Train Driver.
+1. Train driver (+instructor) here, enjoy my work in a passenger firm. Freight isn't what it was though, coal is dead in this country now and there is a surplus of freight drivers. The quirks of freight contracts are far more of a threat to his job as a driver than any mooted automation. I have nearly 30 years left in this job and can say with utmost certainty that my role at my retirement will still be in the front cab of trains with irreplaceable technical knowledge and skills.
I suppose I shouldn't tar all firms with the same brush, but I've worked in a lot of them and they are the MOST corporate, have the MOST outrageous 'office politics' they are the MOST elitist within their own organisation
I wouldn't conflate "being an accountant" with "working for an accountancy practice / firm" - I, and many others, do the former and have never done the latter.
Does he still live with you?
Thank God for TPWS 🙂
One of my jobs in the past.
Train driver all day! bored FFS get a hobby! There is (I believe) lots of overtime to be had as a freight driver and drivers can be earning £60-70k+
Though if he is not much of a mixer then a train driver is a pretty crap place of work for mingling. The odd phonecall to the signalman "Hello I've got a red, don't worry its changed, bye"
Not much overtime on freight these days, the days of big 'happy cheques' seem to be behind us. Some big infrastructure projects (ie building HS2) will pay a fair few mortgages though.
I think accountancy is one of the jobs you hear about people earning load but most are on good but not amazing salary. Those that are on good money love it, hence work load, probably in London and finance related. IF he wants to make money I would say finish the train driving, save money for a few years and start a business. £45k + OT takes a surprising amount of time to build up to even in finance unless you are coming in as cream of the crop front office.
Might also be worth considering the long-term future of train drivers.
This is a bit of a silly argument these days IMO, the chance of having the same career all you working life is pretty small, and to be honest sounds horrible!
He's bored and wants to be an accountant?
I can't think of a more boring job
He doesn't want to work.
Does he still live with you?
Oh yes. 🙄 But not for long as he's buying a house, so he'll have to keep bringing the dosh in whatever he does.
He's mentioned about the lack (or less than there was) of overtime but bloody hell, 45K basic by the time he's 28-9, plus all the other perks the job/company provide?
He doesn't want to work.
You my son, are spot on there! He's got absolutely no motivation really, he loves BMW's & his films & the computer. He's not even a nerd though. (he doesn't even like trains!)
Sticking my neck out here, but I would say that trainee drivers (of whom I have lots of experience training) who lack motivation and interest in the role will struggle with the job day-to-day. The shifts can be horrendous on freight (earlies? That will be any time after 00.01 - lates you might start any time up to 23.59) and your break might be in a freezing rancid cabin that is maybe one notch up from a bothy. We passenger drivers are seen as soft in comparison. Freight work is more interesting but the job uncertainty has put me off applying - there have been two recent big squeezes on freight drivers that have seen redundancies, in 2008 and this year since April (and ongoing).
Goods train, surely? Freight trains are what hobos ride in Jack Kerouac novels.
Nope. Freight.
Sounds like a good profession to me. Sod accounting. IMO he'd be mad to quit before at least giving it a go. Better story to explain too: "I tried it, but actually it wasn't for me".
If he's bored now when he's got company and everything is new what's he going to be like in a few years time when he's out on his own bombing along on a class 4 at 75mph for mile after mile in the dead of the night? It doesn't get any less boring.
If it's boring then your doing it right, boring is good.
Another thing is that quite often he's not actually driving, he could be sitting either in the front route learning or spare & sitting in the back while someone else is driving/learning. I can see his point at the moment but me & his mum can't seem to get through to him to give it a decent go.
@Chebu, your'e right about the shifts, midnight starts, 4am starts, 6am starts, etc etc.
Probably not much advice but maybe something to consider.
Being an 'Accountant' doesn't have to mean you're going to sit behind a desk 20 hours a day in a cream room. I'm a final year accounting and business student now and while I realise I'll need to spend some time in practise I don't intend to just create financial statements all day (For the record all the practises I've worked in so far have been filled with great people). If he looks into it a little more and plays to his strengths there are finance jobs everywhere. I'm hoping to work within the motorsport/automotive industry which doesn't sound too boring to me at all.
Lol, it sounds good when you read "train driver for £45k" but when you see the reality it's not as good as it seems. First off, if he isn't already he'll be grumpy as f*** within a few months moaning about everything. This will be down to not only having to do stupid shifts like booking on at 2:15am but not making it home on time due to being sidelined for late running passenger trains which get priority. There will be potential for overtime (I'd assume) but it will take a while, route learning is a long process and they tend not to bother teaching the routes which are well manned so he'll probably get all the crap jobs for the first couple of years. It is no way an exciting job, get stuck shunting in the yard for 12 hours and you're basically sat on your arse occasionally moving the train 20m whilst a shovel driver loads you up, you might get lucky and not have the shunter stuck on another job whilst you sit waiting to brake test/run round the train and there's the high possibility of encountering a suicide (loads down the Hope Valley round here)
At the end of the day his objective should be to get on something like the Virgin Pendelenos (spelling?) as that is where the real money lies in driving.
Out of interest, which company will he be driving for and whereabouts?
If he wants to earn a tonne of money and have a bit of variety he should look into being a signaller!
He shouldn't jack the train driving in until he finds something else, but.....
I'm in my mid fifties and my job bores the tits off me, and has done for years, I can't get out because it pays so well and would disrupt my family too much to pack it all in and get a lower paid job. I would give anything to go back to when I was 27 and just do whatever made me happy instead of doing 'what's best'. I am so cheesed off at work that it impacts on my friends and family, and also in my ability to be civil to my colleagues at work. I know I'm an arse but can't stop myself now.
OP; please tell your son to do what he feels happiest doing, even if it's not the route you feel is perfect for him.
Ross - practice accountancy is notoriously hard, and you live out of a suitcase. I know a partner of a large accountancy firm, he privately says coming through the ranks was hard work, now he's the boss it's more about entertaining clients than accountancy.
Personally I've found accountancy pretty similar where ever you do it, the size of the organisation makes a difference, the sector very very little. I got disillusioned chasing the big job. I now work for the NHS, and at least now I feel like I can make a bit of a real difference rather than just maximising some big bosses pay cheque
At 27, he's got 38 years ahead of him before retirement
Hahahahahahahahahaha. Retirement for a chap in his 20's, dying in harness more like.
At the end of the day his objective should be to get on something like the Virgin Pendelenos (spelling?) as that is where the real money lies in driving.Out of interest, which company will he be driving for and whereabouts?
Yep, said that as well (ok, I mentioned HS2 & that fast thing that goes to France) He's with Freightliner working out of Stourton in Leeds.
If he wants to earn a tonne of money and have a bit of variety he should look into being a signaller!
Even I looked at that with Network Rail, pay was less than what I'm on (29K)
OP; please tell your son to do what he feels happiest doing, even if it's not the route you feel is perfect for him.
Don't think he knows what will make him happy TBH!
Only a grade 1 or possibly 2 would get less than 29k. I'm a grade 5 (it goes to 9) and I'll probably be looking at 55-65k this year with minimal overtime. We do 12hr shifts and only work 2 weeks a month one of which is a whole week at a time.
Spend the rest of my time at work sitting on here and other forums or tinkering with bikes and I've just started a part time Open University course, best job in the world!
Cheers IIAF, I'll pass that on. He's pretty good at the sort of test you need to pass for that job as well. (I couldn't make head nor tale of it!)
There are two things that I would guide my working life with if I had my time again aside from any moral compunctions: 1. Has it got a good and secure pension and 2. Is the job portable? To me these are the keys in any career, and I wish I'd thought of them when I was a kid.
Train driver I suspect (but don't know) ticks them both, if so stick with it.
isitafox - Member
Only a grade 1 or possibly 2 would get less than 29k. I'm a grade 5 (it goes to 9) and I'll probably be looking at 55-65k this year with minimal overtime. We do 12hr shifts and only work 2 weeks a month one of which is a whole week at a time.
Spend the rest of my time at work sitting on here and other forums or tinkering with bikes and I've just started a part time Open University course, best job in the world!
Where are you based? I'm at the Three Bridges ROC, currently in rostering but have an interview for signalling job on thursday. 😀
Really hope I get 12 hour roster, the 8 hour early/late/night that my signallers work causes so many problems!
If he's bored already then he needs to get his head sorted out, only a matter of time before his concentration slips and he makes a mistake and then he will be under the spotlight getting his performance downloaded all the time off the black box, I couldn't keep my concentration as a driver as they don't even need to steer the trains, that's why I'm a signaller and I do the steering!
Well if my stepson 'goes off the rails' my son can do the investigating cos he does all that stuff! (but for TFL)
Stepson seems to think every job I've mentioned is 'boring'. Is signalling boring? He says it will be cos he's been in a signal box & all they do is look at a computer & press buttons. (which is EXACTLY what he does when he comes home!!)
I despair.
If he's bored already then he needs to get his head sorted out, only a matter of time before his concentration slips and he makes a mistake and then he will be under the spotlight getting his performance downloaded all the time off the black box
This, freight companies are over establishment at the moment. He needs to be careful as they may waste no time in getting shut of him should he start causing them bother or shows lack of comitment. He should consider himself lucky as Freightliner have frozen Trainee recruitment.