My life in the Australian Tax Office

To stay on the topic (for a change), I also worked at the ATO for twenty years and would still be there now if I hadn’t been invalided out at the age of 54. The only reason I went in there, was because there were no jobs going around in 1983, so I took the Public Service Exam. I wanted to get into exciting areas like Foreign Affairs (sounds good anyway) or Defence (probably not so good) but the ATO wanted me more or probably less, but they got me anyway.

I really needed the brass so I joined, if a trifle unwillingly. After my first day I knew that this was not the job of my dreams, more like nightmares. My first couple of weeks were spent in a converted wool store (honestly!) I can’t remember what, if anything, I was supposed to do there. After that I was moved to ‘Lodgment Enforcement’ with another two new recruits.

Apart from the three of us there were four of the biggest deadheads ever to inhabit the ATO (and that is no mean accomplishment). The desks were arranged in a circle around a large pot plant, in the centre of which was an even larger hand written sign, proudly proclaiming ‘THE VEGGIE PATCH’ (this is no bullshit).

Of the four, one used to get to work at 9:30 and immediately go to sleep for his fifteen-minute tea break. He was right handed but kept his pen in his left hand and his feet in the desk drawer and with his face away from the supervisor, slept until lunchtime. Another one once walked out of the office and banged his head in the side mirror of a parked truck, drawing blood. He raced back up the stairs (which in itself was a first) and placed his head on the photocopier and took a copy for evidence in his workers comp claim. One of the others pushed his luck a little too far and ended up getting fired for rap dancing on his desk.

This unholy crew was ‘supervised’ by a young woman, who was semi-permanently on stress leave or on the phone or both. After a couple of weeks of this, the manager asked if anyone in the section wanted a move, me and my two relatively normal co-workers were the first in the queue after sending desks, chairs and pot plants flying.

I could go into this further, but the memories are still too close for comfort, so I shall cease and desist for another decade or two.

Cheers for now,

SkyBlueSkull.

http://keith-skellern.blogspot.com