台灣新光保全股份有限公司

Stable job!!

You never have to take unpaid leave like at electronics factories ○○

Annual salary increases

Too rigid!!

But security companies are supposed to have systems in place!!

After all, it was established 40 years ago!!

I didn’t even get through the door, so I don’t know.

My résumé was publicly posted on a job-search website. Even though it clearly stated that I’m currently employed, they still called to harass me during working hours.

As if the harassment weren’t enough, they dared to call even though they couldn’t understand the professional qualifications listed on my résumé.

I couldn’t tell whether the person calling was HR or a supervisor. What’s outrageous is that the caller didn’t even understand what their own company’s job involved.

They stammered on for ages, and in the end could only add, “Anyway, it’s just the kind of stuff engineers do.”

It’s hilarious— in Taiwan, apparently any position can be given the title “engineer.”

In the end, I only asked, “Is it related to software development?”

They replied, “Uh… yes.”

I checked the interview invitation on the job-search website: it was for an assistant position installing surveillance equipment, and they sent the invitation more than once.

Wasting both our time is one thing, but my software engineering expertise and résumé were clearly right there, and they still looked down on me.

Still thinking

1. The equipment planning is not thoughtful enough. There are only Chinese labels and no English labels, causing foreigners to easily activate the wrong controls and consequently increasing false alarms.

2. Some clients' entrances do not have card readers installed, so security personnel cannot swipe their cards.

None

A bunch of old senior executives hang around without leaving and do nothing.

They either chat, sleep, or watch stocks.

The policies are constantly changing…

To stay, you have to be related to royalty or be very good at flattery!

How could there possibly be any?

Given that the former employees who resigned have already explained things very thoroughly, I’ll add some other points.

1. When you start employment and enter the three-month probationary period, there is supposedly a company agreement (nothing more than an unequal contract requiring you to work for a certain period or else pay compensation).

2. Your unit supervisor and colleagues will constantly brainwash you, telling you how great this job is~~ (Tsk, tsk... if it’s so great, why is the turnover rate so high???).

3. They ask you to inspect clients using your own transportation and paying for your own gas~~ (This is seriously amazing; even 7-ELEVEN isn’t this impressive.)

Supplement: They also require a certain number of client inspections. If you don’t visit 50 locations a day, your supervisor won’t sign off (it’s time to do charitable work~~).

4. The company’s tools are for inspection, not for use. If they are damaged or lost, you have to find a way to replace them, so everyone usually pays out of pocket (the Shin Kong system is f***ing amazing).

5. There is supposedly a vehicle navigation system, but they will still tell you that it might malfunction and expect you to memorize the 300–1,000 different client locations in your assigned area. If you haven’t memorized them and arrive too late, causing financial losses to a client, then...呵呵...... (A job with an hourly wage even more pathetic than that of a convenience store~ and overtime pay lower than the regular hourly wage......)

Remember: Even if you are desperate, do not join Shin Kong Security. This place is synonymous with exploitation.

Can't think of any.

1. Internal procedures are very cumbersome; one thing requires several processes (and several days).

2. Responsibility-based system, with unlimited overtime (of course, unpaid).

3. The company's entire management team consists of old people (the kind who should have retired).

4. Conservative style, no innovation, stuck in the past, and unable to keep up with the times.

5. Extremely, extremely high turnover.

6. Does not value frontline units.

7. The business unit needs to be berated for more than an hour every day (even when performance targets are met); the management style is truly baffling.

8. Before going, first consider whether you are really out of options.

Freedom, high base salary

Don't expect your manager to teach you anything! They casually give you some grand life lessons and then send you out to generate sales. When you encounter problems, they won't help; if you ask your manager for advice, they may even berate you. If you're bringing in results, they'll treat you well, but if you aren't, they'll do everything they can to make things difficult for you and force you out. In this company, if you have no connections and no sales, you will ultimately be let go. There are many salespeople who poach business across territories, so new salespeople have no way to compete. The market is saturated and the company's support systems are terrible! Competitors can easily beat you by offering any quote they want—there's no point in trying. You can't leave before nine, and there are tons of pointless miscellaneous tasks to do, plus you have to put on a show for the manager. Leave too early and expect to be chewed out the next day. If you enjoy being mistreated and enduring negative emotions every day, come work here as a salesperson.

1. On typhoon days (only when a suspension of work and classes has been officially announced), the duty pay is doubled (this probably doesn’t really count as a benefit; many companies offer this).

2. ...That’s it.

I was employed there in 2015, so everything mentioned here reflects the situation at that time.

1. During the interview, the supervisor kept telling you that the salary was better than the starting pay in other industries—NT$33,000 (in Taichung)—but when you actually break it down, it comes to.........an hourly wage just a few dollars higher than the minimum wage.

2. The duty shift was 12 hours, but you had to arrive at the company half an hour early to attend the pre-shift briefing, and you also had to fill out forms after work. In practice, excluding commuting, the working time was already 13 hours. Night-shift workers would also frequently receive calls about incidents just as they were due to finish in the morning, delaying their departure until the end of the shift. You could apply for overtime pay, but colleagues and supervisors would “very tactfully” say that it was troublesome and so on. After a while, you would get tired of it and stop applying.

3. Although the regular safety briefings/educational courses were paid, there was no additional compensatory time off. Day-shift workers attended classes in the evening, while night-shift workers attended in the morning. Those who still had to work that day simply lost half a day of their already pitifully short rest time.

4. When a customer’s contract expired without renewal or was terminated, the work of removing the security equipment was mostly assigned to night-shift employees after their shifts. The pay was NT$500 per location and took 1–4 hours (or longer), depending on how much security equipment the customer had installed. No matter how much had to be removed, the payment was always NT$500. Other companies assigned this work to outside contractors, but the supervisor at the time would only tell you, “The company had considered hiring contractors, but we took into account that some people wanted to earn a little extra money.” ........If the company was really being so considerate of its employees, then please pay “by the job and according to the amount of work.” If two people spend half a day removing equipment from a large factory or school and still cannot finish, it is still NT$500. And you expect me to believe this is “giving employees an opportunity to earn extra money”? Not to mention that in understaffed districts, almost everyone who went to remove equipment still had to work a shift that night. And understaffing happened frequently.

5. You can see traces of the military in many management practices and systems: pointless tasks, pointless forms, and ineffective briefings.

6. They are always complaining about employees not being familiar with customer locations and telling them not to rely too much on navigation systems. Supervisors would also say things like, “Back then, we didn’t have navigation to look at; we had to find maps ourselves and memorize the routes.” ................That was ten years ago. How many districts was one patrol area responsible for? Nowadays, a patrol area in Taichung is responsible for around 500 locations (and you also have to rotate through different patrol areas). For fuck’s sake, do you want me to memorize all of them and recite them for you? Of course you memorize the places you visit often. But if an alarm comes from somewhere you have never been, and you arrive too slowly, you get criticized for not knowing the customer’s location. Not to mention that new customers are constantly being added. With so many locations assigned to one patrol area, no wonder you can never finish responding to all the incidents on typhoon days. And this is Taichung; the locations in Taipei may be even more densely packed.

7. Oh, right—during the interview, they always tell you that the schedule is two days on, one day off, but they do not tell you that “two days on, one day off is only possible when there is enough manpower. When there is not enough manpower, schedules of four days on, one day off; five days on, one day off; or only five or four days off per month are all very common.” For a night-shift job involving driving around outside for 12 or more hours, do you really have the nerve to spend all day telling people to get enough rest before coming to work when the rest periods are like this?

There were probably other things, but it has been two years, and these are all I can remember.

The supervisor is very good at talking,

but never follows through,

driving for more than 12 hours almost every day,

overtime is also deducted—even though the overtime rate is only 100 per hour, he deducts that too,

the internal systems are a complete mess,

when returning to the company, you can only report overtime in half-hour increments, and you must arrive after the hour (e.g., 17:00 or 17:30),

but there are often queues to enter the warehouse, or you have to wait more than half an hour to enter the warehouse,

a company that cannot even afford to pay 50 in overtime