Ponzi Scheme At It's Finest
Pros
There isn't one single pro about working for this company. The paycheck is "nice" if you don't mind doing mind-numbing/emotionally draining "customer service" work on a semi-antiquated phone system.
Cons
Where do I even begin? This company is a huge sham. From an employee side, health benefits are absolute rubbish, management is fickle and constantly changing company policy (Hotwire is a private company so they can do so with reckless abandon, sadly) and there is little to no communication between departments. Your work load is guaranteed to change at the drop of a dime if you're in customer service between management places you in a training queue which is mostly billing and collections calls for a few weeks (months if you're lucky and kiss the right amount of butt with upper management) and suddenly one day when you come in, you'll be thrown into a "troubleshooting queue" without any proper troubleshooting training. Their explanation is "we will train you to take these calls" all the while, they're giving you an evaluation that actually counts towards absolutely nothing (you have to fight tooth and nail for a raise). These evaluations are absolutely meaningless and serve as a way to keep the supervisors busy during the month while they get paid to tell you "send an email" when you go to them for assistance. Did I mention that management is horrible? I have witnessed a supervisor sleeping in his car/at his desk on various occasions, borrowing money from other employees on the work floor, as well as begging employees for food because he "didn't bring lunch in" that day. I have video on my phone of him sleeping for TWO whole hours on one work night and advising customer service representatives to tell the customers he's "on the phone at the moment" when they ask to speak to a supervisor because he doesn't know how to handle most of the troublesome calls that the customer service reps take. Upper management knows of this supervisor's foolishness and continue to keep him employed because of reasons unknown. Also, customer service reps "drop" or deliberately hang up on customers when the call becomes too bothersome simply because they can. Nothing is done about it and with the system we work in, it's easy to detect when it happens, yet this crappy tactic goes unnoticed because management doesn't care. Upper management would also rather hire from the outside rather than to promote within. The only way to get any increase in pay or job status is to metaphorically kiss the crack of management's behind. The manager has her "flunkies" who tell her when issues arise on the work floor and in return, she grants them special privileges like "being able to go home early" by being placed on a special "go home early worksheet" and the employees who she isn't so fond of are placed on a "must stay at the call center" list. Corporate Favoritism at it's finest. Stay far away from this company. Do not inquire about them, do not fall into their "higher than most" pay rate. You'll be stuck making the same $15 an hour for your entire duration at this company unless you're willing to bend over backwards and kiss their behinds to get any sort of promotion.
