Re: So it is true...


Colin Fine wrote:
> Brian M. Scott wrote:
> > On 6 Dec 2005 02:20:38 -0800, Seán O'Leathlóbhair
> > <jwlawler@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in
> > <news:1133864437.993163.161370@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > in sci.lang:
> >
> >
> >>Brian M. Scott wrote:
> >
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >
> >>>London: Foyle's, Hatchard's, Dillon's in Gower Street (which
> >>>Google tells me is now a Waterstone's), and others that I
> >>>don't remember. Oxford: Blackwell's. Cambridge: Heffers,
> >>>of course; they seem to have retained their name on the
> >>>ground, but I see that their online branch is run by
> >>>Blackwell's. All manner of secondhand and antiquarian
> >>>shops, of course, but the only one whose name comes to mind
> >>>at the moment is Peter Bell in Edinburgh.
> >
> >
> >>Your knowledge of British bookshops is impressive.
> >
> >
> > Well, I spent on awful lot of time in them back in the late
> > 70s and early 80s when I went over there for a month every
> > summer. (And I didn't even mention Dark They Were and
> > Golden-Eyed in Queen Anne's Court, which I understand went
> > out of business years ago.
> >
> > [...]
> >
> > Brian
>
> Yes, driven out of business mostly by Forbidden Planet I think.
>
> I haven't been to Foyle's for years (I hardly ever go to London), but
> when I last did, it was not an impressive place, except for its size.
> The staff were not, in general, well-informed, and it was the only place
> outside the Soviet Union that I ever saw the system of 'order your
> goods, go to the cashier to pay, and then go back and collect your
> goods'. The story was that they would habitually employ (mostly foreign)
> staff, give them only the barest minimum of training, and then fire them
> just before the 6 months or whatever the period was that they would
> acquire some employment rights. I don't know if it was true, but it
> would account for my experiences.
>
>
> COlin

I think that bizarre method of paying has finally gone. I used to
regard it as an amusing quirk. I have also seen the system in Sri
Lanka. It was not a place to buy a book in a hurry.

Sadly, I have also heard reports of poor employment practises. One was
that they would ask about your interests and then ensure that you did
not work in a department which interested you. They may have been
worried that you would be tempted to read rather than work. That
working in a department which interested you may enable you to be more
helpful to customers was presumably a lower priority. Despite this
story, I have met Foyle's staff who were knowledgeable and helpful.
Maybe the policy was changed together with the payment system or maybe
I was just lucky.

If I need a job in Foyle's, I will profess an interest in gardening,
home improvements, Mills and Boone, list books, and whether other junk
is popular at the time.

--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair

.

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