The Biggest mistake I ever made

I was still living at home as was my boyfriend (hubby) I was a checkout supervisor for Asda and very unhappy with my life, It wasn't going anywhere plus Glen couldn't get a job even though he was a skilled builder.
Being fed up and wanting something new we saw an add in the job Centre window for restaurant assistants. 2 years training in all aspects of the working in a Public house, kitchen & bar experience.

I handed My notice in at work then we both packed up everything we had to catch a train for Surrey.

Biggest mistake I ever made

Packing up and moving 296 miles away from home was really scary, we didn't know anyone didn't have a clue what was going to happen, One thing we did know was we couldn't go home we had to give it a go.

We arrived in surrey, we got picked up by the manager who then took us to the pub, he drove for quite a while taking us quite a distance. When we got there there was a public house and lots of fields, We went into the office to find out what we would be doing.

We would be working around 72 hours a week each
Pay would work out just over £1 an hour
2 days off
If you wanted to town you had to wait for the post van to take you and bring you back later that day

We were then taken too where we would be living, a wooden shack with 4 other bedrooms where the other couples were living. 4 bedroom's 1 toilet and your food came from the main kitchen.

We were told within 2 years we would be fully qualified to run a public house, so many months in the kitchen, so many months serving and so many months in the bar then paper work. We really wanted to go for it and were pretty all up for putting everything we had into this.
We then started talking to other couples, some had been there over 3 years and still hadn't done lots of the work, they were stuck no where else to go they had to stick with it. The manager and head chef were unbearable to work with, only so much hot water was allowed to wash the dishes, in the middle of the kitchen was the cooking area, on the bench next to it was a row of pate bowls that they emptied the used plates into, left over carrots in one etc. I couldn't believe it. We had to stand over them whilst they chopped carrots as they wanted us to see there was no waste, every slice cost 1p so the only bit that binned was the actual stalk.

Glen started on the dishes and I was sent to do serving, had never done anything like this before that didn't stop them pushing me in the deep end.

My claim to fame was servingJUDY DENCH Deep fried potato skins, I nearly died when I placed her plate, she looked at me and said "Thank you" I was excited when I went back to the kitchen but told to get on with serving. It was a very popular place, was full every night so every night we didn't get to bed until after 2 in the morning then we were up again at 7.30 to start again.

We lasted around a month, I couldn't walk, I was ill as was Glen we were shattered. Talking to the other couples they all said "Get out if you can" I phoned home to tell my parents what was happening, they tried to keep us going but they could tell by our voices something was wrong, Surprisingly my parents said "Come Home" (me and my parents have never got along)

We packed up went to hand our notice in, they were really angry about wasting there time, we told them what we thought but they were't interested, they even said we wouldn't get a penny . They weren't training anyone they were using us as cheap labour. No wonder they were millionaires.

Getting home with our tail between our legs our parents could see how bad things must have been. The very next day we both went down to the job centre to report them. We sat and told the lady what we had done and what was happening, they said they were going to investigate it. 2 months later I got a letter saying our wages for the month would be paid they had also taken the ad out of the window and the company had been warned. So hopefully something came out if it, we never heard anymore.

I was so glad to be home, Something I never thought I would ever say.

	Hi I am Karen, I am here to write about my life and read about yours.. If you like what you read please upvote and leave me a message so I can come visit you	follow me on Twitter