The Joy of Work...!

Times like these make me want to force Sam's boss into retirement... so his son's take over the business and give Sam a promotion and a BIG raise to go along with it. :) This means I can stay home and not have to worry about working unless I want to. But I'm a dreamer. And when there's tension at my office, I dream about that a lot.

On March 27th, Peggy had an interviewee do a "working interview." At the end of the day, Peggy pretty much hired her on as out part-time medical assistant. By the end of the following week, this girl was doing more than just being the medical assistant; she was printing out billing reports and figuring out patient balances and other billing things. I told her I wouldn't be surprised if Peggy fired our current biller and hired this girl on full time.

On April 9th, we had our first "official" office meeting. No talk of feelings this time, thank goodness. :) However, several of the things Peggy brought up really bothered me... to the point of wanting to walk out on my job and that's never a good thing. Peggy wasn't willing to compromise on anything. She didn't care what I had to day; everything had to be her way or the highway. I was getting ready to choose the highway, personally... Peggy's stance was this: "It's worked for me the last 20 years. I shouldn't have to change anything now. It's always worked in the past. The only thing that's different is the staff." I was under the impression that everything that was going wrong in the office was my fault; I wasn't reading the scripts, prompts, and dialogues correctly or at all, I wasn't scheduling people correctly, I wasn't making necessary call backs to patients, I wasn't collecting copayments and past due balances at the time of service, etc... you get the point. But at the same time, that was TWENTY (20) YEARS AGO. That's one heck of a long time ago... I was only 7 years old at the time. That's insane. Step up your game and get with the times! But Peggy wanted nothing to do with that; in fact, she even said she didn't want a website, since that's not how she looks for a provider. Funny thing though, that's how all of us here in the office look for one and when we told her that, she didn't seem to give a crap.

After Thursday's train wreck of an office meeting, I was feeling pretty low on Friday. Of course, there were patients to help cheer me up and the new girl, Christy, did her best as well, but nothing really seemed to help. Over the weekend, we had friends over for "Easter" and that really seemed to help. I got to cook out my anger and aggression and eat away at my emotions. haha!

Over the last two weeks, it just seems like things haven't improved since the meeting. To be honest, it seems like things have almost gotten worse. I have so much built up anger and resentment towards Peggy- it's not healthy. The things she says and does on a day to day basis are just another aggravation. My stress levels are going through the roof and my patience with Peggy is almost non-existent. I love her busy days because I hardly have any contact with her; it's great. Peggy's been asking me to do ridiculous tasks that are stupid and time consuming. Sure, it's brainless work, but if I wanted that, I would still be working at Target.

On another note, the biller (the other Sarah) was fired last week and the new girl (Christy) was promoted to full time salaried status with a starting pay of 50 cents less than what I currently make (which is after 2 "raises"). Christy claims she knows all about our billing program and she has said she will clean up our billing concerns within a day. She's been the biller for the last week and I haven't seen any billing clean-up going on. I watched her post claims last week and I noticed it took her 2x as long as it used to take Sarah to do. I just don't get it. Oddly enough, Sarah has reported back to me that Peggy did not check Christy's references. Somehow, Sarah got a hold of Christy's former employer and asked if she would hire Christy again. That doctor said, "No." It's weird how Peggy is insistent upon references and telling interviewees that she will be calling references, but yet, Peggy didn't call on Christy. Weird.

Tomorrow is office meeting #2. It's a follow-up on our previous meeting as well as discussing new topics... especially the topics we didn't get a chance to talk about at our previous meeting, since Peggy hogged the floor and took up over an hour and a half talking about what she wanted to talk about. Oh, yes, this should be a fun meeting. I have such high hopes for this meeting. I have already typed up an agenda and given it to Peggy; I'm almost positive that she won't want to touch on topics that she hasn't "completed" since the last meeting, but she'll want to stir up shit if the office hasn't done their part. Funny thing is, we HAVE done our part. She hasn't. Fun fun.

Today is Administrative Assistant/Secretary's Day. Do I think I'll get any appreciation for what I do? Nope, probably not. I'm willing to take a bet, even. I have a feeling that, if anything, I'll get told "Thank you for all you do," and that will be the end of it. No flowers, no card, not even a $5 gift card. It's just bullshit, I say, bullshit.

I'm currently looking for another job; I'm applying like crazy and getting no response. I don't want these other places to call Peggy, since I'm not telling her I'm looking for another job. When I give her my notice, then she'll know I'm looking... and that I most likely have one. If I don't have anything before August, I'm putting in my notice and going back to substitute teaching. At least bratty kids aren't as bad as a bitchy, menopausal boss. :)

And on that note...
Back to my non-working state.