>>27363
>Last week one of the best known, the sandwich chain Pret a Manger, added to the worries about how sustained remote working would impact businesses by saying it planned to cut nearly 2,900 jobs following the desertion of high streets.

If an overpriced high street sandwich shop failed to see the forest for the trees when high streets started imploding a decade ago, I'm not inclined to shed a tear for them now. That goes doubly so for any of the more white collar/City firms in crisis.

I don't know what the future holds but as long as it has fewer mind-numbing commutes and a bit more quality of life, I couldn't give a toss about the state of the economy at large.

>>27365
>Pret A Manger demands go beyond traditional requirements for fast-food workers (such as courtesy, efficiency, and reliability) to such tasks as having "presence", demonstrating a quirky sense of fun, and exhibiting behaviour consistent with being inwardly happy with oneself. Pret A Manger uses mystery shoppers to ensure that employees deploy markers of a positive emotional state. Employees who exhibit markers of latent sadness face consequences such as not having a bonus.

It's about time they went to the wall. That's without mentioning tax avoidance and their ownership structure.

>>27365

Pret angled themselves as the defacto "lunch for workers" chain, and it worked - even a dead high street could support a Pret if there's offices about.

They're a notoriously bad company in terms of management though, so fuck em.

>>27364

https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/

>>27367
They did, and they were excellent at first - but they are WAY too ubiquitous to survive this as they are and I really don't think they deserve to.

I work(ed) in a particular part of London where there are eighteen (18) branches within a one mile radius of where I work. I'm sure they did that for a reason (they get the business) but it isn't healthy or sustainable.

I didn't realise that when ITZ happened you had to BUY_YOUR_OLIVEPESTOMOZARELLAFOCACCIO

>>27380
Any right thinking person already has most of those things stashed in bulk already.

>Latest figures show that just over a third (37%) of white-collar workers in the UK are back at the office, compared with over three-quarters of employees in Germany, Italy and Spain, and 84% in France.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/sep/01/trickle-not-a-torrent-workers-in-canary-wharf-and-manchester-return-to-the-office

>Civil servants tell staff there is no point coming back to work as a second wave will mean more WFH

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/08/31/civil-servants-tell-staff-no-point-coming-back-work-second-wave/

>>27420

We're the progressive ones for once. Now if only we could adopt the French work week too...

>>27369
I'm dying to know why there are Betfred shops on three of the four corners of this small block.

>>27422
Go chat with your boss if you want less hours, I'm all good thanks.

>>27425
Fewer.

>>27424
That is appalling - and you already know the answer. I think there should be byelaws protecting people from that kind of thing.

>>27424

High-street bookmakers haven't really been about sports betting for some time. Most of their revenue comes from fixed-odds betting terminals, which are basically slot machines on steroids. As of 2018, the industry was averaging profits of about £1,400 per machine per month. Each shop is only allowed four FOBT machines by law, so in areas with high demand and low rents you'll often see multiple shops in close proximity.

A reduction in the maximum bet size in 2019, combined with the shift to online and mobile gambling since lockdown, means that a lot of these shops are likely to close.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixed_odds_betting_terminal

>>27425

Why?

Before you answer, be aware that I won't accept any answer other than you are a professional blow job quality assessor, Ferarri test driver, or other ridiculous fantasy dream job.

The reason I suspect you're going to give instead isn't actually an answer, because you should already be getting paid more in the first place.

>>27437
I don't think I'd want to be a blowie tester. I bet there'd be lots of grating teeth.

>>27438
>>27437
It would be exhausting and you'd get very sore then very calloused, assuming it is possible to get penis callouses. How many blowjobs a day are we talking? If it's more than three or four you'd start to dread it.

>>27439
>>27438

You know how a taste tester for tea or soft drinks or whatever works, where they just take a sip, swill it around, then spit it out? You can't actually drink the stuff all day long.

You don't actually spaff in their gob as part of the assessment, because that'd affect your judgement of the next dozen. You'd have a checklist of how much tongue work they're doing, if their teeth are getting in the way, if they go for the cheeky bum finger. That sort of thing.

I'd give them a good ten minute window each if it as me, but that might be overly thorough. A good blowie tester can probably give you an accurate rating in as little as three.

>>27440
Nonsense, if you're testing blowies you need to experience their technique from soft to spaff. Just having them go at you for three minutes would be like wine-tasting where somehow you can't smell the aroma or taste the aftertaste.

>>27440
>I'd give them a good ten minute window each if it as me, but that might be overly thorough. A good blowie tester can probably give you an accurate rating in as little as three.

30 seconds max to decide whether they were any good. It's quite obvious from the "off" whether the person is experience or putting any effort in. 3 minutes of a bad one would be torture.

>>27441

I mean fair enough if you want to do it that way, but you're only going to manage three or four appointments in our new utopian 5 hour workday, and the other blowjob rating agencies would drive you out of business with volume alone. You could squeeze more in, but it'd be unfair on the candidates who got you on your refractory period from the last one.

>>27442

I guess if you really want to push the numbers up yeah, but I'm sure there are some people out there who get a case of nerves to start with. I'd be compelled to give them at least a minute to get over the shock of the size of my knob anyway.

>>27444
You're just not going to get an accurate reading beyond the very basic rating of enthusiasm and some or no experience. My method may be slower but at least I'll be able to provide a full review.
Besides, it's not as though I'll be struggling to recruit and keep others to fill the same role for low wages. I believe your approach is a false economy and will give sloppy results.

>>27447

Blow Job Certification and Classification Worker's Union would like a word m8

I think someone would need to suck a variety of dicks to be properly assessed and graded. Someone proficient with an averaged sized dick may struggle with a lengthy or girthy member. Also, I'd imagine men like different things from a blowie.

>>27449

Good point, it'd really have to be more like a British Board of Felatio Certification.

God bless are great nation.

>>27452

My only counterpoint is that covid changed both public perception and circumstances, so I don't think it is purely hypocritical of the rags.

>>27453
I'm fairly sure the top two predate covid, I've seen a much older version of this.

>Downing Street denies existence of back-to-work campaign as office staff stay home

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/09/03/boris-johnson-rishi-sunak-tax-deal-brexit-local-lockdowns/

If your campaign is overwhelmingly unpopular pretend it never happened.

Pret are now offering a subscription service; up to 5 coffees a day for £20 per month.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-54012055

>>27463
Not bad on the face of it

>>27464
>>27463

With the aim of increasing peoples' caffiene dependency?

>>27466

It's a desperate effort to increase footfall - if you're coming in several times a day for your "subscription coffee", you might buy a cake or a butty while you're there.

It's not going to save the innumerable branches of Pret that have infested the nation's city centres like petit-bourgeois pustules, but at least they're trying.

>>27463
It's terrible coffee though. When they start a sandwich subscription I AM IN.

I think this kind of thing will catch on.

>>27468

I say on the face of it because it sounds too good to be true.

5 coffees _every day_ at Starbucks would costs >£400 a month.

So I'm guessing there are plenty of caveats to this deal.

How can anyone have 5 coffees a day and not feel like shit and/or blow their arse out?

>>27472

I must drink at least 4 a day, and I think at this point it's the only thing keeping me regular. I tried cutting back a bit ago and it was like my bowels turned to stone.

>>27471
How many people will pop into Pret five times a day? At the very most I imagine it'll be three; one on your way to work, one on your lunch break and one on the way home. Let's say that's fifteen coffees a week so sixty over the space of a month. It does not cost Pret anywhere near £20 in coffee beans, milk, etc., to make sixty coffees; even if they had 150 drinks in a month that's still a healthy gross profit.

It'll create a regular cash flow, it may lead to an uptick in the number of sales of sandwiches and it should increase their market share; if you have a subscription and you want a drink then you'll be more likely to go to Pret and not have to pay anything extra for it rather than going into Costa or Starbucks for it.

>>27475

Fuck Pret and the metro drone urban 6 pound Gyoza box lunch timers. They should have got a job in IT and learned how to make their own cheese and pickle sandwiches.

>>27516
>Gyoza

Get some Pierogi from your local Polski Sklep and bung them in the microwave. They're almost the same thing, and cost a lot less.

I never thought I'd say this but I'm enjoying homeworking less since my kids went back to school. The house is too silent and I'm finding myself easily distracted.

>>27591
There's a primary school behind my flat. I often work from home anyway and before 'rona I used to get annoyed by the sounds of their screaming from the playground when I was trying to work, but the silence really bothered me once it was gone. Now it's back I don't mind it at all.

Work have started bringing the admin teams back to the office. Apparently because some people have grumbled about having to go in they're making those still working at home, including those self isolating for medical reasons, work an extra hour to compensate for it.

>>27703
How can they make you work an extra hour? You should work to whatever hours you are contracted to work.

>>27703
What the fuck? Talk to your union.

>>27711
I suspect I'm getting half the story, but I do know that the admin staff still WFH are working an hour a day longer than those going into the office. It'll probably turn out that those in the office are working 5 hours per week less than they're contracted to.

>>27714

I would guess it's something to do with people not getting full breaks/lunch hours or what have you due to social distancing in the shared areas of the building.

We were doing that for a while at mine but then some unfathomably small minded tedious bint decided to go on a crusade about how some people were unfairly abusing the ability to have a shorter lunch so they could leave early and then it sort of petered out. There's one of them in every workplace isn't there.

>>27703
That's just straight unfair and your employer should be challenged - people WFH are generally putting in far more hours than contracted at the moment.

>>27714
Is this new? Plenty of people were expected to be on their phones or laptops (Phone Guy or not) working on their commute to and fro. It wasn't right then, and it isn't right now.