Wait, you're closed but you have to work anyway? That bites.

I'm on a conference call for work about our jobs and it is....depressing. They're basically trying to outsource us to Bulgaria and Mexico. I mean, over the next few years. But still. They're desperately trying to spin it as a good thing ("no, your job will be EASIER!"), but everyone is pretty skeptical.

I guess technically jobs are easier once you no longer have to do them...

I don't understand how that would work for your job. Unless Bulgarians get special discount airfares.

I am lucky that I have a four day weekend, because I am so done in.

Dying here. The guys working on the water have been trading wisecracks all day. Now Other Guy just strolled past me singing "Dean in white satin....."

The [bad]fic writes itself!

They're desperately trying to spin it as a good thing

My company went to all HDHP (High Deductible...mumble, whatever) medical insurance for next year. They made us sit through a "Here's why it's awesome!" presentation. Which sounded like making excuses and bullshitting from where I was sitting, but maybe it was awesome from some other seats?

Now Other Guy just strolled past me singing "Dean in white satin....."

bwahahahaha!

Ugh meara, that's a mess. And yeah to what brenda said. How does that work exactly?

I have to run a big important meeting today, and I am feeling both like I'm flaking and overwhelmed. Argh!

Well, basically my job used to involve going places and looking at paper records, and collecting documents that were on paper and sending them to my company to input into a database, etc. Plus calling them in between to follow up on any issues, to tell them about new stuff that's happening, ask them to do things, etc.

But nowadays, the documents we collect are often either scanned, or electronic in the first place (both for our files, and the actual medical records), and the database is electronic (the sites are entering it there to start with rather than writing it on paper to be shipped in). So more and more can be done remotely...in theory...Right now they're just outsourcing more of the "call between visits and follow up and email about issues" part. And then they're having people take a look at those databases between visits. While they can't look at the records and say "you entered 14 and it should be 41", they can say "this part isn't filled out and that part doesn't make sense". And eventually maybe they will be able to look at the records (some of that is HIPAA dependent).

Some of the records will always be on paper, at least for the near future. But more and more can be done remotely...which means more and more can be done remotely from Bulgaria or whatever.

And some of this is fine--the following up in between was kind of a pain, especially if you were supposed to do that while on the road. But part of what it means is that (a) there will be more required travel parts of the job, since someone else can do the other bits (and therefore we have time to do MOAR TRAVEL), and (b) some of the travel bits will be reduced--like, instead of going every 6 weeks, maybe go every 12 weeks, since a certain amount can be done remotely! And if there's less travel to be done, they need fewer people traveling. BUT...the new jobs, because they don't involve travel, are paid significantly less, even if they're in the US. But then hey, why not do it in Bulgaria because it's EVEN CHEAPER! Even though they require the same extensive skill base and knowledge.

...so yeah, we're all skeptical.

Yeah... sounds problematic