I
supervised maintenance of teashops at one
quarter of London - the south-west
quarter, bounded by Hyde Park Corner,
Croydon, Guildford, West Ealing - plus a
couple of Steak Houses and a Wimpy Bar at
Hammersmith Broadway. I had no training
for this work, it was assumed that I knew
about refrigeration, which was not so. I
had three pairs of engineers to cover this
area. My day started with a visit to my
local Teashop, J8 Acton, and phone in to
'control' and find out what breakdowns had
been reported in that morning and where
the three pairs of engineers had been
sent. I would either proceed to the most
serious breakdown, or if it was a bad
morning, make my way to a fourth Teashop
with a problem like a boiler that had not
lit. When all breakdowns had been dealt
with there was routine maintenance to get
on with. It was a hard winter when I
started on this work and there were many
burst pipes. Often I'd walk into a Teashop
and find water flowing down a wall and I'd
have to figure were it was coming from and
then how to close it off without shutting
the Teashop down. I only carried three
tools in my brief case - a screwdriver, an
adjustable spanner (wrench) and a pair of
Molegrips (a vice grip), this was because
it carried requisition and order pads and
other paperwork in there too. Often the
work went into the evening, and you were
never able to get time back as you had t
be in on time next morning for another
round of work. I was travelling the whole
time and only came in to the office one
afternoon a week. I was on this work for
less than two years but maintenance work
is vital to be done at some time for a
balanced career.
|