editted to add: I had an interview for my dream job on Monday the 9th. The boss said she'd let me know by Wednesday the 11th. I called her on Thurs the 12th to find out what was happening, she said she was waiting for approval and that she would have an answer for me by Monday the 16th. So I waited... and waited... I called her this morning at 10 am and she is still waiting to hear from her superiors! Arrgghhh I am going crazy!!

[ 17 June 2003: Message edited by: Meowful ]

I suppose you could have the people you've applied to check with the human resources people at your previous employer to get that information (confirming your employment) and then go with peer or customer references as paxamilion suggested.

quote:

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Kindred was quick to grasp my needs, working within our budget and designing effective advertising for our business. I found her to be willing to make quick changes for me, advise me of special editions that would reach my customers, and always personable and pleasant to work with.

I always felt she had my best interests at heart.

I would not hesitate to place my advertising needs with her and had the utmost confidence in her ability. I often just advised her to do up the ads she felt I should run when I was busy, and she never let me down. She is in my opinion a real professional

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This is a real hurting thing, I applied for jobs who's requirements could have been written specifically for me - and nothing, for a whole year I have been sending our dozens of resumes, beating my head against a brick wall and getting really depressed thinking I am over 50, female and disabled, I obviously dont stand a chance and to find out this ! I am past anger -

I believe the unions are going to do some shaking up over this - I dont belong to it, but I did so much labour work, I went way way above and beyond for labour organizations while I was there.

I guess I can put the info on my resume, employer is not happy that I quit - or something equally lame about them.

Even other sales people who shared clients with me, from other companies are sending me letters

quote:

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Kindred and I became acquainted through her contact with a mutual client. I have known Kindred as a news print media representative and I have seen her skills in practice and her behavior while working. She does a commendable job of addressing the client’s needs by honing a suitable fit with the need and the product she is selling. She is quite skilled at demonstrating the advantages and benefits of the product she represents.

Further I have know Kindred to be tenacious, unrelenting and dedicated to her work and her employer. She is accustomed to routinely conducting a considerable number of face-to-face sales calls on a regular daily basis. She is a self-started and has her time management down to a fine art.

Kindred would enthusiastically grasp local, regional and national advertising, product information and develop the necessary sales knowledge readily. Similarly she is able to address internet new media knowledge with adept comprehension.

In character Kindred is honest, trustworthy, praiseworthy and would be a commendable employee asset to any organization.

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I am so damn angry - time to revise my resume, I hope the union and labour guys go after them big time. I am not the only one they are doing this to you - there are three others who were screwed over by them with regards to references as well.

I recently went back to college and got a diploma in "Computerized Business Systems and E-Commerce." There were many students over 40 (private college.

quote:

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some the people I worked with were unbearable

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Confidence and that ego thing can take you a long way, and when all your appreciative clients are throwing perks at you, well its darn nice. So I cant deny I had a healthy ego -

BUT I would have never stabbed someone in the back, not ever! I can say I dont like such-and-such a person but they do their job well so thats the bottom line.

But back stabbing and sabotage is too often the name of the game in the media with people tying to claw their way upwards over the bodies of the co-workers they have slaughtered, trying to steal clients and so on - and thats bull shit.

When you leave a place they are terrified all your clients will go with you, and I am pleased to say quite a few cancelled their advertising when I left. I had handed them over to another advertising rep, took that person out with me and introduced them and didnt ask any of them to leave because I had - but some of them did -

Before I left I sold ads for the next six months for them, got ad copy in, proofed and ready to go and made sure all my clients were happy and taken care of. And left lists of who was going in where, who to call for what issues - I left a huge paper trail, all someone had to do was step into my slot and maintain client relations. But apparently they couldnt do that --

I am notorious for having a desk buried under reams of paper and back issues, and magazines, and faxes and contracts, and stuff needing to be filed - I spent a month before I left weeding through it all, filing, leaving notes and lists. My desk and files were never in such great order !

I filled out sales sheets for the next six months, with size, orientation, placement, attached all the ad copy and contracts - When I started that job I didnt even have one live client to contact - it was all my hard work that built up the client base I had. And I filled it all in on the computer database - that was bullshit too, our mgr was more concerned with us spending hours filling in info on the data base then he was with us being out in the field selling ads.

He is a total control freak - and having both of us quit at the same time must have made him snap.
I am completely exhausted from all the phone calls and faxes and emails I have received today and answered - but the letters being sent are really uplifting and "feel good making" (sorry when there isnt a phrase in english I lapse into bastardized translated German or something

quote:

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To prove your case you must be able to present sufficient evidence that the statements in fact are:
1) a DELIBERATE misrepresentation of the facts of your employment record
2) that the facts provided intentionally DISTORT the record
3 that the author of such comments knows the comments are untrue, and that the author of such comments is duly charged with the responsibility of providing Human Resources Employee records to prospective employers, and that such author is acting on behalf of your former employer and no-one other
3) that the author of such character reference has conducted themselves with malice of forethought and extreme prejudice and has continued to do so on more than one occasion
4) You must prove:
a) That you have been damaged occupationally, financially, economically, emotionally and psychologically by the erroneous misrepsentation of the facts about your employment record.
b)That damage has occured as a result of a malicious intent
c) and specifically, evidence that you have been denied employment because of the unture and malicious reference they are providing to prospective employers ( this may be hard to do as most prospective employers may hesitate to disclose their reasons unless compelled by a court to state the reason

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Being a disabled person who suffers from chronic fatique and pain it seems like a huge undertaking to me. I was so exhausted from yesterdays uproar and all the correspondence that I have slept for over 12 hours straight and still feel exhausted.

I feel as if I should go to some society for the disabled and get them involved. If they were aware of my disabilities they can hardly trash me for taking a few days off to recupe when I worked evenings and weekends, for a base salary of $500.00 a month.

You're going to need some good solid proof of course that this employer is trashing you when prospective employers call for references.

But given that you've been out of work for a year and suspect that bad references from your previous employer are the reason, and that you have a physical disability that makes getting re-employed more difficult then the average person I would think that its well worth consulting a lawyer.

They tried to pit us against each other, my mgr told me my partner had complained about me being hard to work with, I asked her, she said she hadnt and we confronted the mgr together - She and I started holding "meetings" outside the office and they knew it. We would meet at a local cafe to discuss sales strategies and how to deal with situation at work. Eventually we both left at the same time - and we WERE their sales staff. When we started there were four sales people but in the end it was just us and sales were increasing at an amazing rate with just the two of us - which in itself shows how hard we worked.

When we left it was their entire sales staff leaving and they havent been able to replace us, sales are way down, and they have suffered financial difficulties as a result.

I am going to email my mgr and tell him my employment counselor wants a written reference from him - in fact I may ask my counselor to contact him and ask for it -

When I went into interviews I was quick to bring it up. I indicated that I had left my last position on poor terms and I was doubtful that I would get an unbiased reference. I supplied previous employers and peer references.

I was lucky. My current employer was very accomodating (they did call an employer from 10 years previous as due diligence). The fact that I aced the aptitude test (poorly designed one, but hey it got me a job) also helped.

It's amazing how many people will put their former boss's contact information on their references without CALLING their former boss first and asking them whether they would be willing to give them a good reference.