12 Sept 2017
Terrible rudeness
Anonymous employee
Jobcentre Plus Reviews
3.3
60% would recommend to a friend
42% positive business outlook
Jobcentre Plus has an employee rating of 3.3 out of 5 stars, based on 97 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Jobcentre Plus employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Government and public administration industry (3.6 stars).
Reviews by job title
97 reviews
3.0
17 Dec 2022
Fast paced, insane, not for the faint-hearted
Former employee, more than 1 year
London, England
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook
Pros
If you like work that will keep you on your toes, work on the frontline in a Jobcentre. It differs from office to office but in my experience, working in Willesden and Harlesden primarily, it was very lively. It’s great fun because you never have time to be bored, and the people on the most part are great - I never thought I’d have a ‘work family’ and ‘work wife’ etc but I really did here. I trusted these people with my life - you need to at times. Working with the public can be amazing too, you really have the opportunity to change lives. I enjoyed this as a gateway into the civil service and I also found the interview process tremendously easy. This was my first ever job interview and I scored 25/28 , then when I left for study break and had to reinterview I scored a full 28/28. As long as you have basic comprehension and common sense you will ace the interviews. It’s also a great place for working class parents who need a job that pays decent while allowing flexibility around families.
Cons
All those positives about it being lively, and the staff, and working with the public - can all be flipped too. It can sometimes be unreasonably busy and things go into complete meltdown. For example if a work coach or two call in sick and you have to cover all their appointments on top of your own. Sometimes a ‘10 minute appointment’ can also turn into an hour if the person has specific needs or requires help with something which has a huge knock-on effect for your own workload and your colleagues’. The public can be lovely as mentioned, but you do et that 5% who ruin it for the others. One man tried to kill my friend for absolutely no reason (he was just insane I guess). One staff member got chased at knifepoint (she deserved it in fairness, horrible woman). One customer also threatened to wait for me after work and stab me to death because I asked him what time his appointment was. But security are generally pretty good and some risked their lives in front of their eyes. It can be dangerous in summary but I find if you treat people with respect you get it back - although there are always loose cannons you can’t predict. Also completely different topic but management is awful. They are seen as a common enemy among staff in most cases. You get the odd good one but most are playing office politics or have been moved around offices because of complaints. DWP never actually disciplines or fires bad managers, they just move them somewhere new until that place gets sick and complains about there behaviour too, then the cycle goes on.
3.0
14 Jul 2021
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook
Pros
There is some flexibility with work times and the pay is stable. Which is not so normal these days
Cons
The entire system is poorly run. Information is haphazard and fleeting. Things seem to be organized with no rhyme or reason. Not sure if it is my autism or their lack of organisation but regardless it seems nobody has any clue what there actually supposed to do. Just mindlessly drifting from one rule to the next without any awareness. Maybe the best example of double think I've ran into in my life. Oh and they make you engage in 3 months of training which is completely useless. My theory is it's a form of psychological torture ment to make you believe the job is harder then it actually is and therfore to distance us from our claimants... Which they call customers. (Very strange)
Viewing 1 - 3 of 97 Reviews
