Why I want to work at enterprise despite reading this board

I'm a recent college grad. I live an rural area where it is VERY cheap to live. To sum it up, rent is $300 a month (share a three bedroom apartment with a roommate), car insurance is $65, electricity my share on average comes to $20, internet/television is $45 and cell phone $50. That's only $480 a month in bills. There are NO jobs here at all, a downfall of the low cost of living I suppose. After taxes and bills I will still have at least $1800 a month for food/clothes/entertainment/savings. The 31K is not an issue.

I have a lot of down time. I've been unemployed for about two months now and spend my days usually reading, working out or playing basketball. I grew up in San Diego where there is a ton to do so out here I'm struggling to fill my idle time to begin with. Long hours are not an issue.

As for washing cars or whatever, I'm not scared of physical labor in any way. Might not be fun to do in a suit, but outside of that I don't care.

Anything else I am missing? My plan is to do this for at least a year, save some money and move back to a real city. And who knows, I might like enterprise and transfer to another branch.

I withdrew myself from the interview process, didn't want to work for a company which had so much negative connotations for it.

I never worked there, but from reading around here for a day or two, this is what i got out of it.

Long hours was a huge complaint, because people had no time after work to have a social life. The clencher was that some unscrupulous managers might erase overtime hours to keep their branch profits high.

Washing cars, not something I was tripping about either, since that was covered during the interviews so I expected it, but people complained about ruined shirts and ties.

Inbreeding, I doubt this happens a lot, maybe you want it to happen too, but some people claim managers slept with naive girls who just got into the company. Ethically I find it wrong, but to every man their own, the girl should be old enough to make her own decision anyway.

There was this whole performance thing, sounded to me like people got promoted based on being nice with the manager. Also selling a lot of CDW with no commission.

I hope this all helps summarize a few things about the site, you can hear about the good things from the recruiters mouth instead, like never laying people off, growth rates, fun and all that goodies, but like I said before I'm just trying to help summarize this site for you, and I have not and never worked for Enterprise.

I don't think you are missing anything. I worked for ERAC for a couple years. Please realize that 95% (if not 99.9%) of everything on this site is true. However if you go in with the right expectations, it sounds like it may be a good fit for your situation.

However, to be honest, it sounds like you are in a pretty boring area. If I were younger and looking for work... I'd move! ;)

what region?
and i've said it before, ERAC is not the worst opportunity
it def sucks, but it does provide a little bit of $$$...just go into realizing that you will be like the other 90% before you that quit and/or got fired

Originally Posted by shook

I'm a recent college grad. I live an rural area where it is VERY cheap to live. To sum it up, rent is $300 a month (share a three bedroom apartment with a roommate), car insurance is $65, electricity my share on average comes to $20, internet/television is $45 and cell phone $50. That's only $480 a month in bills. There are NO jobs here at all, a downfall of the low cost of living I suppose. After taxes and bills I will still have at least $1800 a month for food/clothes/entertainment/savings. The 31K is not an issue.

I have a lot of down time. I've been unemployed for about two months now and spend my days usually reading, working out or playing basketball. I grew up in San Diego where there is a ton to do so out here I'm struggling to fill my idle time to begin with. Long hours are not an issue.

As for washing cars or whatever, I'm not scared of physical labor in any way. Might not be fun to do in a suit, but outside of that I don't care.

Anything else I am missing? My plan is to do this for at least a year, save some money and move back to a real city. And who knows, I might like enterprise and transfer to another branch.

Where is this god forsaken place you live?

Originally Posted by shook

I'm a recent college grad. I live an rural area where it is VERY cheap to live. To sum it up, rent is $300 a month (share a three bedroom apartment with a roommate), car insurance is $65, electricity my share on average comes to $20, internet/television is $45 and cell phone $50. That's only $480 a month in bills. There are NO jobs here at all, a downfall of the low cost of living I suppose. After taxes and bills I will still have at least $1800 a month for food/clothes/entertainment/savings. The 31K is not an issue.

I have a lot of down time. I've been unemployed for about two months now and spend my days usually reading, working out or playing basketball. I grew up in San Diego where there is a ton to do so out here I'm struggling to fill my idle time to begin with. Long hours are not an issue.

As for washing cars or whatever, I'm not scared of physical labor in any way. Might not be fun to do in a suit, but outside of that I don't care.

Anything else I am missing? My plan is to do this for at least a year, save some money and move back to a real city. And who knows, I might like enterprise and transfer to another branch.

That's a very optimistic way of thinking, but Enterprise does factor in the cost of living in it's salary. When I was an MT back in 99, the starting salary was $27,500. I moved to work in the administration building in 2002 and by time I left in 2006 the starting salary was $30k or $31k in NYC. A smaller town, with a cheaper cost of living, the annual salary will be less. $31k in NYC may be equal to $25k somewhere else. That $31k is not across the board. If so, hell, I would've stayed working for Enterprise and moved out of NY. Try to do research on costs of living before you make a final decision. At the end of the day though, when all is said and done, a job (even with Enterprise) is better than no job.

Originally Posted by FridayUnregistered

That's a very optimistic way of thinking, but Enterprise does factor in the cost of living in it's salary. When I was an MT back in 99, the starting salary was $27,500. I moved to work in the administration building in 2002 and by time I left in 2006 the starting salary was $30k or $31k in NYC. A smaller town, with a cheaper cost of living, the annual salary will be less. $31k in NYC may be equal to $25k somewhere else. That $31k is not across the board. If so, hell, I would've stayed working for Enterprise and moved out of NY. Try to do research on costs of living before you make a final decision. At the end of the day though, when all is said and done, a job (even with Enterprise) is better than no job.

I already got the paper work and it is $911 bi-weekly for 40 hours worked a week. If you work 48 hours overtime kicks in and it goes to $1184.28. Which is roughly $30,800.

Originally Posted by shook

I already got the paper work and it is $911 bi-weekly for 40 hours worked a week. If you work 48 hours overtime kicks in and it goes to $1184.28. Which is roughly $30,800.

bro these number are always off some fuggin how...trust those that have gone before you, it will equal out to around 27k word is bond.
and i worked in a super rural area, erac views that as a opportunity to not pay you as much...mark my words it will be 27k

Originally Posted by shook

I already got the paper work and it is $911 bi-weekly for 40 hours worked a week. If you work 48 hours overtime kicks in and it goes to $1184.28. Which is roughly $30,800.

$911 bi-weekly? I agree with another poster. That number doesn't sound right at all. Not for an admittedly small rural town. I can buy that figure in a big city, like NYC or San Francisco or LA, but not Smalltown, USA. But hey, who am I? I'm just a former employee. I don't know what the taxes are like where you are from. Times do change. Good luck regardless!

I worked in a rural area and left about a year ago. I believe they promised at least 31k/year to start. I was working 50-55 hour weeks and after taxes and medical/dental, etc I would clear around 900 every 2 weeks. Breaking it down, I was clearing about 8 bucks and change per hour.

Luckily I left when I was offered a job that paid much better.