Devin Silvernail, 21, used to be a “smile-maker” for Washington Mutual—until the sub-prime mortgage mess happened. After that, Washington Mutual became a much less smiley bank. Then it became another bank altogether. At which point Devin lost his job.

DevinS.jpgI was among the masses of WaMu employees to be laid off. I got the axe on the last day of 2008.

I used to run an employee recognition program. It was pretty big. It was a monthly program for all eligible retail bank employees (28,000 people). The long and short of it is that I gave awesome people awards. I would send communications from the Smile Maker Team daily, and laugh a bit internally every time I used that signature. It was pretty great.

Well, then the FDIC decided to take us over and hand the bank off to Chase… that was a pretty glum day. I remember having the day off and logging into my work email and finding out. After 20 minutes of “Oh, fucks” I proceeded to go out and get drunk.

It took them a few months before they found my program. It was only about a year old, so it was sort of hidden from the slick Chase assholes in their fancy suits. Holy shit, though, when they found it, they found it. Of course Chase already had a program. They didn’t need me. They didn’t even need my larger team, or department for that matter. Closing things down was swift and before I knew it I was out of there.

After this really shitty event I decided to leave Seattle for a while. I traversed the west coast for two weeks. I went down to San Francisco and Oakand. I just forgot that I needed a job. I forgot that Seattle existed. All I knew is that I would be heading north in the near future. It was an amazing experience. I lived out of my backpack and the kindness of strangers (most of whom were in the same boat as me). I ended up hitch-hiking back to Seattle in a matter of two days. I made my way up the 101. I almost thought about disappearing to San Francisco or Arcata forever.

Since my return I have been looking for and applying to jobs like crazy. I have probably submitted resumes and such about 40 times. Hell, I even applied for a job as a personal financial rep (which is like many tiers below where I worked) at a WaMu branch, only to be turned away because my skills “didn’t match the position.” Apparently my Sr. Executive references did not help. I am still spending my days applying for jobs. I applied for unemployment. (No severance package for me!) I am living off ramen. I have started re-playing Halflife2. (Being broke means not much going out.) I rearranged the furniture in my apartment and I am walking everywhere. (Yay for not having money for a bus pass!) I applied for my FAFSA. I need to finish school.

The other day I got my first unemployment paycheck. I put most of it toward debt and groceries. I took $20 out for fun. I went to a show at Neumos and got coffee at Vivace for the first time in quite a while.

Oh, and yes I am applying to jobs as we speak. But taking a break to rant feels good. Thanks.

Devin

Have an unemployment story to share? Write to jobless@thestranger.com.

Eli Sanders was The Stranger's associate editor. His book, "While the City Slept," was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. He once did this and once won...

31 replies on “Notes from the Unemployment Line”

  2. I know how tough it is to find yourself unemployed at the same time everybody and their brother is out of work too… but. When you have one of those jobs that is, you know, extraneous? Not exactly a core function? I’m just saying that one probably shouldn’t plan on staying in the same position for a very long time if that position doesn’t involve actually making the donuts, or isn’t vital to the people who do make the donuts.

    Maybe the upside is that when you do finally find a job in this lousy economy it will very likely be doing something that absolutely has to get done. Yay? Or not. Good luck.

  3. It’s easy to blame JP Morgan Chase for what has happened to so many WaMu folks, but it’s the management that ran the company into the ground. The Board and Killinger are the real culprits, but of course they will all land on their feet.

    WaMu was a great corporate citizen and a fun place to work for many (I did consulting work with them from 2001-2003, and it seemed like generally a great environment).

    Unfortunately, the organization had been destroying itself from the inside out for years. Wall Street knew there would eventually be problems — the stock was always valued at a lower multiple than many of its peers. In 2003 WaMu was writing subprime, ALT-A, and LowDoc loans as fast as it could, and ultimately those decisions caught up with it.

  5. I’m curious … In the few months between WaMu shitting the bed and Chase figuring out that you existed, did you continue to send out emails from the Smile Maker Team, or did you try to stay below the radar for as long as you could?

    Good luck, Devin!

  8. @2, 7: C’mon, guys, he worked for HR. You know, that department that, among other things, tries to make the office a place where it doesn’t totally suck to work. Maybe the benefits of “smile making” don’t look all that impressive on a balance sheet, but creating a good work environment is part of a sound business strategy.

  9. Most people in most HR departments are expendable, Greg. I mean, why is there a need to announce that someone did a good job? If they are competent, they know they did a good job. If they are competent, they know which of their peers is doing a good job. The position exists to help the incompetent be more aware of what’s going on around them. Harsh, I know, but true. It’s why as organizations grow larger they become ever more inefficient.

  10. What’s with all of these people losing their jobs and then traveling up and down the coast? This is at least the third such story I can remember reading like that in this series. Is this a natural response or something? I did something much milder when I quit my last job, but if I was facing no severance and hoping for unemployment to fund a job search I sure as hell wouldn’t be road tripping the west coast.

  12. @Greg- Not to be a dick or anything, but “smile making” emails make me dislike work. If my boss can’t be bothered to notice that I did a good job, some grinning jackass from HR isn’t going to make me happy with a novelty balloon.

  14. >>Hell, I even applied for a job as a personal financial rep (which is like many tiers below where I worked) at a WaMu branch, only to be turned away because my skills “didn’t match the position.”

    I found this a bit offensive, as one who held one of those lower tier positions, who has a college degree who is good at that position. It isn’t a pity short term, fall back position but a real job. Like all jobs, there are good and bad people in it, skilled and less skilled. But for the most part, it wasn’t just people doing a job because that was the extent of their skill level. I did it because I was able to interact with people every day and they paid me a lot better than a lot of jobs (even those neat ones in Downtown). Just because you worked in a corporate office doesn’t mean those skills automatically qualify you for a financial representative position.

    Best of luck to you; I have tons of friends in the exact same boat as you. I honestly hope it all works out.

  15. Just a quick note from the other side: I had to lay off someone this morning. First time I’ve ever done it. It was awful. I cried. I haven’t gotten anything accomplished since. Sorry to everyone on both sides these days.

  16. Chase is pretty dickish…I know more than one person who has left Chase/WaMu because Chase is in the habit of prioritizing transactions to their benefit regardless of the timing of the transactions. In other words, if you make a $20 transaction on the 2nd, and a $30 transaction on the 3rd when you have $62 in the bank, (enough to cover those transactions), but then are forced to go into overdraft with a $80 transaction on the 4th, Chase frequently will put the $80 payment through first thus putting you into overdraft immediately and ringing up THREE overdraft fees instead of the one fee that would be justified. Yes, I know all banks do this sometimes, intentionally or not, and the consumer shouldn’t be going into OD, but Chase seems to be doing this as SOP to generate a lot of money for themselves.

  18. >>What’s with all of these people losing their jobs and then traveling up and down the coast? This is at least the third such story I can remember reading like that in this series. Is this a natural response or something?<<

    I don’t know, but I wouldn’t be surprised. When I lost my job in November, the following week I got drunk in a bar with a friend and after hours of ranting about needing to get out of town, we hopped on a plane that night and flew to New Orleans for four days. Probably the least responsible, most spontaneous thing I’ve ever done, but it was also arguably the greatest. Drinking on Bourbon Street all weekend definitely gave me some perspective on how losing a job was far from the end of the world.

  19. @15 – agreed. A personal financial rep is “like many tiers below” a no degree 21-year old member of the smile making team? It sucks that you lost your job – it does – but no need to diss the financial reps. After all, it’s a bank, a financial institution; not a “smile making” institution.

    @17 – I’m curious if you dislike payday loans. They are definitely usurious and exploitative. But in some situations it’s better to pay $15 to borrow $100 for two weeks, than to have two $30 overdraft charges on your checking account.

  22. You should have applied for UI as soon as you were laid off. You could then have put your benefits on hold while you went traveling around. (An exception to this is if waiting a few months to apply would have increased your base year wages that are used for the UI amount calculations.)

  23. 1)Losing your job can be seriously traumatic and is a leading cause for depression. It’s not uncommon or weird to want to escape for awhile to recover and make plans…also, since many people DON’T get paid vacations or are encouraged to NOT take vacations to further your career, a lot of people NEED a break.

    2)Payday loans are evil and dangerous. Seriously.

  24. Would it be a dick move to quote the dick from “Reality Bites”, Ethan Hawke?
    “Your bravado is embarrassing.”
    Good Luck, Devin.
    I’ve been to a food bank a few times, I know how you feel about the food situation.

  26. @21 – One can cry with empathy for someone else (at least most people can), but it’s also reasonable to feel sad that you’ll miss working with someone you care a lot about and enjoy spending your days with. So yeah, we’re both sad today.

  27. Hey all. Just to clarify. I have tons of respect for PFR’s. This post was edited a bit of course, but basically what I was saying was that I applied for a job in a store when before I was working at a position that was a bit closer to the top.

    Believe me. There are so many people in stores and ECC that I gave awards to that are amazing individuals. I have the greatest amount of respect for these people that go above and beyond every day. THAT is what my job was. I helped recognize people that went above the norm and connected with people as humans while doing an extremely hard job.

    Believe me, there is no offense there. I worked with people from stores as well. I have also done a TON of customer service work. I know how it feels.

    PS yes, I do not have a degree because I am paying my own way through school. Yay for being poor my entire life!

    Take care.

  28. Word to being poor your entire life. Somehow it makes being poor right now a lot easier. Especially since I was living on a know-nothing budget even before this crisis hit.

    Although I did have the good sense to drastically downsize my living situation and move into a tiny ass room rather than a 4 times as big studio that was only $190 more expensive per month. Hooray for a big kitcken and living room. Although the washer/dryer are still coin-operated.

    What scares me about the coming depression is how the crazies, ie liquored-up, gun-toting, republicans, handle the situation. YAY AND BLACKWATER(Xe).

    Seems like these sunny February days would be a good time to start planning your roof-top garden. If you throw a couple of marijuana plants in the middle I doubt the coppers would notice, and we could maintain a self-sustaining Seattle pot crop.

  29. 17: i had the overdraft problem as long as i was at wamu. now that i am part of a credit union, it has yet to happen ONCE and if i do overdraw, i will only owe the money i overdrew plus a $10 fee. compare that to wamu’s $35 per each individual debit and i feel like one of those in denial abused housewives for staying so long.

    20: it’s impossible to get a payday loan when you are a student and your only source of income is financial aid and babysitting jobs. “i’m sorry, but we cannot grant a loan ontop of a loan. can we call your employer to verify when your next $39 check comes in?” uh, no…

  30. Banks don’t need or want the business of people living paycheck to paycheck. They don’t want to get busted for redlining people of little means, but if they can get rid of you with high overdraft fees, all the better.

  31. NEVER WANT AN OVERDRAFT AGAIN? READ ME: Look, this works. I have this on TWO checking accounts, and have never had an overdraft fee. This is what you do: You tell your bank you do NOT want your account to be able to be overdrawn. That’s right. They set your account so you CAN NOT go overdrawn. But, hear this. If you do, you don’t get charged – you’ll just be notified of insignificant funds. Of course, this means you can’t get an extra 20 when you don’t have it, but it beats getting charged 20+ for it. I have Bank of America, and I don’t know if other banks do it, but as far as I know it’s part of the law, and has nothing to do with bank policy. *This may need to be done when initially setting up your account – that’s when I did it.*

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