This story is 'bout a guy named Alex who had completed his service in the Army: Alex's POV: When I completed my national service in the Army,I looked round for a job which would enable me to carry on with my studies.My ambition was to become a chartered accountant,but I had been forced to interrupt my training to fulfill my national service obligation. I asked all my friends and relatives to let me know if they heard of a suitable job for a would-be chartered accountant.Then,one evening my father showed me an advertisement tucked away in the SITUATIONS VACANT column of a national newspaper.The wording of the advertisement intrigued me.It said,‘Internal auditor wanted.Previous experience not essential.Must he adaptable,accurate and with plenty of common sense.Experience as interviewer/interrogator useful’ I couldn't quite see why an auditor should need to have interviewing skills but I sent in my application nevertheless.Three days later,I was invited to an interview at which an elderly man explained the work.‘We audit retail sales systems,’ he explained.‘Our job is to check that money is handled efficiently and honestly in large stores.’ He mentioned several well-known stores and said that they were customers.‘You'll have to check till rolls,receipt books and other documents.If you come across any, ah,discrepancies, you may have to interview the person concerned, although we do have a man who specializes in this but sometimes... Well,sometimes we have so much work that a second interviewer would help.’ The salary was excellent.I was offered the job and I accepted gladly.That was when my troubles started.I discovered that the main function of our company was to catch shop assistants who were cheating their employers.The work was done in stages.First of all,we sent a team of men and women to a large town or city.Their was job was to visit large stores,explain the services offered by our company,persuade stores to sign a contract,and then move on to the next city.Our company charged each store a purely nominal fee.We made our profit by stipulating that we would retain half of any money recovered from dishonest employees.Since a store manager rarely expected us to recover any money,he invariably agreed to this clause in the contract. The second stage was a crucial one.A team of trained shoppers visited the store,bought goods and immediately made out reports.They worked in a systematic way.First,one of our women shoppers would go to a counter,buy something for,say,$23.40 and hand the assistant $30.The shopper then stood by the cash register to make sure that the money was correctly ‘rung up’ on the register.As soon as the shopper left the store,she completed a report,describing the assistant and exactly what she bought.The description included details of jewellery,clothes,shoes (if visible),scars (if any),etc.A second shopper was waiting near the same counter.When the first one left,she would buy something for,say,$17.95,and pay with 2 ten-dollar notes.Next came our third shopper who chose something costing,say,$30 and paid with 2 ten-dollar notes and 2 five-dollar notes.The third shopper always turned away and left before the assistant could walk to the cash register.Thus,the assistant had an opportunity to keep some or all money since no change was needed. Goods bought at each store was returned to the store,wrapped and unopened.The ‘auditing’ phase of the work began after the store closed.The manager opened the cash register and handed the till roll to me.Using the reports prepared by the shoppers,I looked for this succession of amounts on the till roll: 23.40 17.95 30.00 The times on this reports showed me roughly where to look on the roll.Alas, what I too often say was this: 23.40 17.95 10.00 We could see at once that the assistant had pocketed 20 dollars.The case was then handed over to our ace interrogator. I stayed with the company for nearly 2 years.Then,my conscience began to worry me, so I moved on to less interesting work in the office of a large firm of chartered accountants. THE END •I know it's hella long,but I just wanted to share this story.I hope you guys like it.Toodles!??