They do a really good job selling you the job in the interview and induction stage but once you're out working you soon realise you have been sold a lie.
To get work you have to phone the office to see if they have any hours for you so you never know when you will be working one day from the next. Throughout September we were told we were not allowed to book a single day off, not even on the weekend, because they needed you, even if you were only part-time. If you attempt to take a day off they will hound you on the phone and persistently keep ringing you with the threat of you losing your job if you don't reply. The people in the office giving you the hours couldn't care less about your health and safety, they will send you to work with no sleep and tell you "we've all done it, you've just got to suck it up and get on with it".
While they admit that the working hours are unsocial, prepare to live on night buses, they don't explain just how many they will have you working and they have unattainable ideas of the hours you should be doing. On one occasion I was working in Maidstone from 8am to 9pm and received a phone call asking if I wanted to work in London from 10pm-3am, I was already set to work 8am-9pm the next day, but when I told them there would be no way for me to get home and get a sufficient amount of sleep to prepare for the next day, I was told I had to be more committed to the company and find a way next time.
While some of the crew chiefs were professional and nice guys to work with, some really are sound blokes and make the day a lot easier, most were lazy and couldn't lead the crew properly. On one occasion the crew chief left me and two other new crew members on a big job with no extra help just so he could go to the cinema promising us we'd get extra pay, we never did. On another occasion a crew chief left me, on my third day, constructing a massive set at Olympia so he could have an "extra long lunch" and when I phoned him to get him to sort out a major issue another crew had with his work, he ignored my calls.
I had a very serious family tragedy while working at Gallow and told them I wouldn't be working for a bit to help my family get through it, initially they were caring but after a week they kept emailing me and phoning me despite me making them aware of my situation. This led me to throwing in the job and getting away from the vile company. I know people who work for other event crew companies and while they may pay slightly less, they have had far better experiences than I had with Gallow.
One of my fellow event crew summed up working at Gallow perfectly, "people just work here to find out what they want to actually do with their lives and the rest are thick".
