AUTUMN... now the changes (Part 143s)

AUTUMN... now the changes (Part 143s)

A little recap on Gina...

When it became quite obvious to me that the lady, Letitia, who held the title ”Head Teller“ was anything but that, I came up with a plan. As a long time employee, Trustee and customer favorite, there was no way I was going to be able to remove her from that position. A productivity study that Bret and I had run showed, conclusively, that she was the slowest teller on the line. Her accuracy was OK but she had no leadership skills at all. As Head Teller she should’ve been overseeing her ‘flock’ of tellers but, afraid to speak up she made it difficult to establish lines of communication. I’d had the idea of creating a new position, Chief Clerk, to fill the void and had even spoken to Cara, the senior teller behind her, about taking the position. She surprised me by saying she wanted no part of it and was satisfied by being just a teller. I’d had any number of examples of Gina’s ability to think through problems and come up with solutions so she was my next choice... until Hobie shot it down. It was at the time the bank was making the commitment to using a service bureau to process customer transactions. One of the concerns was in what to do with the two employees whose jobs were being eliminated. Laurie, the bookkeeping (computer?) operator had never done anything but that job in the six years she’d worked for the bank. But, during that time she’d become one of Hobie’s favorites. Sooooo... when Hobie said ”no“ to Gina he immediately suggested Laurie even though she’d never handled customers, money or been in a supervisory position. I was, to put it mildly, upset.

Just by chance, at a regional banking meeting, I was talking with an officer from a similar type bank located about 30 miles to the West of us. He, off handedly, asked if I knew of anyone capable of filling a Head Teller’s position as their long time person was retiring at the end of the year. I immediately thought of Gina and managed to get the two of them together. When the other bank offered her the position but not until sometime around the first of December I became concerned that if word got out about my involvement with the arrangement that it would come back at me. I got Gina to promise not to say anything to anybody about her upcoming resignation or my part in it and to help that situation, had made as little personal contact with her as I could. Now, with the name and address project on the immediate horizon I had to let her know about it and what was expected from her.

Getting back to where I was... I told Bret to get word out to all the tellers and first floor staff for a meeting at 4pm. Trish had been working with me on a benefits problem concerning Gina going back to when her daughter was in the hospital for a medical procedure. The insurance company wouldn’t pay the bill because the daughter had a different last name than Gina’s. Gina and the father had never been married and he hadn’t been involved, in any way, with her or the daughter since the birth. We were trying to get through all the paperwork to get them to pay but without much success. Gina had asked a few times about it but, with little progress on our part, neither of us had met with her recently to discuss the situation. I figured it would be a legitimate reason to meet with her, alone, without raising any questions. I had Trish go to her window to tell her to report to the Board room while I gathered my things concerning the name and address project.

It took a few minutes before I headed upstairs. The quickest way was via the back stairway so I walked through the work area anticipating what it would look like once the new teller machines were delivered. I made the turn for the stairs and as I looked up I saw Gina bounding up towards the landing located half the way to the top. She was wearing a short, dark colored dress and as I peered upwards I caught a few glimpses of white. As soon as she heard my steps behind her she reflexively put her hand across her backside to hold the hem of the dress down... and then turned to see who it was behind her. As soon as she saw it was me she removed her hand and continued on up to the top... with me enjoying the short, but interesting, peeks of white. It was but a short distance to the Board room door and as soon as we entered she turned to look right at me and with this big grin stated ”I had to take care of my panty man“. I know I turned beet red and as I did she kept right on smiling.

After calming down I tried to be as businesslike as I could but it was difficult. It was obvious that she was enjoying the fact that I was uncomfortable. It took a try or two for her to get serious and I went over the hospitalization issue as best I could. Then, it was on to the real reason I wanted to talk with her. She was very surprised that I’d selected her. I explained that it was for two reasons with the first being she was truly the best person for the job. Then I added that it was also a ‘cover’ to hide any thoughts that anyone could have conjured up about her future with the bank. I got the distinct impression that she felt honored by the selection.

After describing the project I went on to tell her that if it went well that I was going to use her to train the other tellers on simulated monetary transactions. Albie had told me that they (the service bureau) would set up a fake bank so that all our tellers could get used to doing regular transactions using deposit tickets and passbooks. I wanted to make use her as much as possible before she left and this was one way of doing it. We ended up taking about twenty minutes and by then it was almost time for the meeting downstairs. When we were getting up from the large, comfortable Boardroom leather chairs that swiveled Gina on a whim, decided to give herself a spin. I started to laugh when I saw her. As she completed one revolution I saw her knees about a foot and a half apart. When she grabbed the table to stop I was less than four feet from her and was close enough to see the front crotch line of her white panties.. She saw where I was looking and as she got up made another ”panty man“ comment that I lost somewhere between then and my Day Timer but it, again, made me blush. To be safe I waited for a minute before leaving the room.

To be continued...