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Anyone work at Atari?

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TechSmith polycounter lvl 18
HIya guys. I'm back on the job hunt in Washington. My old job was a bust, and I was thankfully let go. However I found that Atari is hiring some "Technical Support Representatives". It basicly sounds like call center work, but that's right up my alley. Anyone here know anything about working the working conditions there?

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  • Mark Dygert
    Yup, this is where I work. We are hiring temp work for the holiday rush. At the most it might last until Feb.

    Now for the bad news. (as if a short contract wasn't bad enough)
    I think they filled all the open slots already last week. I will check tomorrow. You might want to send me your resume "markd at atari.com" so I can forward it on, IF they are still looking to hire.

    In the past for a lucky few temps (1 per year) it has stretched to a full time position. With this year more about corporate restructure I am not sure if they are looking to hire from the temp pool this year. We have had a perm people leave and their postions are not filled, I am not sure if they plan to hire for those slots or not. I know of one other person that might be leaving very soon so it would be good to get me your res ASAP espcially if you are looking for a full time position.

    On Dec 26th we work 10hr days 7 days a week, until the madness calms down. Normally in mid January. So far from the temps I have talked to they are entry lvl at best and are in for some trouble. Most of them don't have call center experince and are not much more than power gamers.

    I haven't been on the phones for a while but I hear the biggest call generator is Path Of Neo. Most of the calls we get are people trying to run games on "integrated graphics chips", sorry requirements not met. Pretty fluffy support for the most part, sometimes it can stretch to something more technical so they like to grill you pretty good from what I hear.

    I have worked at Atari since 2001 and I like it. 11 months out of the year everything is relaxed and light hearted. Durring the summer it is not uncommon for 60 calls to trickle in over 8 hours. Spread that across 10 techs and you have a pretty relaxed work enviroment. On the flip side 2 years ago I took 60-80 calls a day for 7 days durring the holiday rush. My brain was mush...

    Good luck (if I didn't scare you away) =P

    I also hear that Comcast and Verizon are hiring. I think you might live close to the Comcast center? I hear they are pretty strict and take a TON more calls than we do at Atari. The subject matter is less than exciting and I think Atari is the only one out of the three that encourages you to play games at work.
  • TechSmith
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    TechSmith polycounter lvl 18
    Just tried to email you and got a bounce. The old "The recipient name is not recognized" error. markd "at" atari.com, right?
    Should I try to send it to the vigville addy?
  • TechSmith
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    TechSmith polycounter lvl 18
    Well, I sent one to your vigville addy. So check your mail.
  • Mark Dygert
    Arg, it's mdygert at atari.com no need to send it again I already passed it on =)

    When we moved offices down stairs they disabled the old HE server that would forward the "first name first letter of the last name, email accounts". Pitty that is gone, good thing they forgot to tell us! Some of us used those addy's in our email sigs to customers... Time to kick skippy in the nuts.

    Also we have our own homebrew database, its kind of "special".

  • TechSmith
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    TechSmith polycounter lvl 18
    Well I hope they contact me soon. I Have another interview tomorrow morning. It's doing tech support for a company in Kirkland, but not as much fun. I think I would have much more in common with the people working at Atari than some office IT job.
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