Finding part time work

The time had come for me to find a part-time job. I went to the job centre to find out more about how to go about it. The only thing I gleaned from there was that I needed a National Insurance Number. So, first things first: I phoned to get an appointment to apply for a NIN. They asked allsorts of questions and made me an appointment for a week later. They mailed out 15 pages of information, all of which repeated itself over and over again. When I went for the interview it took almost an hour. They photocopied around a dozen various forms of ID: electrical bill, marriage certificate, driver’s licence, passport, birth certificate, student visa, rental agreement, etc. I’m sure I signed my name over twenty times. They had said that I'd need 2 letters from businesses to say that I'm actively looking for a job. I asked about employment in over 30 businesses before I got my 2 letters. Apparently here you don't drop off resumes - you can only apply for jobs that have been advertised and most businesses use employment agencies ( that take a % of every pay cheque) It's a catch 22 situation! After I'd finished applying for the NIN he said that I could have found a job without the number! He said I should hear from them in 3-4 weeks to let me know if my application was accepted or not. I have applied for a couple of jobs and in the next post I will describe the results.