Business Controller: Business Runs YOU!

[witch]

I have a problem with sims getting paid twice every hour. I have these hacks.


smartercashier.package 9/3/06
waiterfix.package 3/5/06
businessrunsyou.package 5/4/06  +skillinator et al
nolamehires.package 13/3/06
noreassign.package 19/3/06

NON-AWESOME_Hacks
MQ_Open_Closed_Sign_Fairly_Paid_Regulator.package 6/4/06
nopodiumphonecalls.package 4/5/06

The ching ching with the money floating upwards happens so fast, is there any way I can generate an error log at that time that would be of any use?

[J. M. Pescado]

Hmm. Can't imagine why you'd be getting paid twice an hour, unless you somehow have a duplicate employee controller, or the Merolian Time Manipulator. None of which concerns Business Runs You.

[Marvin Kosh]

I have a problem with sims getting paid twice every hour.

The ching ching with the money floating upwards happens so fast, is there any way I can generate an error log at that time that would be of any use?

Is it all employees or just one in particular?  The reason I ask is that a while ago I noticed that there is an additional ching ching at the bar if you have a non-controllable tending it.  It's the same pay that you get if you tend a bar on a non-owned community lot (this functionality was introduced in the first expansion pack as a way of letting students earn a little extra cash) when it usually comes up every 12 sim minutes.

However, because this functionality is supposed to be disabled on an owned community lot, you can get an extra ching which goes straight into the business funds, because it wasn't intended to seek out a specific Sim and pay them instead of the household funds.

Another possibility, with a bar at least, is that you're seeing the customer pay for their drink.  Provided your customers aren't lured away by other attractions, a bar can be a good way to make extra money in a place which already charges for entry.

[witch]

No, the only businesses so far have been retail, it happens on both home and community lots. I emptied all hacks except JM's at one point and it was still happening. It happens to all employees hourly, two lots of the same amount float up.

How do I trigger a log file?

[Marvin Kosh]

All you need to do to generate a log is enter debugging mode and shift-click an object on the lot to pop up the Force Error option.

Just pick Cancel when the error message pops up, but take note of the filename that the error log has been saved to - you should find it in My Documents/EA Games/The Sims 2/Logs/ and since it will be the most recent log created, it will have the latest modified timestamp in that directory.

[J. M. Pescado]

Forcing an error tends not to be too instructive if nothing is wrong with the errored object.

[witch]

Yeah, I'm not getting an error popping up so I can create a logfile, so everything seems to be working OK. I'll keep monitoring and see if I can even get a screen dump when the staff get paid..

Edit:
OK. The scenario is a home business selling plants and flowers. The only two sims currently under control of business uses you are Rocky, the paid employee as cashier and the owner who is currently being salesperson. Rocky is the only paid employee of the business.

I managed to catch a screen dump of the two amounts floating up. You can see $42 by Rocky and the same on the far right under the business UI.



Edit last: OK I finally worked it out. I checked the money. In fact the $42 is being deducted from the family balance - the OTHER $42 I can see on the right is coming off the business cash flow amount. It's not two separate amounts but just the same amout being dealt with in two places. Phew. Never mind, I get there in the end!

[pioupiou]

For me your screenshot is perfectly normal : +42 being paid to the cashier and -42 being deducted from the family funds.
It's always like that in my game since I have installed OFB...
Or do I miss something in your shot and explanations ?
Pioupiou

[J. M. Pescado]

* J. M. Pescado points and laughs.

[witch]

* J. M. Pescado points and laughs.

Yeah. cheers mate.

K'n I buy ya a beer?   

[ZephyrZodiac]

Any chance of getting something done about the stupid message you get when a sim moves neighbourhoods and tries to call to check on his businesses?  Or the way when you demote a manager, you have to actually cut his pay before promoting someone else and raising their wages?  After all, in a properly run modern business, there would be a pay scale which would be automatically applied!  And sometimes you don't want to fire the manager, just demote them since they aren't really very good at managing!

[J. M. Pescado]

Any chance of getting something done about the stupid message you get when a sim moves neighbourhoods and tries to call to check on his businesses?

What stupid message?

Or the way when you demote a manager, you have to actually cut his pay before promoting someone else and raising their wages?  After all, in a properly run modern business, there would be a pay scale which would be automatically applied!  And sometimes you don't want to fire the manager, just demote them since they aren't really very good at managing!

I could implement QC-0 pay scaling, sort of like how Monique's whatzit tries to make everyone "fairly paid" (which, of course, I think is simply outrageous: How do you expect to run a profitable sweatshop like that?!?). Then employees will automatically be paid the minimum possible wage that they'll accept without quitting.

[dadditude]

I could implement QC-0 pay scaling, sort of like how Monique's whatzit tries to make everyone "fairly paid" (which, of course, I think is simply outrageous: How do you expect to run a profitable sweatshop like that?!?). Then employees will automatically be paid the minimum possible wage that they'll accept without quitting.

That would be perfect!

[witch]

I could implement QC-0 pay scaling, sort of like how Monique's whatzit tries to make everyone "fairly paid" (which, of course, I think is simply outrageous: How do you expect to run a profitable sweatshop like that?!?). Then employees will automatically be paid the minimum possible wage that they'll accept without quitting.

That would be perfect!

I second that notion! Even if sims are good at retail, $48 an hour or more is ludicrous. Retail is not a highly paid job. Though if the prices in the sim shops rise, so should the sim minimum wage, as presumably the business is then higher class and attracting more revenue.

I'm never sure how low I can pay sims before they quit (it's a pain getting new staff and dressing them etc etc.) - because I don't want them to quit so I've been using the fair wages sign - but those wages aren't fair, they're OTT.

[J. M. Pescado]

Well, if you want less ludicrous wage demands, you might try "Relevant Wages". This greatly reduces the influence of skills on wages paid (since many skills are entirely useless in a business). Each badge-level otherwise seems to jack up a sim's wage demand by $5: Relevant wages makes it so only relevant badges affect this.

The wages are still pretty high, but then you figure it also costs $40 for a pizza. This produces the "Fairly Paid" wage, which is not necessarily the QC0 wage. For a random employee that doesn't really know the business owner, the "Fair" wage is QC0, but for better relation levels, you can get QC0 wages as low as the "Very Underpaid" mark. Ridiculously Underpaid seems to produce a minimum of about 3%, even with every other factor in your favor (max STR/LTR, plat mood), and in practice, this doesn't seem likely to actually trigger if you keep them from idling much.

[starrling]

*protects lips

Um... JM?  For some reason my BRU is all goobered up.  The last time I used it (probably a couple months ago-haven't been playing businesses lately) I was able to get "be a salesperson" or something like that along with cashier and restock.  Now I only get the  cashier and restock options.  I read all the posts above, got the new phone hack (just in case that was it), took out all download's except MATY and still nothing.  Any ideas?  I do have the Fam Fun Pack but that's about all that's different, I think.  Help, please? 

[jsalemi]

*protects lips

Um... JM?  For some reason my BRU is all goobered up.  The last time I used it (probably a couple months ago-haven't been playing businesses lately) I was able to get "be a salesperson" or something like that along with cashier and restock.  Now I only get the  cashier and restock options.  I read all the posts above, got the new phone hack (just in case that was it), took out all download's except MATY and still nothing.  Any ideas?  I do have the Fam Fun Pack but that's about all that's different, I think.  Help, please? 

Does the sim in question have a gold sales badge?  The "be salesman" will only show up for sims with gold level sales badges.

[starrling]

OMG how stupid can I be.  Of course.  I'm not using cheats this time so I forgot about that important part.   

Thanks SO much!

[pcgeekri]

Hellllo everyone,

The main thing is I wish someone would modify how much energy is consumed on dazzling customers.  My manger's scenario is like this, dazzle about 3 or 4 times then this mod has him caffeinate because his  energy is halfway down.  And this becomes the vicious cycle. 

Thanks for any help,

Pcgeekri

[J. M. Pescado]

The main thing is I wish someone would modify how much energy is consumed on dazzling customers.  My manger's scenario is like this, dazzle about 3 or 4 times then this mod has him caffeinate because his  energy is halfway down.  And this becomes the vicious cycle.

That's not a vicious cycle. That's a BUSINESS cycle. If you have him running sales, that's what sales is supposed to *DO*. How else do you expect to make a profit? Clearly if he's choosing Dazzle, it's because your goods aren't peddling from a mere Hard Sell. Thus it bumps to the next level of action in an attempt to sell that product, and that is Dazzle.

Is it WORKING? Is that merchandise MOVING? If so, then that's what's supposed to happen. The energy thing? Cost of business.

[jsalemi]

The main thing is I wish someone would modify how much energy is consumed on dazzling customers.  My manger's scenario is like this, dazzle about 3 or 4 times then this mod has him caffeinate because his  energy is halfway down.  And this becomes the vicious cycle. 

Alternatively, you could get TwoJeff's static energy statue  (http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php?topic=1193.0) and stick it on the business lot -- that'll keep everyones energy from dropping.  If you really want to sell to beat the devil, check out Squinge's hacks/mods over on insimenator.net -- he's got everything from a hack that keeps dazzle from draining energy to a picture you can put on the business lot that keeps all motives raised (which is handy for sims that have multiple businesses and want a reasonable chance of running all of them in one day ).

[pcgeekri]

Me so sorry Pescado,

The latest version of Microtastics fixed all the problems in my business lot everytihing works great, so well in fact that I don't need a mod to reduce the energy consumption when dazzle is used.

Thanks everyone for your help,

Pcgeekri

[J. M. Pescado]

The Dazzle Energy cost really shouldn't be considered a "bad" thing, it should just be regarded as "cost of business". Since Macrotastics is perfectly capable of handling this cost, there is no reason to cheat.

[idtaminger]

I so want this in my game, but goodness, did you really have to make the mesh a giant sickle and hammer? I mean, wouldn't it have been sufficient to have a tiny desk ornament or something. It just seems very odd that my capitalist entrepreneur sim would have a giant SU symbol in their business. Plus, it totally ruins my design schemes. I'm terribly picky about good design.

Perhaps you could replace the mesh w/ something simple, like a Maxis painting (I really like the small white modern one that came w/ofb)? Please? Pretty please?

[J. M. Pescado]

Perhaps you could replace the mesh w/ something simple, like a Maxis painting (I really like the small white modern one that came w/ofb)? Please? Pretty please?

I'm not going to replace the mesh, but I might make it morphable in-game into something. What objects do you suggest as morphs?