Life at Bell Labs Day to Day Life. Insider Notes on Lucent Technologies and Bell Labs. Money. After Hours. From shopping to entertainment. Day To Day Life The Bell Labs is located ca. 28 miles outside of Manhattan at the rim of the New York City suburban area (the sprawl does not yet extend from Boston to Washington DC, but we are getting there...), i.e. you can get to the city without ever leaving the suburbs. Around the labs, residential areas with middle-class private homes dominate. Murray Hill is part of the town of New Providence, which has something resembling a center in the form of a shopping mall about five minutes by car from the labs (from the main entrance turn right onto Mountain Avenue, then take a left turn to South Street and keep going straight). Here you will find a supermarket, a drugstore, a post office, various restaurants, and laundry facilities. A hairdresser is located on South Street, but several of us prefer to go to the neighboring town Summit. The hairdresser in Summit is called Rocco's and is located on Summit Ave, about 200 m down from the train station. Insider Notes Stockroom: Most of the small things people in the labs need, like tools, chemicals, screws, nuts, CD-ROMS, Floppy Disks, and so on. The system has recently been changed; you are advised to ask your advisor or your secretary for further instructions. Lucent has a Code of Conduct, as do many U.S. companies. Regarding the use of the Internet, you may use e-mail or the for other purposes than business. But be careful. There is a very strict policy against accessing web pages or files that contain hatred or sexually explicit material. In fact, people have been fired for that reason. The policy sometimes changes, so ask your supervisor for the restrictions on using the Internet. None of us had any problems in sending private e-mail or surfing the web. But be aware that every e-mail you send or receive is screened, as is every web page you access. To ensure a minimum amount of privacy, you might want to consider using tools like ssh and PGP. Clothing in the labs is casual as long as you work in the scientific community. Some notes on the salary and the reimbursement of living expenses: Your pay checks are titled reimbursement of living expense. This is not really the case, because your living expenses will be higher than the amount of the paychecks. Especially for people without a diploma (people who do not get the 1,000 DM per month from the Studienstiftung) it is impossible to cover all expenses with the money from Lucent. This becomes even worse if you stay longer than 200 working days (200* $50 = $10,000, the maximum amount paid by Lucent), because then your salary is scaled down to $10,000/(number of working days). Thus it is necessary to bring your own financial resources. Bell Labs sees itself as among the best research facilities in the world. Thus they hire the best people available. 70% of the technical staff at Bell Labs has a PhD degree, so you can expect working with people who know a lot more than you do, and - if you are lucky - can teach you a lot more than you could have learned at an average university in the same amount of time. There are no official working hours. Researchers get paid for the usual 40 hours per week, but most people work far more than that. Even though many researchers work from home, it is expected that you are around during business hours, unless you have a different arrangement with your advisor. If possible, check in advance your colleagues' work schedules. Be aware of the fact that the stay at Bell Labs may be a unique opportunity to improve your scientific career. If you are just interested in any kind of stay in the U.S., Bell Labs is probably the wrong choice. Most people here do see their life as research. As a consultant you are paid per day worked, which means you are not paid if you are ill and at home or if you are on vacation. If you want to extend a weekend or take a week off for a longer trip, check with your supervisor. There are some special holidays such as Thanksgiving (last Thursday and Friday of November) Christmas (12/25 only) New Year Independence Day (07/04) Memorial Day (June) Labor Day (September) which can be used to make longer trips. With a contractor's badge you are generally not allowed to sign people in, i.e. to bring non-Lucent people into the Labs. However, you can (and should) try to get special authorization for signing people in. To do so, you need your supervisor to check a field on the badge application form, which then results in a V printed on the badge. Since the bading process is about to change, this information may be outdated by the time you arrive. Murray Hill has a library (above the cafeteria), which features many journals, but is in certain fields poorly equipped with regard to textbooks and conference proceedings. Consider bringing essential books. If you feel like getting coffee, there is an espresso vendor next to the cafeteria, which supplies good coffee and lattes. After hours, there are machines (e.g. by the stockroom in the fifth floor, where you can also get sandwiches (yuck) and ice cream). There are blackboards for ads of all kind. One is located upstairs from the cafeteria, another one is at Cafe Lucent (building 2). In the Cafe there is a TV set, too. Read your contract carefully. For example, you are not insured by the company for any injuries you suffer or any damage you cause. Usually, no one will sue you, if you drop something. But, for example, the Bell Labs medical facility will not treat any of your injuries. Useful Links within the Labs The POST directory, where you look up people LUCID, the internal Bell Labs directory, for example the Event Calendar, where talks are announced. The library search site The internal home page of Bell Labs Discounts for Lucent Employees. Money Here we give you just an idea of how much money you will get and how much money you might spend. Lucent will pay you about $50 per day up to a maximum amount of $10,000. So, if you stay longer than 200 working days, you will be paid less per working day. This will end up in about $1,050 per month. If you already have your diploma the Studienstiftung will pay you a scholarship of about 1,000 DM/month (for a duration of 10 months at maximum). If your Diploma is still ahead you will just get your normal scholarship. In both cases the Studienstiftung will pay the expenses for one flight (round trip). Expenses: The first salary check from Lucent is due after 4-6 weeks; in order to get started you need a lot of extra money (about $3000). Rent: Room (usually furnished, shared kitchen and bathroom): $450 - $600 per month Apartment: >$800 per month Ask for additional utility costs (central air conditioning, oil, etc.). $50 per month should be acceptable. Car: Used cars can be obtained from $1,000 - $3,000. Car repairs can never be ruled out and may turn out to be expensive. But if you prefer new cars and money just isn't a problem consider buying a new one in America. There is no import tax on your car if you lived for a year in the U.S. and you owned that car for at least half a year in the U.S. Look up the "Car Go Home Story". Car insurance(e.g. State Farm or AllState): appr. $800 per year (if you are under 25, then double that!) Gas: 1.25$ per gallon Lunch (Cafeteria): approx. $3 - $6 per day Telephone: U.S. to Germany: $0.12 per minute to Germany with pre-paid telephone cards (but connection fee !!!) or subscribe to AT&T World Wide Savings -> $0.20. per min. There is also the New Jersey exclusive phone cards: connection fee is $1, $0.06 per minute. You can buy these phone cards e.g. at Exxon gas stations. Germany to U.S. Try e.g. Otelo or look it up at Teletarif Groceries: a little bit more expensive than in Germany (but: COUPONS and preferred customer cards save money!!!) Postal services (airmail to Germany): Postcard $0.50 Letter $0.60 Inexpensive are e.g. CD's, apparel, sporting goods, drugstore articles and bikes Bank: on the premises is the Summit Bank, where you can open a checking account free of charge (as long as there is a certain minimum amount on the account). This makes it possible to cash your paychecks. Credit cards: Almost everything is payable with MasterCard or VISA. If you open a bank account, you will most probably get a debit card, which is just like a credit card, except that purchases are deduced directly from your account and not billed once a month. Unfortunately, you cannot expect to get a real credit card in the U.S. Back to the top. Back to the main page.