Apologies if this is rambly/bad formatting. I’m writing this on my phone at midnight.
I live in Australia and work for Woolworths. I started about a month ago on June 16.
My best friend who has worked there for 6 or 7 years helped me get the job. Though he works at another store(Store B), he got me this job at one of his old stores(Store A).
I enjoyed working there (Store A) but was only getting a guaranteed 10-15 hours a week with the occasional early call in. My friend has the ear of his Assistant Store Manager (Store B) and got me a couple shifts with him. This was bolstering my hours to about 30-35 a week.
I always asked my Department Manager/Direct Boss at Store A if I could do a shift at Store B, and eventually he asked if I just wanted to transfer there. I told him this wasn’t necessary and that I enjoyed the work at Store A. He dropped it after that.
A couple days later my Friend went into Store A to do some shopping, he met up with my Department Manager and they started chatting, they agreed it would be best for me to transfer stores, they put the transfer request through and it was official as of July 18th.
I told my Department Manager from Store A I would finish out my roster there and we agreed on a system where I would send him my roster from Store B and I could pick up some extra shifts at Store A when I was free.
The first night I was free was tonight. I went in to Store A where I was greeted by the Store Manager. She proceeded to aggressively tell me that the transfer did not go through her, and I needed to transfer back and it wasn’t allowed because I have only been with the company for a month. I sort of laughed at her because I thought she was joking at first. She then hit me with the old why are you laughing? I haven’t said anything funny.
Anyways I’ve done my research and there is nothing in my contract or the Woolworths employee agreement about store transfers. Just some loosely worded guidelines on a website.
I’m fairly certain she has no recourse, I’ve transferred to a whole new “Area” so she would have to get in contact with some higher ups for something as petty as a level 1 employee store transfer. She might write a strongly worded email to my new store manager lol
Final thoughts: Woolworths management communication is garbage apparently. Also can she really hold me responsible for what seems to be a miscommunication in management
If anyone sees this, let me know if you want an update if anything actually happens
TLDR: transferred to a new store, old boss got mad and is trying to tell me I need to come back