So to start, I’m just gonna say that this is more of a vent outlet for me than anything. I apologize for the long, rambling text walk that will follow and I know that compared to a lot of the stuff on here this is small potatoes so if anyone thinks I’m being a little bitch that’s fine. But I need to get this out (and frankly I have an easier timing screaming problems to the void than to my close ones for whatever reason).
I am 21 years old and I still live with my parents. My only job for the longest time was being a freelance video editor because video editing is my passion, but the problem is freelancing isn’t the most consistent work. This year I’ve been super paranoid about money for many reasons (including wanting to provide more to the household), so I decided to get a “real job.”
Since I can’t drive I looked for jobs I could walk to, and turns out a convenience store only 15 minutes away was hiring. And getting hired only took me a few days, too!
…3 weeks in and I already hate it.
Firstly the job details are laughable. $11 an hour but you get no benefits, you’re expected to work weekends and holidays if needed with no holiday pay, and there’s no scheduled breaks so you just gotta try and squeeze one in when you have downtime. But hey, if you work hard enough they say you’ll get a raise. The store isn’t huge but there’s a lot to do: Shelves, a freezer, a tobacco case, and a cooler to stock, cleaning everything, coffee to refresh, hot food to make and cycle out and of course the registers to man.
My first day was on one of the busiest days of the year (my manager called it a “trial by fire”) and I struggled to keep up with learning what tasks to do and deal with the influx of customers. Despite this in the end I was told I did a good job and I came back a couple days later to work a full (and exhausting) 8 hours. The following day I wake up to a group text where the manager is chewing out everyone (including me, the newbie she had praised days prior) for not doing enough in the store declaring that no extra money (raises, overtime) will be given out going forward and in fact hours may be cut and shifts will be cut from 2 people to 1 person if we didn’t work hardee. What? Things aren’t getting done with 2 people, how do you think dropping it to a single person is gonna help??
The people there are mainly fine. A lot of my co-workers are nice people that are just doing their jobs like I am, though it’s really frustrating how they each tell me how to do things and that I can work my own way before I also get lectured that what I was taught was wrong and get constantly micromanaged.
3 people in particular just rub me the wrong way though. The owner isn’t an awful guy but he solely thinks in business. It’s always about selling, and if you don’t sell he’ll just tell you to do something else and start doing the selling job for you (assuming he doesn’t get on your case for not completing two contradictory tasks simultaneously). Yet despite this he’s also bad at his job, as he’ll have us stock up the entire hot food case with food and brew 4 – 8 pots of coffee that don’t sell and then he’s like “Why are we writing off so much stuff?????” One of my co-workers is a nice person…but she barely works. She’s regularly late and last shift I had with her she spent most of our shift smoking outside or talking to her friends while I was left to cook, clean, and do registers. Hell she even tried to leave early! In the end she even clocked out early and then I got chewed out because the store wasn’t prepared for the next shift! And then my manager. She seems nice, but she’s also kinda two-faced. I mentioned the text before (which similar texts have happened a couple more times) but she also has a tendency to praise my work ethic and then condescendingly explain how to actually do what I’ve been doing. Not to mention my co-workers have straight up told me that she’s more than willing to throw us under the bus if the owner catches wind of something he doesn’t like. (Example: Twice she’s let the garbage get overfilled so ahe tells us to put further garbage in the back room, but the manager doesn’t like that and she’d deny knowing about it if he asked)
Recently a group text was sent out saying everyone had 2 weeks to get their food handler’s permit. Which like, ok yeah I get needing it. We sell a lot of hot food. But that was NEVER mentioned to me prior (and considering it was a group text it implied to me that most of my co-workers didn’t have one either), and they said we had to pay for it ourselves. It was $25 which in the grand scheme of things is not terrible, it just frustrates me that they spring this thing on us suddenly required for the job and expect us to pay for it ourselves.
But what REALLY gets me is how many red flags this set off. Firstly, the reason they wanted us to get them at all was “because COVID is in the past” (my manager’s actual words) then that means the health inspector will be coming around more often. Wait, what?? You didn’t require the permits during a time when good hygiene was at its most important?! And you’re only doing it now because the health inspector is coming around?! Secondly, I did in fact take that course, and the entire time I was going “…we follow very few of these protocols. In fact, a lot of these would be impossible to follow given the layout of the store and how quickly we’re expected to carry out our many tasks.”
Oh yeah, and it turns out they’re cutting hours and shifts anyway because we’re entering a “slow season.” So I guess that initial text about us not working hard was just to scare us into working harder or something when they planned on doing it anyway.
The things to do themselves are not issues. I can do registers, I can clean, I can count till, I can stock, but it’s the expectation and requirement to juggle all these conflicting tasks AND serve customers in a timely fashion AND prepare the store for the next shift that has given me panic attacks at work and outside it. Hell, my co-workers have actively told me about how they have to work 8 – 12 hour shifts and multiple jobs at multiple stores in this chain to live. What the fuck.
I’ve only been here 3 weeks and I already hate it. I want to quit but I’m scared to leave without another job lined up, and I’m struggling to find other jobs. I’ve even expanded my search to work from home (which around me is mainly just call centers) and places I could bus to but still nothing I qualify for. I’m seriously considering trying to push my freelance work more but I’m not I’m scared that’s not gonna work. I’m scared and stressed and I don’t know what else to do.
Again I’m sorry if this is stupid and whiny since this is my first time in this job and I haven’t even been there a month. I know people have gone through worse experiences and you can downvote me into oblivion if need be, but I had to let it out cause I felt like I was gonna burst if I didn’t.