I Have Had Enough.
I have worked at this store for very nearly five years now and in that whole time have I never felt more undervalued, disrespected, angry and stressed as I do currently. I have worked 6-7 day weeks, I have come in on days off on a couple hours sleep to throw freight when we were buried in it. I’ve ditched established plans to work and still none of that made me really consider being done.
A couple years back my Cancer stricken Uncle wanted to take me shopping at a certain store on one of his good days where the cancer or treatment didn’t make him feel like crap. Those days were not the majority. Every single good day he had I was at work. More than a few of those days were meant to be days off. He’d show up at my Mother’s house to find that I had been called to come in and work and would not be meeting him there. Well, he died and we never got to go. Because I was at the STORE NAME REDACTED. Even then I still did not want to leave.
I pride myself on the impression that people have of me that I’ve been told my whole life by nearly everyone I’ve ever met. I am considered an easy-going, polite, kind and friendly person that doesn’t have a problem with anyone. 30 years of life and that is the impression I have given off in all of it yet right now, here I am, such a person, writing a letter so I don’t end up yelling in someone’s face.
Every day now I come into work and there is something. Something that was done wrong, something that wasn’t done. Something that needs to be different or something else needs to be tacked onto the list of things to be done. Nothing is ever good enough. Always another message, always another note, always another complaint.
Based on the fact that STORE NAME REDACTED seemingly wants me to control customers minds so I can force them to buy promotional candy that they don’t want day after day and move at the absolute optimal pace when paying so each transaction only takes a matter of seconds to a minute all while I am zipping around the store at the speed of light so I can clean, and stock freight to their laughably absurd standards I’d say STORE NAME REDACTED wants Superheroes working in their stores. Except they don’t because if they did I wouldn’t have recently been told that it’s not my responsibility to help customers with their FoodStamps/EBT issues. If they wanted such they wouldn’t be trying to force me to keep an important customer service tool such as my Phone in a locker in the back.
“A Phone? What do you need a phone for? How’s that help you do your job?”
Well putting aside the fact that my phone is my direct contact to the people that come first in my life above all else, my Family(FYI the building may say Family on top but that doesn’t make it such) a Cell Phone allows be to help disadvantaged folks who want to shop in our store for something to put in their belly by quickly checking their Food Stamp/EBT balance for them so they can know what they can get. It allows me to help the elderly and Tech-challenged out with the Smart Coupons. Instead of wasting STORE NAME REDACTED’s precious time trying to tell these folks why they can’t just stand in line and sign up right there or argue about what does or does not count on a particular coupon I can just whip out my phone and offer my unused coupons to them and double check item qualifications with a quick scan. If someone has an item that won’t ring up because of a distorted barcode of the system generally just not recognizing it, as is becoming more common, I don’t have to chase down the Manager on Duty to get the always reliable PDT gun so I can get the hidden SKU number, I can just ask the customer where it came from and quickly go snap an image of the home barcode on the shelf and and have what I need.
This company does everything in its power to make this place a worse place to work. Every little thing employees do to make it more tolerable be it the music playing, the exact clothes worn,the way we choose to bundle the money in our registers or even the easy access to the restroom they strip away. At this point I’m genuinely thinking I’ll soon be told I have to use the dinky Company provided box cutter instead of my own that’s much quicker to use,or that my work apron with deep pockets purchased straight from the company is against Dress Code or that my Air Conditioner Cup and water bottle that I use to stave off the heat of this store that makes customers complain and me feel like I’m situated right between Satan’s butcheeks are personal belongings that I can’t have.
This is not a store, it’s a factory of Misery and pain and the $8.60 an hour is not enough for me to continue to be here and put up with it. My effort is worth more, my peace of mind is worth more and my happiness is worth more and I no longer feel like giving this place any piece of me. I will no longer be treated like a child in school, I will no longer be pushed to give more and I will no longer be undervalued. I appreciate EVERONE in this store that I have worked with and I will miss my customers but I am done.
Any further communication with me that has tone or content meant to admonish or demean me for this will be met with a swift block.
-BK