Read lots of stories here, time to share mine.
Way back in 2008 I started a job in a pizza shop. Now being a young lad and this being a government subsidized traineeship position, they could pay me $7.74 AUD.
Basically my employer got money to have me employed and undertaking vocational training on things like food safety, workplace safety, customer service, topics that benefitted everyone involved.
Finished the traineeship after a year, started getting paid $8.25…… then they reduced it to $8.00. I was like WTF? They bumped it up to $10 “because I was older now”. This is a thing in Australia getting paid more as you get older from 16 to 21.
The owners of the franchise change, they have me sign a contract saying they don't owe me anything and are absolved of all legal and financial liabilities. I thought this was suspicious but signed it anyway.
New owners are some dodgy brothers who have lets say backwards views towards women and professionalism in the workplace. One time they fired a delivery driver on the spot. He got upset but counted out his change to give back to the manager. Some bullshit pissing contest stuff happens and the owner's brother tells the driver he can't disrespect the owner in “HIS STORE”. Now there are grown men fighting and rolling around on the kitchen floor.
The owner then lies to me later on saying the driver was doing shit like stealing from the till, he absolutely was not. I am still friends with this former co-worker.
I'm getting paid $12 an hour by this point to put up with this shite, and it is 2010.
Boss goes on holiday. I tell the bosses brother I am leaving to focus on studying for my final high school exams. He asks me to train the new employees and I say “sure”, he gets upset when I do no such thing and leave at the end of two weeks.
I get a phone call from the boss when he gets back from holiday asking if I am sure I don't want to work there any more. I firmly and confidently say YES.
I got a new job shortly after that paid me $20 an hours roughly. A huge increase for me, much better conditions and the boss and managers were not horrible people.