I applied for frontend supervisor

[bean]

Well.. our assistant department manager had to step down, and now a supervisor is needed pretty badly. We don't run a supe on midshifts at all right now because we're so shorthanded, which is killing everyone.

In my store, supervisors answer the phone, do overrides, loans, pickups, verify every till, and verify every cashier deposit. As it is I answer the phone constantly (one of our registers has a phone that can answer incoming calls, I try to ring on that one) and they have me watch the service desk when they have to hit the bathroom.

I was a shift manager for 7 years at Papa John's (offered my own store twice, turned it down, offered a salaried position several times and turned it down), a supervisor in a medium sized call center for almost a year, and I'm comfortable handling large sums of money. I think that puts me ahead of everyone else that's applied so far (only 2 people, and I've been with the company longer than both.. combined).

Wish me luck!

[SG15Z]

Being an FES is fun!

Do y'all's supes make sure breaks get done too? If you don't then that's the only real difference between our stores. Oh and the FES don' answer the phones, the Boothies do instead.

Hope you get it, who knows, maybe you'll like it more than I do!

[bean]

It depends on if we have a "hopper" or not.

Our store has a policy of 1 drawer = 1 cashier, but we have 2 drawers ("A" and "B") at all of our main line registers (only 1 at each express register). If we have a hopper, a cashier has a break sheet and goes to every register and signs in on the "B" drawer while the person on the "A" drawer goes on break, carrying their own till between registers. The register locks the A drawer while the B cashier is signed in. This way we don't have to shut down a lane when someone goes on break - especially handy because we don't actually have lights at each register (I think we're one of the only stores in the entire company that doesn't). When we're closed we slap a little metal sign that says "Next lane please" on the belt and hope that people actually notice it. We CAN turn people away once that sign is out thankfully, though if I see someone on the next lane with only a few items after I've put my sign out I'll tell them to come through my line.

From what I understand, a lot of stores will let multiple people ring on a drawer through the day... we don't. You clock in, count your till, take your till to a register, sign in, etc. At the end of your shift, you take your till to the office and count it down, make your own deposit, and the till goes back in the safe (it has to be built up to $400 again before you leave, we do a final loan about 1-2 hours before the end of a shift). It's basically like being on audit every day.

Clear as mud right?

We run hoppers on busy days. On days when we don't have one, supervisors run breaks.

[Teysa]

Good luck with the promotion. It sounds like you'd do great. Glad to see things are going OK with you too. I was just thinking I hadn't seen you post in a while.
Slightly off topic, but I so want to steal your store's shelf tag system for mine. It looks like it would be a lot less of a pain to deal with then a gazillion price stickers.

[bean]

The electronic tags are neat... when they work. They use a weird coupling to hook up to the power supply that's really sensitive, and it's common to see entire shelves, sometimes entire 4 foot sections, go blank (sometimes they go blank with a flashing orange light, which means they're getting some power, but not enough). Once they get power back to them it can take up to an hour for the tags to come back on, they're updated wirelessly and have to wait for the server to send out every.single.tag in the store again.

The power supply that powers all of our tags in the dairy coolers is flaky and likes to go out from time to time - it sucks having to print up hundreds of stickers to cover up the electronic tags for a few days until we can get it repaired.

The worst though, is when we have an extended power outage. The tags are all on UPS's (battery backups for computers), and they don't draw much power - but the batteries in the UPS's are old and don't run for very long anymore. Usually by the time we get the registers back up and running maybe half of the tags will be working again, our registers take a long time to boot up.

[Teysa]

Yeesh that does sound like a bit of a pain. Oh well, they looked cool anyways. At least with our low-tech way of doing things we just have to worry about some dum-dum ripping the tag off the shelf.

[fireheart]

I'm not a FES, although we don't have a requirement either for IPM. I can generally hit the 13-14 mark, but they've taken into consideration that depression/anxiety can throw the scanning rate off.

At work, the sups do the following:

-Phone duty.
-Serve cigarettes.
-Overrides.
-Handle complaints.
-Drawer counts.
-Train the new hire.
-Breaks.
-Run any training videos or team talks.
-Assign jobs to the staff.
-Register loyalty cards, sign up credit cards.
-Refunds, exchanges, queries.

Basically, they run the floor whenever the manager is not around. Those who have a liquor certificate as well tend to cover the liquor staff when he or she needs to go to the loo. (Our minimum is that anyone who's 18 can assist in liquor for 15 minutes tops while that person has a loo break ONLY if people with a liquor certificate are unavailable for various reasons.)

Cash office people have the same priveliages and can generally do most of the work as a FES. Smokeshop staff just handle complaints, serve smokes, do refunds and

Me? Out of that list, I can do just about anything that doesn't relate to the service desk. I've trained the new hire, I was taught how to do a drawer count back at my first job (the system there is very much the same) and from time to time, I've handled complaints and queries. (Not complaints as much as I used to)

[SG15Z]

Yeah we have the system where multiple people can be on one till. Basically every register is assigned a till and all accounting is done by register instead of cashier. Which means if it's short, it's really hard to determine who it was that was short.

The FES at our stores basically are the managers of the front end. We are usually the person just below the manager. So if the manager is out of the store for some reason, the FES becomes the MOD. We handle breaks, overrides, contested prices, train newbies, etc.

I'm am also cross trained, I can do the Service Desk, Fuel Station, Pharmacy Clerk, SCO, Cashier (obviously), and Starbucks (though I haven't done it in a while. I'm just everywhere!

[Primer]

Our store has a policy of 1 drawer = 1 cashier, but we have 2 drawers ("A" and "B") at all of our main line registers (only 1 at each express register). If we have a hopper, a cashier has a break sheet and goes to every register and signs in on the "B" drawer while the person on the "A" drawer goes on break, carrying their own till between registers. The register locks the A drawer while the B cashier is signed in.

You clock in, count your till, take your till to a register, sign in, etc. At the end of your shift, you take your till to the office and count it down, make your own deposit, and the till goes back in the safe (it has to be built up to $400 again before you leave, we do a final loan about 1-2 hours before the end of a shift). It's basically like being on audit every day.

WOW! I wanna CM in my town to work at!
Bean, if you end up managing a store a few hundred miles south, I want to work for you!

[bean]

WOW! I wanna CM in my town to work at!

..... I work at CM's competition, WFM.

The FES at our stores basically are the managers of the front end. We are usually the person just below the manager. So if the manager is out of the store for some reason, the FES becomes the MOD. We handle breaks, overrides, contested prices, train newbies, etc.

We have department manager ("Team Leader" or TL), assistant department managers ("Associate Team Leader" or ATL), then "Guest Service Supervisors" (frontend supes). The supes do the majority of the overrides, breaks, price changes, etc, but we have 2 cashiers that train the newbies. The store manager can't do overrides, in fact I doubt he even knows how to do anything on the registers (I don't think he's ever touched one, he started in produce and worked his way up). One of our assistant store managers used to be a cashier and if we're REAL slammed he'll jump on a supervisor's register. The supervisors usually have 2 drawers, their supervisor drawer that they keep at the service desk (which starts out with quite a bit more money), and a regular drawer that they keep at a register in case it gets busy.

I've rung on a supervisor's regular drawer a handful of times - usually when I wind up with a bagger shift and the supervisors get behind on work and we're busy. I've wound up with supervisors ringing on my drawer too, usually if I have to run to the bathroom while we're busy. There's a lot of trust there since we're under the 1 drawer = 1 person rule.

Overrides need a physical key, a supervisor's ID, and a supervisor's password. The front end TL and ATLs carry keys and have ID/passwords as well, and if one of them is around they're always willing to do overrides. TL/ATLs are expected to pull supervisor duty often.

If there's not a store manager or assistant store manager available (STL or ASTL), a department's TL or ATL becomes the MOD ("shifty"). We have 1 STL and 3 ASTLs.

[SG15Z]

..... I work at CM's competition, WFM.

I'm so confused now.

[bean]

I'm so confused now.

They said they wanted to work at CM after seeing me describe how things worked with our drawers.

CM = Central Market, a very upscale store that's owned by HEB (a big grocery chain in Texas, though proper HEB's don't exist north of Austin, I'm in the Dallas area). WFM = Whole Foods Market, which is an upscale, all natural (with an emphasis on organics) grocery store all over the US and England (and I think parts of Canada). If you're familiar with Wild Oats, same concept as WFM - in fact WFM now owns Wild Oats. Trader Joe's is the only chain that really competes with WFM on a national level (CM is only in Texas).

Central Market and Market Street are my store's only real competition - Market Street is a small upscale chain, but they focus on premium products and not organics. Central Market has a decent organic selection, larger than most stores, and an amazing prepared foods department. Whole Foods makes a killing off of prepared foods, so does Market Street.

I won't work for CM, they don't pay nearly as much as WFM and started random drug testing (... for some odd reason, we have a lot of former CM staff in my store... WFM doesn't drug test, period). If I wanted to cashier at CM, I'd be taking at least a $3-4/hour pay cut - before factoring in my monthly bonus at WFM (anywhere from 100-200 depending how we run our labor) and free medical insurance.

[Teysa]

WFM does sound like a pretty good place to work. I know it's a neat store. I went there with my mom a few weeks ago when she visited. Yeah, yeah I work at a grocery store and visited another grocery store. Actually my store carries many of the same brands, just not in the same quantities.

On the bonuses, does everyone qualify or is it only certain people? I know where I work only the managers and some of the perimeter department managers get bonus. We always know that it's close to bonus tiime when we get the 'Cut Hours! We don't care how much you have to do! Cut Hours! Blargleblargleblah!'

[Primer]

..... I work at CM's competition, WFM.

oops! I knew it was one or the other. I still want a WFM in my town with you as the manager, then!

[SG15Z]

oops! I knew it was one or the other. I still want a WFM in my town with you as the manager, then!

No they need to come down here South of Houston!