im quitting over new store policy and so are others

[danegrous_21]

well its just like how its sounds, my store which is ------ sports and outdoors has come out with a new policy for closing. "everybody leaves at the same time." before the depts in the store(fishing and hunting,apparel,camping,team sports,footwear and frontend)would "compete to finish first so they can call the manager at closing to walk and look at the dept so we could leave. well with one or two mangers even if people all got done, you would have to wait in line if they went somewhere else first. well it seems that managers started noticing that zones where starting to get sloppy and i guess the figured we as employees where cutting corners to get done with our zone and dept. well under the new policy all depts now have to wait in untill everybody else it done. last night was the first night we did this. we didnt leave to 12:30am. we close at 10 pm. my dept(apparel was done at 10:10pm) and other depts where done. i think footwear was the one keeping us up. we didnt go over there to help them, we just help our dept over night stockers with whatever there doing. giving them less to do at night.. MAJOR problems with this poilcy


1. 95% of people who work at my store are either in high school and go to college. i talked to so many people last night saying they has class at like 8am or 9am and still had homework or something to read last night for class.

2. we still had minors out at that time. i dont know about where you live about the state laws on minors and work, but here in texas minors have like a 11pm curfew. so state law is that they be done by 10pm

3. (this is just IMO)the managers willing and knowingly inacted this policy knowing that most of these college student this job is there only way of income and cant afford to quit so that gives the free reign to do whatever, like keep us out to almost 1am on a school night.


i work at second job that is easier than this and pays more so im finally leaving today with my two week notice. i just feel bad over the treatment of the ones that cant leave. also im not the only one leaving. college is too important to have the place screw it up for you. thanks for reading.

[wagegoth]

I have a feeling that when corporate sees the huge increase in overtime, that policy will be changed immediately.

And, since you're a short-timer, it wouldn't hurt to call the local labor department to let them know that the store is keeping minors illegally late.

[Barefootgirl]

Just out of interest, why didn't you all go over and help apparel, since that would have resulted in everyone getting out of the store a lot earlier?

I agree with Wagegoth, though - management are behaving unethically, esp with the treatment of minors. Call the labour board.

[danegrous_21]

barefoot, i think you mean footwear b/c i work ahem worked in apparel(unless i worded baldy which i think i have a habit of) but in all truth i dont know. i thought that would make sense but thats the case in point, managers in general have a streak like customers of doing things that dont make any sense at all.

[Gurndigarn]

First off, they are paying you for standing around, right? If they're not, that is a serious violation of labor laws. You're there are their request; they have to pay you for it. A few weeks of watchin payroll go skyrocketing, and they'll get over it.

Second, yeah, the labor laws for minors will also nail them. One disgruntled employee— or employee's parents— can rack up some serious fines, possibly a bit of jail time, too. Quietly mentioning that to one of the saner managers might get things changed.

Unless you want to be that disgruntled employee, naturally.

[BookstoreEscapee]

Ha, Gurndigarn beat me to it - I was going to say they'll probably hear about it from one of the minors' parents first. My store closes at 11, we are scheduled til 11:30, and we are all supposed to leave at the same time (mostly that's a safety issue, so that no one is walking to their car in an empty parking lot). We stayed late plenty of times to finish cleaning, but it always bugged me when the music person would just sit in the chairs by the time clock and not help straighten stuff, especially when we were really slammed. But there it's all books, everybody does everything. The store is divided into zones for cleanup and if you're done you help someone else. OK, I'm rambling.

In NJ if you're under 18 you have to leave at 10 (I think at 17 you can stay til 11 with parents' permission but I could be wrong about that). And 17yo can't drive after midnight because of the license laws.

OK, before I go completely OT, I'll go now

[myswtghst]

*don't hurt me* I would also suggest that if they're forcing you to stay, who's to say you can't bring in your books/schoolwork to work on while you're waiting? Just a thought.

I do agree with everyone upthread though, the threat of the curfew laws being broken and the increase in how much they have to pay you for the extra hours should be enough to make them realize that this policy is idiotic.

[danegrous_21]

sane managers? let me break it down

store director- i dont think i ever see him close

Apparel manager(mine)-she very stern on doing work, not standing around, but was the one that kept us late yesterday.

Footwear manager- picky, one night closing made us stay a extra 30 mins making sure all our racks lined up with each other

Camping manager- lost all my respect on "the night". the night involes the TS manager too, but the gist is that is 11:30, and i ask him to walk us to leave and he says no one ever called him.(even though we called at least 4x)

Fishing and hunting Manager - not to bad, cant come up with anything right now

Teamsports manager - on "the night" found him on the computer with the over night manager looking at you tube.

but to answer some more question. what i understand this is not just our store policy but corporate. i think i not to sure on that. but all the mangers know about it so they only problem is that managers sometimes show favortism for their dept. also we did get paid for all our time there. i just dont want to be there that late anymore that all, and thats why im leaving. my other job is better and more important to me. also on the whole minor stay late thing, my mom wants to complain about it(she refers to the store as a slave shop) and i wouldnt be surpriesed if other parents complained too. its just over the past couple weeks treatment of the people that close has gone downhill

[CrazedClerk]

and this my friends, is why corporate are morons.

[SuperDan]

As long as you're getting paid for the time you're required to be in the building, there's really not much you can say about it.

The minors, however, are a different story. Your corporation is in clear violation of both state and federal laws if they are keeping minors even one minute past 10pm. So pass the magic phone number on to the minors you work with.

Yes, the magic phone number is 1-866-4-US-WAGE. It is open 8-5 your local time mon-fri and will connect you to the US Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division. Like I said, you don't have anything to tell them about, but I'm sure they'll be thrilled to hear from some of the minors you work with or their parents.

You could also loudly read the work laws poster with a manager and some minors in the area and see if they get the hint. And if they don't have a labor laws poster that's something the DOL would love to hear about too.

[Jack7957]

well its just like how its sounds, my store which is ------ sports and outdoors has come out with a new policy for closing. "everybody leaves at the same time." before the depts in the store(fishing and hunting,apparel,camping,team sports,footwear and frontend)would "compete to finish first so they can call the manager at closing to walk and look at the dept so we could leave. well with one or two mangers even if people all got done, you would have to wait in line if they went somewhere else first. well it seems that managers started noticing that zones where starting to get sloppy and i guess the figured we as employees where cutting corners to get done with our zone and dept. well under the new policy all depts now have to wait in untill everybody else it done. last night was the first night we did this. we didnt leave to 12:30am. we close at 10 pm. my dept(apparel was done at 10:10pm) and other depts where done. i think footwear was the one keeping us up. we didnt go over there to help them, we just help our dept over night stockers with whatever there doing. giving them less to do at night.. MAJOR problems with this poilcy

There's your problem, go help the other depts so you get out quicker. That's what we always did when I worked places that we couldn't leave until all tasks were completed. It also helps you learn where everything is in the store.

[Crosshair]

There's your problem, go help the other depts so you get out quicker. That's what we always did when I worked places that we couldn't leave until all tasks were completed. It also helps you learn where everything is in the store.

Bad idea. Good chance that people arn't going to be able to be much help. The layout of the departments changes too often to know exactly where everything is. Domestics is near my department. I can get you to the right area where a product should be and mabee look around and find it. However that is hit and miss. Getting the customer to the right area is all they need 99% of the time.

However when you get me and other floor associates together to go and actualy put stuff away Domestics, (Or other departments.) the result is the proverbial "monkeys banging on typewriters", alot of effort being expended but not alot of work getting done. Yes we know the general area where products should go. However we have no idea where they specifically go and spend large amounts of time staring at the shelf trying to find where the heck this product goes. There can be 10 of us there and the one person who works in that department can do more than we all can combined.

[Argabarga]

Yeah, depending on department, there's a little to a lot of specialized info that is required to know how to run/open/close it, and simply adding untrained bodies to the mix isn't going to make it go faster

And beyond that, it's just silly to penalize other people who've done their jobs by making them wait

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Just out of interest, why didn't you all go over and help apparel, since that would have resulted in everyone getting out of the store a lot earlier?

It doesn't work that way.

I, for example, would be completely lost trying to put away clothing items. I wouldn't even know how to fold something that became unfolded. (don't know how to use the folding table). Anybody else who works on the hardlines side of the store would be lost to. We would not be much of a help over there.

And neither would those people working in softlines who had been asked to go over and help hardlines. They may be able to get to the general area where an item should be, but would then have to spend a lot of time looking for the precise shelf location.

I know what company the OP works for; requiring all the employees to stay later than scheduled is a common thing for them, and frankly I'm surprise they haven't been nailed for violations of labor laws.

[Jack7957]

Maybe it's just me then, with all the experience I've gained through the years working in different stores and departments, that I can figure out an entire departments layout in about an hour. So I'll stick my my original comment of helping the other departments so you can learn where things are located. Once you can get down to the one aisle, it shouldn't take more than 2 minutes to find exactly where an item should be returned to.