(USA) Letter from GM + Rant
This list was stapled to everyone’s paycheck not that long ago. He makes some valid points but the grammar and stuff is kinda off… (english is his first language). He also has not enforced these rules since. My coworkers/managers are still rude to guests, overnight shift is always 15-30min late, most not in full uniform, and everyone is always wearing earbuds. Genuinely for over a year now, the overnight shift has never been on time, meaning I get off work late. They all come in high, and not in proper uniform, talking on the phone, have their airpods in the whole shift, are rude to customers and tell them we are out of items instead of grabbing it from the back or replacing it (like frappe base or soda syrup). Corporate and our GM do nothing about it. We constantly get complaints and corporate has been cracking down on morning and midshift employees, when in reality overnight is the problem.
Context: I work at a location near a university and popular night club. Usually most busy past 9:30pm. 24 hour location that is often closes the lobby overnight. Typical shifts have 5-6 crew members and 1-2 shift leads.
Managers come in with airpods and bonnets too and are extremely unprofessional. Often times they send me (Crew trainer, 21 F) to deal with customers problems because they have cussed out customers and get irritated easily. My coworkers are also very rude to guests and have a bad attitude over all. Many times when overnight employees come in late, my managers will tell me I can leave because it’s not my problem anymore and overnight should have been on time. This is true, but we are extremely busy during this shift switch, and no body is there to fulfill orders. I mentioned this to my manager and she said “oh well, they can wait”. Idk if it’s just me, but I would feel terrible making 20+ orders wait for over 20 minutes for their food, so I stay and make it.
My coworkers and managers also are constantly on their phones, even being on facetime or making tiktoks during their shift for hours. For example, a coworker of mine in the drive thru window will prop her phone up on the sweet tea and have it on facetime while she is handing customers their food and drinks. Grill guys will also have phone in one hand while making sandwiches with the other, and often get orders wrong, it’s also unsanitary. A lot of times, orders take forever to get done because everyone is on their phones and I have to be the one to do everything.
We also have this employee (16 F) who has been working there for about 2 months now. I am the only crew trainer at my location and I only work 4 days a week because i’m a full time college student. So she started working when I was off work, and was trained by someone else. When I went in for my next shift, she was still in training so I was working with her in back cash. At my location, we typically have 1 person on headset that takes both drive thru lanes and cashes them out, so for training purposes, we both had on a headset. I demonstrated taking orders and how to use the headset buttons, showed her the menu, how to customize sandwiches, all the big things. After about an hour or two of her watching me take the orders, I had her press the buttons on the POS while I spoke on the headset. Understandably, I had to help her find some things and do weird modifications. I asked her if she felt comfortable trying to talk on the headset to take an order and she said yes, and tried taking an order. She doesn’t greet them, doesn’t ask about the app, just says “What’s your order”. (Mind you I had been taking orders for like 3 hours now, greeting and asking about the app every time and explaining to her why thats important). She doesn’t ask any follow up questions in the order, for example they say they want a big mac meal she just says “okay” and goes silent. She doesn’t ask medium or large, what to drink, anything else. So I start quietly telling her to ask those questions. And she does, but it’s like “What drink?”, “What else do you want?”, “Are you done?”. I try telling her other ways to phrase the questions but she still does it her way. After 6 hours of the shift she still cannot take an order on her own and I don’t know how to help her because she says she knows what to do. Anyway, fast forward to now (2 months later), she has been trained on back cash, bagging, window, and front counter but frequently messes up orders. When she takes orders, she rings up the wrong sandwiches, doesn’t make things a meal, puts the wrong modification or doesn’t modify at all, etc. And when bagging, she leaves out items or uses the wrong size cups for drinks. Multiple people have tried training her with no success. Her older sister (17 F) also works there and her mom is the overnight shift lead, so she doesn’t get fired or written up for the mistakes. She is also extremely slow, always on her phone, and does not do anything unless specifically asked to. Like if the sweet tea runs out, she will not brew more unless someone asks her to or if there are no fries, she will not drop a basket unless told to.
As the only crew trainer, I feel like I failed/I am not a good trainer but we have another new employee (19 M) this week and after 3 hours of training from me he has been able to work on his own without help (besides occasional questions on stuff he hasn’t learned yet).
I am often working by myself when we are understaffed because my managers enjoy sitting in the office on their phones. Like over college spring break, I would be doing front counter, bagging delivery, bagging drive thru & handing it out, on headset taking orders and cashing them out. The only time my manager would help me was if I yelled across the store for help, she would do front counter/delivery during the rush and then go sit back down. One time I even had to make the food on grill/table on top of all of that. While we are not a big store or super busy, it is still a lot of work at times for one person, especially with big orders or multiple customers. I’m getting so burnt out and don’t know how much longer I can last.