Bird wrote:
I for one am getting tired of running to the front to cover cashier lunches every single day or to cover schedule gaps for a couple of hours, losing time to zone recover or complete tasks, losing dept managers to cover head cashier lunches, only to see the cashiers running out the door at the closing bell or after their work is done. It seems as if we are required to work around lunches, breaks, customers, tasks, and zone recovery to help them do their jobs, or to do their job for them, yet when it comes to catch up time at the end of the day, they are not held to the same standards as us. I have talked to others from other stores and they feel much the same, but I always hear excuses from head cashiers as to why they should receive our support and help, yet they should not have to return the favor.
If we have to put our priorities aside to help them, then they should have to stay the one or two hours after closing to help us zone recover as far as I am concerned. Who knows, maybe we wouldn't have to stay as long at the end of the day. Maybe people wouldn't be as disgruntled seeing others held to the standards that they are, and everyone could gain a better understanding of the operations around the whole store instead of just the floor associates. Part of orientation now is for floor associates to be trained on the cash register. Maybe then the cashiers should be required to be power equipment certified so they can help us fill lumber etc at the end of the day. Does it or does it not make sense, and is it or is it not fair to require the same from one group as the other? Do you feel the same as I do, that the work load in many other areas of the store is being laid on the backs of floor associates while the cashiers etc are not required to return the favor? Thoughts?
I am a cashier and we are often told that we may not get our 15 minute breaks
because there may not be enough cashiers to cover us. We often go without breaks.
Also, our scheduled lunches are pushed either up or back as the Head Cashiers fill in gaps caused by one or more cashiers calling in sick.
I have gone for up to six hours without a break.
We are all told that the customers come first. Lines are never allowed to be very long, and they will call other people from their departments to man registers so that the customers will not have to wait so long and will have a more positive overall experience.
In our store, everyone is required to be certified as a spotter and employees are asked to be certified on power equipment.
Cashiers are not pulled to work in other departments because we are always needed at the registers. Believe me, we would be delighted with the chance to get a break from the registers and work in another position once in a while. There is a spirit of competition among us to get pulled from the registers to fill the drink machines or the cash wraps
Cashiers at my store do stay after the store is closed for one hour to do basic cleaning (which I can see in cashier areas, but the break room and bathrooms should be cleaned by the FSA, which is not always the case where I work.) We also zone aisle 10 (cleaning supplies and outdoor lighting) and aisle 1 (light bulbs) If we finish with all that, we are put to work zoning other areas.
There is great wailing and gnashing of teeth by people asked to answer a code 3, but when it comes to cashiers doing zoning in their departments, they act like it is somehow their due.
I think cashiers should have to keep up their areas, just as other associates are expected to keep up with cleanliness in their departments, but I do not think that cashiers should ever be looked upon as emergency janitors, which sometimes happens.
Cashiers, at least in my store, work hard.
We get a few "clunkers" who want to get hired, but do not want to come to work when scheduled and make it hard for everyone. I don't know what to say about that, except that it seems to happen everywhere I have ever worked.
Capricorn
