The customers are getting angry!

[Retail Associate]

When I came back to work in the hell-hole aka as Meijer, I was trained as a cashier. I lasted 4 months and transferred to another dept. Couldn't handle standing in one place for hours on end.

Well, the last 4 weekends I have been forced to go on a lane and spend a good portion of my shifts cashiering because they can't be bothered with scheduling enough cashiers for the weekends.

Tonight there were 3, count 'em THREE cashiers working the front end. On a Friday night. The lines were endless so the Service Coordinator is frantically calling all depts to send anyone with register training up front. It was almost 8:30 when she called me.

SC: "I need you to come up and run a lane."

Me: "But we're short-handed and I haven't had time for lunch. I was just about to go."

SC: "Just come up for a few minutes."

Me: "But I've been here since 2:30 and I'm hungry." (I get very dizzy and shaky when I need food.)

SC: "Just for a few minutes. The customers are getting angry."

It was an hour before she let me take my lunch. Seven hours after clocking in. This is getting real old, real fast!

[Amethyst Hunter]

And that is just one of many reasons why I will NEVER do cashiering work ever again. *9-month-veteran of that crap* :hugs:

[Becks]

I'm so glad that, even if the powers at be actually paid attention to my application and saw that I've had experience as a cashier, they can't do anything about it because I wasn't trained to cashier for THIS chain. :evil laughter:

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Say...don't some states have laws stating that you have to be given your meal break after a certain amount of time (like 6 hours) and can't be forced to wait any longer?

Gotta love backup cashiering. We used to have every register or almost every register open and staffed until the corporate bean counters (is there any lower form of life?) decided cashiers are a waste of money and instead only one or two registers should be open at all times, and if the lines back up you can just call other people to come up and cashier for a while.

[Andara Bledin]

In California, if you work at least 4 hours, you get one 10-minute break. At 6 hours, you also get one 20-minute, unpaid lunch. At 8 hours you get a 2nd 10-minute break.

If you work more than 8 hours in a day/shift, you get overtime. At 12 hours, it turns into double time. If you work more than 40 hours in a pay period, you get overtime. At 60 hours it's double time. If you work all 7 days of your pay period, then you get double time for that day, regardless of hours for the week, even if you only get paid every two weeks. A job can make you work 12 days in a row, however, and not have to pay any extra if they give you the first day of the first week and last day of the last week off.

Fun fact: if you fail to take the state-mandated breaks and you do so in violation of your company's policies and without their knowledge or consent, your company can still get in trouble with the labor board for it.

^-.-^

[BookstoreEscapee]

A job can make you work 12 days in a row, however, and not have to pay any extra if they give you the first day of the first week and last day of the last week off.
^-.-^

And my job has been known to do it! But not to me because I was always "unavailable" on Sundays...I made sure I had at least one weekend day off unless they were really desperate and they asked me first!

[Food Lady]

Fun fact: if you fail to take the state-mandated breaks and you do so in violation of your company's policies and without their knowledge or consent, your company can still get in trouble with the labor board for it.

^-.-^

...and then they fire you. One of our California stores fired some guy who'd worked for the company for years because he violated policy by not taking lunch on time. He was in the garden center and had called for someone to cover him ahead of time, and they didn't send anyone fast enough, and he wouldn't leave because he didn't want to leave the register unlocked or something. I guess he figured if anything happened to that money it would be his fault, but he got fired anyway. damned if he did, damned if he didn't

[Andara Bledin]

Yikes!

That is such a lawsuit waiting to happen.

^-.-^

[siead_lietrathua]

... he wouldn't leave because he didn't want to leave the register unlocked or something. I guess he figured if anything happened to that money it would be his fault, but he got fired anyway. damned if he did, damned if he didn't

see, that is why i tell my managers that if i didnt take a break, to consider it a forfit unless i tell them otherwize. makes life a whole lot easier.

[wagegoth]

In California, it's now a 30-minute lunch period for a five-hour shift, although it can be waived upon mutual consent of the worker and the employer. However, it's not automatically double time on your seventh day, if you haven't put in 40 hours yet. You will get time and a half, and double time kicks in after 8 hours, instead of twelve. (I haven't had any luck finding the exact code for the rest/break periods.)

http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/wa...ction=retrieve

If you ever have questions, no matter where you live, contact your state/province/county/national labor board to find out your rights. If you're lucky, the labor code may be online, like above.

It's unfortunate that many companies do not obey the law by attempting to save money. If they wanted to save money, they should fire all the extra middle managers who have nothing better to do than write up impossible policies, and limit the salaries and bonuses of officers.

But, as Becky always says, "If it makes sense . . . ."

[Andara Bledin]

I love the internet. Information at your fingertips.

California Overtime Regulations
California Rest Period Regulations (Breaks)
California Meal Period Regulations

I suspect that every state has a place where you can find labor regulations.

^-.-^

[Rocko]

All I know is that at my store, we absolutely have to take our lunches before our fifth hour (If you start at 8 am, you have to take your lunch by 1 pm, no ifs, ands or buts) our registers even lock us out 15 minutes before our fifth hour is up. And management doesn't mess around either. I've sadly heard of too many employees getting written up or fired for going past their fifth hour.

[MadMike]

I got called in the middle of my lunch to help a customer once, and I was pissed! The manager let me extend my lunch by the amount of time I spent helping the customer, but a break doesn't do much good if you only get to take it a minute at a time.

It only happened to me once, but some of my coworkers told me that the managers were so bad with that for awhile, that people started going offsite to take their meal breaks, even if they just went out to the cars to eat.

[Andara Bledin]

I don't know about the laws regarding interruptions during scheduled breaks and the page I found about California laws regarding breaks had no metion of interruptions.

If anyone is interested, here's the FAQ on California breaks, including what to do if your employer won't let you have them.

^-.-^

[MoonChild2007]

In California, if you work at least 4 hours, you get one 10-minute break

Lucky California. Here in CT, I get no break even though i work 4-5 hours. And believe me, 5 hours of no food is not right AT all.