Conclusion

I know that the entire point of this blog was to express my frustrations with working at Walmart and they're all valid and true frustrations, but the one thing I haven't really talked about is what I do like about my job. The biggest benefit of my job is my coworkers. My coworkers get me through the day and I owe 90% of my happiness at work to them. Obviously there are enough positive things about my job to keep me around because I've been there for over a year. It's been great this semester to have a place to vent about my frustrations at work but this will be my last blog post. Thanks reading my rants-- I know that not all of my posts were gold, or even bronze, but thanks for sticking through it with me.

#1 Pet Peeve

I complain a lot about customers, coworkers, the crappy company that I work for, etc. But the thing that irritates me the most about my job is when a customer approaches me and doesn't compose a full sentence. For example, tonight I had a customer walk up to me and he simply said "Playdough." I know it shouldn't bother me as much as it does but when customers do this it just comes off as being incredibly rude. Would it have been that much more work for him to say "could you show me where the Playdough is?".

Good Customers

I know I complain about customers a lot, but one to two times each week I get a customer that brings a smile to my face. Whether it's just a complement, or the feeling of accomplishment when I help them find the item they're looking for.

A few days ago I helped a lady find three bikes and a ton of accessories for her kids. As she was heading up at the registers she looked back at me with the biggest smile, full of excitement, and said "thank you". I knew I didn't really do a whole lot for her, but seeing how excited she was to give the bikes to her kids was incredibly rewarding. It's customers like these that make my job almost worth it.... almost.

When will you get more in stock?

Being a sales associate means that you frequently have customers asking you to check in the back for an item. What customers don't understand is that the back room in most stores is incredibly small and departments have limited space for overstock. This means that most of the time, if the item is not on the shelf, it's not in the back room either. When I inform the customer that I don't have an item in the back, the next question is usually "When will you be getting more?". This is a fair question. However, what most customers don't understand is that most people don't understand is that the warehouse seldom gives us any sort of idea of when we'll get a certain item in more than 48 hours in advance. Delivery estimates from the distribution center would be incredibly unreliable because so many factors change what freight is loaded onto a truck.

My handheld terminal will only display to me the number of an item we have on-hand, if the item is in the back room, if it's on order, if it's in the warehouse, and if it's in transit from the warehouse to our store. I don't mind explaining this much to a customer, what gets frustrating to me though, is when a customer complains about how dumb it is that our technology is that limited. You think I don't agree with you? I work for a company that makes billions of dollars each year, but we're still running Windows 95 on most of the computers in the store. I know how stupid it is. But that doesn't change the fact that I can't tell you when we'll have more in stock. When I offer the solution of checking another store for their item, most customers scoff at the idea of having to drive to another store. I understand the customer's frustration, but I'm literally exhausting all of my options to get the item in your hands today. I wish customers were more considerate.

Walmart isn't a retail store.. It's a cult

Sometimes I joke about Walmart being a cult for several reasons. The first reason being that they honor a Sam Walton so much that he feels like a deity. There are posters with quotes from him all over the break room and his quotes can even be found throughout loading screens on miscellaneous computer programs in the store. I understand that Sam was the company's founder and a brilliant business man, but he's been dead for 23 years for Christ's sake. Some of the big whigs in the company are obsessed with him to the point that it gets creepy at times.

The next reason is that there are Walmart cheers that are shoved down our throats at every single stupid meeting. These cheers feel more like a chant to the dead. Okay, not really, but they are really annoying and nobody has enthusiasm except for management (and even then, some members of management look like they want to hang themselves during the cheers).

Walmart probably isn't actually a cult, but it certainly does feel like it at times.

Overtime

One of the biggest reasons that I have such a huge lack of respect for my managers at Walmart is the pressure they put on associates to stay past their scheduled shift. At just about any other job that I had, I had no problem staying past my scheduled time off because I knew that I would be adequately compensated for that time. However, because Walmart is a corporation that is more concerned about profit than they are for the well-being of the people that make their profit possible most stores have disciplinary action in place for associates who are clocked in more than 40 hours in one work week.

I cannot tell you the amount of times that assistant managers have told associates that they "have" to stay late, and the assistant manager will usually use the argument that "I stay late without pay all the time", but the difference is that they're salaried, which not only means that they receive much better pay and benefits, but most of the time they know going into the job that they'll be working more than 40 hours some weeks. Then, the day after telling someone that they had to stay late, they'll turn around and tell the associate that he/she must take a long lunch to cut any overtime. I've become so tired of this manipulation that I've refused to stay late and clocked out in front of a manager right after being told to stay late even though I'm part-time and rarely have to cut OT. The way that managers manipulate their associates and threaten them is unfair abuse of their power. My store makes nearly $300,000/day but it "can't afford" to pay an associate time and a half for an hour (keep in mind that time and a half for most associates in my store is roughly $13.50). I'm disgusted their greed.

Walmart Raising Minimum Wage: Is it a PR Scheme?

In February Walmart announced that it would be raising it's minimum wage for all U.S. facilities to $9.00/hr, which is 24% higher than the federal minimum wage. In one of my earlier posts, I expressed my concern that this was a PR scheme to get the media off of Walmart's back for a little while. Although many may argue that this is untrue, now that the raise has officially taken place, my feelings about the raise are still there. Forbes makes an interesting case as to how this was just an act for good publicity. Forbes illustrates how although Walmart claims it'll have a massive effect across the company, the wage increase will only effect a small percent of Walmart's employees.

Burtless, a writer for Brookings.com, expressed his concerns that the wage increase means that inflation is just around the corner. The video below is from Slate, and suggests that shoppers will only see about a 1¢ per item price increase to account for wage increases, however, it neglects to point out that Walmart is a huge part of the U.S. labor economy, and this wage increase could cause a market-wide wage increase.

My next concern with the wage increase was that Walmart would be cutting it's benefits. Although this isn't completely true, there is still some validity to my concerns. I previously mentioned how there were pay levels (1-7). With the pay increase, levels 1-3 will now all be making the $9.00 wage, and any associates who were already making more than $9.00 will only receive a 2% increase (for most associates this ends up being about $0.20). Then there are associates like me, who have an annual evaluation raise that increases their wage $0.40 higher than a new-hire of the same position. Essentially, I've lost my evaluation raise because I'll only be making $9, which will be the same as a new-hire (with less experience). Don't get me wrong, I'm happy that I'll be getting an additional $0.60/hr, I'm just a little discouraged that I'll be making the same as an associate with a year less experience than me.

Next, a $9.00/hr wage is still not a living wage. A part-time employee making $9.00/hr is still only making about $25,000. According to The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, this is still below poverty level.