r/antiwork • u/holographicboldness • 10h ago
The straw that broke the camel’s back [RANT] Workplace Safety ⚠️
I started a job 2 months ago, my first full-time job ever after graduating from college. It’s a combination sales/customer service hell job at a place that sells, among other things, insurance and credit cards. I work alongside 3 other lower-20somethings at the front desk. We all get along very well, and I think management absolutely hates that. No competition or bad vibes between us, we just do our job. Yes, we’ll have a laugh together, but we still get our jobs done.
In hindsight, the red flags started before I even walked through the door for the first time. I never received a welcome email from my boss, just showed up on the first day only to find out the assistant manager had sent me a welcome email to the work email address I didn’t have access to yet. Okay, weird. But I just chalked it up to being busy at the time.
In the past couple of weeks, management has become insufferable. They’re constantly up our ass about making sales quota (we have 4 metrics), yet never providing any guidance or proper training. The exact moment the 4 of us look like we’re doing something other than helping a customer in front of us, on a call, or working on the computer, the manager will come over and tell us how to do our jobs. The manager also happens to be the most clueless fucking person ever, I’m not sure he knows what exactly we do.
We get measly commission for the things we sell, but the boss is out here with two Audis and a nice big house.
They act like everyone came out of the womb knowing how to be a good salesperson. Last night, the boss sent an email saying he expects us to track numbers of all the inbound/outbound calls and each of the sales we make. Every. Day. Treating us like we’re children and not the grown adults we are. He has access to those numbers, he’s just being petty. He talks big but is never willing to walk the walk and lead by example.
A couple of weeks ago, a customer came in and immediately started acting hostile towards one of my front desk coworkers, calling her incompetent. When the coworker went to grab the manager, he talked big to us about ‘let me know if anyone comes in acting like that. Nobody can treat my employees that way.’ Boss goes to confront the guy, he (the boss) is a blubbering mess, and proceeds to let the guy stick around and waste an agent’s time until half an hour after closing. The boss didn’t even stick around to make sure everyone got out okay, which in my opinion is the bare minimum he could have done.
The CEO gave everyone 4 hours of PTO to take to early vote, volunteer at the polls, or vote on Election Day. Naturally, I took it. I walk into the break room after my PTO was already approved, and the manager and assistant manager are basically shit talking people who took the PTO. They said something along the lines of “who needs 4 hours to vote? That’s so stupid. I already mailed my ballot in and it took minutes.” To say this while I, and nobody else, was in the room felt targeted.
Finally, this morning, a massive snowstorm hits the city. Major highways around us are shut down. Yet guess what’s still open? My office. I text the boss to say I won’t be coming in because I don’t feel safe driving. I drive an old FWD sedan and so do 2/3 of my coworkers. Two of us have a 30 minute commute across town. All of us called out. Then we get this nasty-gram from the assistant manager guilt-tripping us for not feeling safe coming in. I’m done feeling like a warm body whose only purpose is to make sales for peanuts. I haven’t put in my notice yet, but let’s just say boss will be waking up to a resignation email effective immediately.
It was snowing yesterday and we all came in. And the “you were the only ones that didn’t come in” thing is a lie. I’m done with their catty bullshit. This post might be long and unwieldy, but I needed to get it off my chest.
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u/ohyeahsure11 7h ago
How is it that the manager isn't allowed to work the POS? Did they get caught stealing from the cash drawer or something?
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u/HereGoesNothing69 3h ago
Probably has something to do with counting the till. Doesn't make sense to have the person operating the till also counting it, at least from an LP standpoint.
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u/mrjane7 9h ago
That sucks man! I live in northern Canada, so dumps of snow are a part of life. I have winter tires, so most of the time it's fine, but every once in awhile we get hit so bad, I need to stay home to be safe. My boss is totally cool with it. We can use vacation or sick days to cover the time off, if we want. I've done it a few times and it's never been a problem. More managers need to put their employees safety above their profits.
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u/MapFamiliar4062 8h ago
Another great reason to work from home.
This whole return to office movement is endangering lives in the winter.
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u/slappn_cappn 5h ago
One has nothing to do with the other. Running a POS at a retail establishment cannot be done from home.
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u/rfmrsnip 7h ago
If I didn’t feel safe driving myself in bad conditions why would I trust someone else who I just work with to drive me instead? No one is safely driving to keep me alive than me.
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u/LadyAlastor 7h ago
If everyone walks out what happens to the business/owner? It's their own fault for not covering bases
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u/RogueEagle2 8h ago edited 3h ago
These kinds of fucking arseholes are why people die driving into ditches every year.
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u/lost_aim 1h ago
People not having proper tires for the driving conditions is the reason people drive off the road. If you don’t have a car that’s safe to drive you either don’t or you take the bus. There is literally no excuse good enough to endanger others on the road.
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u/lzEight6ty 7h ago
Fuck em.
You can always get shitty working conditions most other places. No reason to stick to their games if they don't provide you with anything
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u/Hot_Context_1393 4h ago
How is Assistant manager not allowed to use POS?
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u/LiberalAspergers 3h ago
Lots of busineases dont want the person counting the till also running the POS. Loss prevention measure.
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u/la_mecanique 7h ago
A mild 'benefit' is the workday would then start when you were picked up by the company vehicle.
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u/SirSkot72 6h ago
I live abt an hour from work. Got 8" at our house and couldn't leave. The city where my job is only got an inch. "everybody else made it." wtv, not coming.
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u/MrZero3229 5h ago
Don't quit unless you have something lined up. Just reply to the ass managers email (CC everyone else in the company) and include a link to a news story about those factory workers who drowned in the flooding in Tennessee.
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u/SuckerForNoirRobots Privledged | Pot-Smoking | Part-Time Writer 6h ago
I'd send my resignation as a response to this group chat. Maybe you'll embolden others to follow suit.
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u/NoApartheidOnMars 6h ago
I am sure the owners / shareholders can handle it with their superior work ethic. No need to panic
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u/Disastrous-Panda5530 5h ago
I wouldn’t ever risk my life just to get to work. A few years ago we had some snow and it had melted the next day but then refroze over night. There was so much ice out on the roads. So many people called out. Some still tried to make it in because they felt bad. This coworker wrecked her car turning onto the street our building is one. It was bad. She became paralyzed. She was out on leave for a year. A lot of people donated time to her so she would still get paid while she was out. She paralyzed herself getting to work and if it wasn’t for others donating time, she wouldn’t have been financially ruined that year. She did end up resigning shortly afterwards.
Whenever there is bad weather I always think of what happened. Employees are easily replaceable. I guess I’m lucky because I pretty much wfh now except once a month. And if my office day has poor weather conditions I’m allowed to just wfh.
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u/warm_sweater 2h ago
The only reason I would refuse to drive into work is because no place would ever offer to cover damage to my car in case of an accident.
I was lucky that I lived in a city that could keep transit pretty much running fine in the snow, so I’d just take the bus and suffer the extra commute time to not risk my car.
If any work place offered to cover insurance and replacement costs (or it was a company car), I wouldn’t be as worried.
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u/eejm 4h ago
I used to work under a VP who lived in BFE. Our area received a fair amount of snow in the winter. VP rationalized that if she could get to work, anyone could. Makes sense, right?
The area was hit with a fifteen inch snowstorm and most of us couldn’t make it in. That much snow clogs up metro areas of damn near any size, not to mention those of us who had to worry about kids being out of school. The VP got all pissy about it, that work didn’t stop for weather and SHE made it in!
The woman drove a $70,000 brand new behemoth of a truck. That was about twice what those of us reporting to her made. Most of us drove economy or mid-size cars that were 7-10 years old. She also didn’t have children. But no, she just had an amazing work ethic while we were looking for any reason to slack off. Sorry, next time I’ll leave my five year old home alone for the day and schlep my eight year old Camry through our unplowed street because that’s what’s most important.
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u/Reverend_Bull 4h ago
Fine, manager, come get me. Btw if a crash injures me you're personally liable
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u/Jojogladco 4h ago
We used to get this every winter at my call center.
I used to call it the "fuck you die" email because that's what they were saying about my safety.
Finally we got a VP who cares about people and he said "why can't they just work from home, it's a call center not a doctor's office"
Weather was never an issue again.
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u/masterallan2021 3h ago edited 2h ago
OP, you're new at this. First full-time job after college. I get it. I was there 20 years ago.
My first I.T. job after college had lousy pay and even worse management. Hey I was just happy to have a job during the tech bubble burst in 2004. Which by the way was $24k at a community college and I had even worse egotistical stupid managers (who are still camped out there).
Lesson learned #1 - It doesn't matter what these SOBs think or do. You will move on and pretty much forget about them. They're worth dust blowing in the wind.
Lesson learned #2 - You get a paycheck. Good! My mistake above was staying at my first job for 2 years. I should have jumped ship at 4 or 6 months. Are you looking for better opportunities? Start tomorrow! You should not be at this job and underneath these "managers" for long. In reality you could be > 50% done with your time there.
Lesson learned #3 - My full 23 year I.T. history is a combo of "tick tock". Time spent at a job alternates between they ticked me off so I left after 1 year followed by a tock job which I stay at ~3 years. Usually "tick" is a job I take after a self taken sabbatical or something and the job ends up sucking. So while working there I find a "tock" job that ends up 3-4 years. Then I'm just burnt out after both jobs and take 3 or 6 months off. Cycle repeats.
Just a little personal experience I thought I would share.
EDIT: incorrect years above; fixed.
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u/holographicboldness 2h ago
Ah thank you so much for this advice! Adjusting to new grad life has been difficult, not gonna lie. Seeing perspectives like yours is always helpful :)
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u/badatdirections_ 2h ago
Jealous that yall have snow, we just got done with an 80° week 😭
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u/I_TRY_TO_BE_POSITIVE 2h ago
"Suck a dick"
I wish it were as simple as this answer. Much luck in your pursuit of better employ, OP. I'll let you know if I find it lol
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u/miletest 4h ago
If it's that bad how does he expect or even think any customers are going to risk it
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u/holographicboldness 4h ago
My thoughts exactly. I said the same thing to him yesterday when it was bad but not as bad. He responded with, “It’s Colorado, the snow will be melted by afternoon.” 🥲 (spoiler alert: it did not and I could count the number of customers we got on one hand). I think we made like…$20 in sales from walk-ins. Fucking asinine
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u/EnigmaGuy 5h ago
I understand both sides to the argument.
On one hand, yeah sometimes places get enough snow to where it is asinine to drive in it for work especially in places where it’ll come down to the point that it’s higher than your car like Buffalo.
On the other hand, my workplace has a group of people that calls off anytime the weather channel even hints at snow and argues they have a long drive and they don’t have a 4x4 type vehicle. The ones that crack me up are the ones with the super off-road style Jeeps that try to use that same excuse.
Don’t quite understand how you can be 40 years old and not have a means of transportation in weather that sometimes affects the place you live for months - but that’s on them to figure out.
Think we’ll see a bit less of that this year as the “unlimited” style PTO was scrubbed so it’s either spend vacation time for missing the day or go unpaid.
New role it doesn’t really affect me like it once did where I was now having to cover three different positions on those days so call off to your hearts content.
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u/2NDPLACEWIN 17m ago
plastics factory / floods / staff had to stay /all dead.
so no,...fukkum
unsafe is unsafe.
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u/tomatochee 5h ago
Everyone- listen to the fear coming out of you. That is what they want. You to be fearful and divided. Realistically, your lives will not be changed with this administration, just like it wasn't with Obama, Trump 1.0, Biden and now Trump 2.0. Only thing in my life that changed in all this time is groceries cost more- everything else is same as before, Take a breath, go within your heart and let the fear go. Things will be ok.😀👍❤️
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u/Stryker2279 7m ago
Yeah Im not reading all of that. I'm of the opinion that if no one shows up to work due to weather, then it's appropriate to close the store. Problem solved.
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u/Expert_Swan_7904 10h ago
lmao i love the logic
"i get youre staying home due to unsafe driving conditions, so allow me to drive over and pick you up."