Confessions of a Courtesy Clerk

Backstabbing

Brath — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 22:52:16 +0000

Which, I’m sure takes place everywhere and this isn’t really associated with just courtesy clerks, I wanted to talk about that a little here. Around the store, there are phones that employees can call and put in anonymous tips about another employee’s conduct. Good for the company in terms of money. Bad for the employee structure. I personally feel a pull towards other employees in order to fill the time between clocking in and clocking out, yet I feel a sense that I need to remain distant as I have this nagging suspicion of everyone. Several instances I have overheard others complaining to the supervisors about the conduct of another when they had once played it cool and nice with that employee. It gets to the point where no one can trust anyone else, or at least, the new employees cannot be trusted, or the employees who are looking for advancement. This doesn’t add to the general “family” feel of the employee structure and creates more of a division.

Never happened

Brath — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 20:20:26 +0000

Apparently, my name was removed from the position I had requested. I received no feedback from my request. It is as if my request never happened. They even replaced the position sheet with a new one, completely negating my request. I was tempted to put my name back up but to hell with it.

Sweep logs

Brath — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 20:23:17 +0000

Where to begin? It’s been a week since my last update, and this is due to Vons clamping down on everyone, or at least, me. I’ve been working at Vons for going on a year now and have yet to receive a warning, yet in the past week, I’ve received two. Both warnings are trivial and only based off of Vons’ own scoring system. Neither of the warnings had to do with customer service problems. Vons seems to be so closely attached to their own importance that they miss what’s important: the customer. I like helping customers, even if some can be a pain. It’s the ones that really appreciate what I’m doing that makes it all worthwhile. And while these self-induced rules deal with the customers, it’s their strict adherence to them that makes them lose sight of what the rules are there for. For instance:

We have a little task called the sweep log. Courtesy clerks are tasked with walking around the store every 20 minutes, then come back and log it into the system. Well, when things are getting hectic, it’s sometimes hard to pull away from helping the customers at the check stands to go walk around the store, uselessly, helping no one. In the night in question, I had to cover four check stands all by myself, customers coming through the lines like they were giving away ice cream and booze, and the sweep log alarm goes off. Now, instead of pulling myself away from bagging, I stay. I ended up missing three sweeps in a row. Two days later, I get called into the office and receive a written verbal warning (why call it verbal if they have to write it down?). Apparently, the sweep log is more important than helping with bagging, which I thought was the main focus of my job. Therefore, since that day, I’ve concentrated solely on the sweep and have, at many times, dropped what item I had in my hand to go do the sweep. If this is what they want, then this is what they’ll get.

Rules are rules in the corporate mindset. I did learn something though: leave no evidence. Sweep logs, go-backs, carts, all leave something behind saying that I did or didn’t do something. Helping customers leaves no evidence. Thus, do everything with a paper trail and forget the customer, which I think is the worst action to take, but I can only do so much by myself, and I have to protect myself. The customers will just have to fend for themselves.

By the way, those 40 minutes without a sweep didn’t cause the store to collapse. All was well when I took my walk after things had calmed down. Also, the night crew was there, stocking shelves, and me walking around the store with 10 pairs of eyes already covering the floor is pointless.

Thank you

Brath — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:18:28 +0000

It actually started out as a good day. My first customer had a kid, young man, who after unloading the cart for his mother, walked over to me, said “Thank you, sir” and asked if he could help me bag. I said no, but it was just that act of asking, especially in such a polite manner, really made my day. The other customers after that seemed to have a politeness that was rare, or at least, I noticed it more after that boy. There is something to be said about those two words that hold such a powerful quality that can’t be written down. It adds to be meaningless and repetitive tasks that seem to drag along forever. Two words changed my day, and until next time, I’ll still have them.

Uneventfulness

Brath — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 19:11:39 +0000

Last night was uneventful. It’s a problem underlining all jobs sometimes. Being one of the footstools, however, we must find something to do in order to keep the supervisors from inventing ways of keeping us busy. At one time in the past, I had to clean out the catch trays in all the check stands. The nastiest thing I’ve had to do since starting work at Vons, and this includes having to clean the dry milk from all the milk shelves (there are a lot of shelves). Anyway, I’ve developed a repertoire to look busy by doing the dumbest things, and I think all courtesy clerks need to learn and to think of ways of avoiding the inventiveness of the supervisors (and managers as well). Doing go-backs is easy if done properly and without too much sluggishness. Going outside to bring in the carts is a nice way to get out of the store so they can’t call you on the intercom. Walking around to all the stands and putting all the magazines back in order is good and makes things look better. Cleaning the area before the belt on the stands makes for a good show. Following a customer around asking if they need help then helping them even when they say they don’t need help is somewhat funny when they keep saying thank you and try to walk away, yet I keep following them around, pointing out things they could buy.

Better than you

Brath — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 02:34:11 +0000

Last night, a customer had their stuff bagged by another courtesy clerk. All her food went into only two bags. On her rush to leave, she apparently didn’t want to push the cart anymore, so she picked up the two bags and left, leaving the cart sit there, in the middle of the road, also blocking the register aisle. Why couldn’t she push the cart back to the cart corral? She would have to walk right past it on the way out of the store. However, she didn’t, and this happens many times in a night. Sometimes, they’ll leave it where this lady did, in the middle of the road. Other times, they’ll leave it in the back of the register, blocking people from even entering the stand. Going back to my previous post, I’m here to help, not serve. Now, I need to take time from bagging to remove the cart and return it. Then run back to continue bagging. Coming in late for bagging, when most of the stuff is already checked, creates a whole new problem. The customer will just stand there and watch me bag rather than help. They won’t even lift a finger and nudge their fat ass to pick up a bag of chips. The watchers really annoy me, and I’ll usually drop their eggs in the basket or place them in a spot so that they’ll fall between two bottles of soda on their way out. Other things to do: pop the top of the cleaner and leave the top hanging out of the bag or smash the bread with my fingers when I put it in the bag.

Poop on the seat

Brath — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 08:18:29 +0000

Yep, I had to clean off poop last night. It wasn’t much, but it was still there. Why can’t the person who did it clean it off? If they were at home, they would. Why not here? I’ve come to the realization that people act completely different when they are away from their home. It’s as though everyone else is here to serve them. It’s everyone else’s job to do so. I’m sorry to say, but that’s not my job. I’m here to help, not serve. I have many examples of this “master-servant” attitude that many (not all) customers tend to have toward courtesy clerks, and this poop on the seat is just the beginning.

Funny thing happened at work

Brath — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:12:26 +0000

As usual, Mercedes and BMWs will park in the handicap spots, even though they aren’t handicapped, at least not physically. They also have the tendency to park as far away as they can (I guess this will somehow protect their car from damage.) Anyway, last night, a Mercedes parked in the handicap spot, but not just parked there, straddled across two spots, including the spot with the blue lines. The guy who gets out of the car ran to the door, so obviously he was not handicap. I looked at his car and noticed an oddity about his license plate. It wasn’t one; it was drawn to look like one. Yep, he apparently lost his other one, so he drew a new one. Everything was there: proper colors, cursive state name, tags. Everything that I wanted to do to his car was taken from me since it was already done.

Confessions

Brath — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 17:33:08 +0000

My attempt to part some wisdom for courtesy clerks, future ones, and the people that have to deal with them. We are the lowest among the Safeway family (except maybe the bailer, which I also had the privilege of doing for 3 months), yet we are also the most utilized and overlooked. I put my name down for another position, so I’m not sure how long this part of the blog will last.