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[RejectReality]

I worked 23 1/2 hours once in the middle of 3 months where getting out in 16 hours felt alien. Company policy required a full 24 hours off if you worked 24 hours, so they herded us out like cattle at 23 1/2, sending management all over the warehouse tracking down people to make sure they got out in time. Standing there at the timeclock with a list, checking it off and saying, "See you in 8." Meanwhile: sanitation, maintenance, damage and returns, forklift drivers, office clerks, and basically any warm body in the building took over loading trucks, while upper management was doing Q.C.

The state had passed a $2 per pack tax increase on cigarettes, but made it so whatever you had in inventory wasn't subject to the tax. That meant every pack a store had on hand was going to make a guaranteed $2 profit as soon as the tax went into effect. Everybody spent every dollar they had on cigarettes for months. We would get a truck at 8 in the morning, and finally get the last of the cigarettes for it at 9 that evening. Loaded everything else down one side and stood around for hours to slowly drive pallets of cigarettes down the other when they showed up.

They literally hired armed guards in black SUVs to follow some of those trucks through their routes.

They gave us a $50 gift card after that summer of hell.

 

[Erozetta]

I worked 23 1/2 hours once in the middle of 3 months where getting out in 16 hours felt alien. Company policy required a full 24 hours off if you worked 24 hours, so they herded us out like cattle at 23 1/2, sending management all over the warehouse tracking down people to make sure they got out in time. Standing there at the timeclock with a list, checking it off and saying, "See you in 8." Meanwhile: sanitation, maintenance, damage and returns, forklift drivers, office clerks, and basically any warm body in the building took over loading trucks, while upper management was doing Q.C.

The state had passed a $2 per pack tax increase on cigarettes, but made it so whatever you had in inventory wasn't subject to the tax. That meant every pack a store had on hand was going to make a guaranteed $2 profit as soon as the tax went into effect. Everybody spent every dollar they had on cigarettes for months. We would get a truck at 8 in the morning, and finally get the last of the cigarettes for it at 9 that evening. Loaded everything else down one side and stood around for hours to slowly drive pallets of cigarettes down the other when they showed up.

They literally hired armed guards in black SUVs to follow some of those trucks through their routes.

They gave us a $50 gift card after that summer of hell.

Corporate... Gotta... I don't even know, deal with them at times, I guess? God they suck, lol.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

I worked 23 1/2 hours once in the middle of 3 months where getting out in 16 hours felt alien. Company policy required a full 24 hours off if you worked 24 hours, so they herded us out like cattle at 23 1/2, sending management all over the warehouse tracking down people to make sure they got out in time. Standing there at the timeclock with a list, checking it off and saying, "See you in 8." Meanwhile: sanitation, maintenance, damage and returns, forklift drivers, office clerks, and basically any warm body in the building took over loading trucks, while upper management was doing Q.C.

The state had passed a $2 per pack tax increase on cigarettes, but made it so whatever you had in inventory wasn't subject to the tax. That meant every pack a store had on hand was going to make a guaranteed $2 profit as soon as the tax went into effect. Everybody spent every dollar they had on cigarettes for months. We would get a truck at 8 in the morning, and finally get the last of the cigarettes for it at 9 that evening. Loaded everything else down one side and stood around for hours to slowly drive pallets of cigarettes down the other when they showed up.

They literally hired armed guards in black SUVs to follow some of those trucks through their routes.

They gave us a $50 gift card after that summer of hell.

Stories like this make me want to go hug my boss.
I stayed 2 hours late a few weeks ago to take care of something. Got flowers and a $100 Amazon gift card the next day.

 

[RejectReality]

Want another one? A tornado blew a large chunk of the warehouse roof off, and dumped it on the electric, computerized sortation system, destroying a large chunk of it. We were in there the next morning trying to send out what we could while they furiously worked on getting parts for the sortation system. More 20 hours per day weeks. As soon as they got that up and running a week or so later, they started running the system, still with nothing but tarps covering the cavernous hole in the roof.

Thunderstorms were rolling through on a daily basis.

We would have waterfalls pouring off the upper deck. They drilled holes through the upper deck to drain parts of it and made trash bag gutters to keep it from ( mostly ) pouring onto our heads. Most of the time, there was 2-3 inches of running water on the floor as it rushed out dock doors. Probably around 60 people from Servepro running scrubbers to pick up water or squeegees to push it out the dock doors faster. Sandbags futilely try to contain to deluge.

Then a battery on a forklift caught fire and torched an isolated part of the warehouse in the middle of the night, setting off the sprinklers.

Have you ever smelled long-term wet cardboard? I can tell you without a doubt it smells exactly like vomit, which is what pretty much the whole warehouse smelled like for months. That's on top of the nasty water that was purged out of the sprinkler systems when they went off, which smelled like sewage. That's on top of the mold and mildew.

Pizza every couple of days and... can you guess? A $50 gift card once the roof was finally back on and things got somewhat back to normal.

They would literally have someone step over your corpse to load your truck while they waited for the meatwagon to haul you off. I've got a photo I took that tickles me to no end. They periodically replace all the propaganda signs in the breakroom and hallways every so often. A few weeks ago, I finally managed to snap a picture I've been trying to get for years.

The "Beliefs and Values" sign in a trash bin. Highly illustrative.

 

[paulboulder]

Woman are as horny and pervert as men.

That's not a controversial statement on this website...

 

[TheLobster]

The "Beliefs and Values" sign in a trash bin. Highly illustrative.

Damn. Their chicken might be good, but they're clearly lacking in much more important areas

 

[RejectReality]

Damn. Their chicken might be good, but they're clearly lacking in much more important areas

Barely a drop in the bucket. LOL Every time someone within a 100 mile radius asks where I work, and I answer, the look on their face is the same sort of horrified sympathy they would have if they'd just asked how your grandma is doing when you just got home from the closed casket funeral. Unemployment offices all but automatically rubber stamp any claim because their layoff fake-out procedure is so consistently egregious. Temp agencies won't even send people there anymore.

But I'm not going to get built up to 5 weeks of vacation plus holidays and sick time anywhere else at this point before I die, so there I am. I always say my badge is an automatic insanity plea for anything short of genocide, and I didn't even get my 20 year one because it was during covid. Next year I'll be trading in my 15 for a 25. I still have 120+ hours left right now after taking 4 weeks and some random days. I've scheduled 80 off between now and the end of the year like I do every year, and I'll still be rolling over 50 some-odd ( more accumulated sick time + Thanksgiving and Christmas ) to start the process all over again, which begins with a week off in the first couple of weeks of January.

It's a shithole, but if you survive the first couple of years, it's hard to take the hit and go anywhere else.

 

[iwatchus]

I was an assistant manager for a convenience store while I was in college. I spent about a year working 41 1/2 hour weekends. 7 1/2 hours Friday evening and 17 hour days both Saturday and Sunday. Plus I didn't drive then, so it was a 40 minute walk each way each day on top of that. It sucked. And then they spared me by firing me, saying I hadn't carded someone under age.

 

[Erozetta]

But I'm not going to get built up to 5 weeks of vacation plus holidays and sick time anywhere else at this point before I die, so there I am.

And that is a big part of why I am still at my job, lol.

 

[TheRedChamber]

There are only three true Star Wars movies...

I agree that only three exist - A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back, and the version of Return of the Jedi with all the Ewoks replaced by Wookies.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

I agree that only three exist - A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back, and the version of Return of the Jedi with all the Ewoks replaced by Wookies.

In hindsight, everyone should have realized the Ewoks were the beginning of the end.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

And that is a big part of why I am still at my job, lol.

Same. Plus the flexibility of working mainly from home, and apart from a meeting or two most days, whenever I want. Six weeks leave including holidays, flexitime, but in the UK sick time is counted separately - can't really blame them for monitoring that closely after taking 18 days in a year, twice. At least I'm now old enough to retire early if I do get forced out.

I did have some months working on a crisis, 10-12 hour days in the office, up to 6 days a week. But anything outside 8am to 8pm was paid double, and anything beyond 8 hours a day was overtime, and my colleagues were wonderful, so I happily raked in the cash, given I could leave the office at midnight and still get a train home by 00.40. Given the spouse worked 11-7, me doing noon to 10pm or later meant we actually saw more of each other.

I have done voluntary work where we needed to get an abandoned building ready for a performance, so needed a fire safety certificate. Ended up pulling about 40 hours doing carpentry, sent myself home when I could see two circular saws instead of one. We got the fire officer to sign it off with 10 minutes to go, audience in their seats already...

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

In hindsight, everyone should have realized the Ewoks were the beginning of the end.

It changed things for me when I realized Ewoks were cannibals...

 

[Kelliezgirl]

It changed things for me when I realized Ewoks were cannibals...

And where did the dress they gave Leia come from?

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

And where did the dress they gave Leia come from?

I heard that the former owner lost a lot of weight and it just didn't fit any more, so...

 

[NuclearFairy]

I heard that the former owner lost a lot of weight and it just didn't fit any more, so...

Or maybe they had it laying around for their next human sacrifice.

 

[Statius]

In hindsight, everyone should have realized the Ewoks were the beginning of the end.

Some of us did, even at a young age

 

[Britva415]

Or maybe they had it laying around for their next human sacrifice.

I’d have figured, from the last human sacrifice.

 

[StillStunned]

Controversial opinion: a post starting with "Ah yes" is fifty percent likely to be humorous, fifty percent condescending.