A security guard was baffled after he stated a new job and turned up on the first day right on time, only to be told off.
Writing on Reddit, the man explained he had arrived to the shop he worked at at 10am as stated on his contract, but his manager said he should have got there even earlier.
He wrote:
“I get there at exactly 10AM, and ask to place my belongings in the backroom. I was in the room for a few minutes max, and then came back out to man the door. However, in that time I guess many customers had already come in and one of the sales staff had to play security.
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“On my lunch break, the manager of the store approached me and asked if next time I could come to a little bit earlier next time so that by the time I put all my belongings down I can be in front of the store at 10AM.
“I told her no, that if I’m rostered to start at 10AM then I will show up at 10AM, and that if they want me to come earlier then the store would have to arrange that with the security company. I’m not getting paid to come earlier so I really don’t see why I’m required to. She got huffy with me and said that the sales staff aren’t trained to be security, and with the popularity of the store every morning there will be people lining up waiting to go inside, and that I needed to be here earlier because of that.
“She said that it really wasn’t hard to come a few minutes earlier, and that it wasn’t fair to come ‘kust on time’.
But the man wasn’t happy about that arrangement. He added: “I know it’s not hard to come a little earlier, but I feel it’s more about the principle - if you want someone to come earlier then make that clear through the hours. I told her such and she just sighed and walked away. We didn’t talk for the rest of the day.
Responding, lots of people thought he was wrong to cut it so fine.
One user said: “At every job I have had, if you are scheduled to start work at 10 that means that at 10 on the dot you are on the floor available to work.
“If you’re in the back putting away your belongings then you aren’t working. You weren’t working at 10, you started somewhere around 10:05.”
And a second added: “In every job I’ve had the start time is when I’m expected to be ready to work, not walking in the door.
“If your job is to man the front door and you are scheduled to be there at 10 am, then I would expect you to be at the door at 10 am.
A third wrote: “Your start time indicates when you start getting paid. That means you are in position and ready to start working at that time.
Why should your employer pay you to put your stuff in a locker?”
But others thought he was in the right. One said:
“Screw jobs that nickel and dime you like that for less than five minutes. If they want you there at 10 too, they should schedule it that way.
“Don’t expect your job to be happy about it though, especially since they already pulled you aside to talk about it. Pick your battle.”
Another said: “Why should you give the company even 5, 10, 15 minutes of your day when they are not paying for it? This type of mentality is what leads to our bosses that we owe them more of our time, not commitment or more attention to our jobs than what they pay for.”
Whether he is right or wrong, we doubt he’s going to get employee of the month.
