I work at a retail store. I trust the managers a lot. Something happened the other day which I've decided I am going to raise with them. A supervisor told me that if I need to do another refund because of a mistake, I will be written up. What happened was I was working on a till and someone left an item they had purchased. I thought it belonged to the next customer and charged them for it. I try to guard against this by saying "I have scanned 10 items, is this everything?" but still this mistake happened. With COVID we're letting customers do their own bags. Also, there's a big screen facing the customer with a list of scanned items.
When the supervisor told me if it happened again I would be written up, he said it in front of many customers (and coworkers) and one of the customers I know from outside of work.
Also I'm relatively new so I find this rather harsh even if I wasn't. I've had to get a refund 3 or 4 times since I started a month ago, but the other times were caused by something different.
I had been expecting to work with the managers who hired me, but they are usually not in the store. I would like to send them the email of
Hi Manager A and Assistant B:
Something happened yesterday I would like to bring to your attention. Something was scanned in incorrectly and I had to get a supervisor (Bob) to do a refund. In front of the customers and colleagues, Bob said if it happened again I would be written up. I have several issues with this. First, in the hiring process getting "written up" was never discussed and I was led to believe this place was forward thinking with "level headed individuals". Second, I think it's the right thing to do to refund a customer if they mistakenly purchased an item, I made a mistake, or a machine malfunctioned (which often happens). Penalizing an employee for fixing a mistake seems counterproductive. Also, Bob said I would get written up next time in front of lots of people, one of which happened to be my friend from outside of work. Assuming he signed a confidentiality agreement, this would have been a breach.
Please confirm you have received this e-mail.
yuftre111
I'm afraid this comes off as overly demanding. Also, there's been other issues. Should I include anything else on, or is this enough? For example I notice everyone's trying to boss each other around and get into each other's work.
For example, a little while later, the security guard brought my some items and told me to include them in the next persons order. I did so. Then the person on the next till saw what I did, assumed it was a mistake, and called the supervisor to do a refund.
After the store cooled down I had a private talk with Bob. I felt we were both honest but didn't agree. He basically said his job, as defined by management, is to write people up when they keep making mistakes.
I don't mean to be defensive but I'm not sure if including the item is "my fault". I don't like playing the blame game but sometimes I think it's important to be realistic. If someone put an item in the wrong basket and the other customer paid for it, I don't think this would be the cashiers fault.
EDIT: I'm a bit surprised from some of the answers. No this isn't my first job, though it's been awhile since I've worked in retail. A lot of answers seem to assume management isn't interested in making things better. I don't believe this to be the case. According to here, it's the right thing to do to dispute a write up you don't think is objectively fair, but I guess this only should be done when the write up is finalized.