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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To close at closing time?

127 replies

Bananafritter · 17/12/2018 21:08

I’m pretty sure I’m not but the reactions you get from some people you’d think I am!

I work in a retail store inside a shopping centre. It’s a popular clothes shop. Our shop closes an hour earlier than most other shops in the centre at normal times of the year. At the moment some shops in the centre are open much later for Christmas shopping however our Christmas shopping times don’t kick in till next week.

I often get abuse from customers in the 10 minutes before the shop closes as we can no longer let new customers in the door, or into the fitting rooms. Tonight it was particularly bad, with several people verbally abusing me (as if I set the closing times and not head office).

The simple fact of the matter is that staff don’t get paid after the shop closes therefore we can’t keep serving people with unpaid staff. On the more practical side people have buses to catch, lifts waiting, kids to get home to. It’s not fair that staff have to wait.

Is it unreasonable to close a shop at the time we say we close? I’d be interested to hear opinions from people who try to argue their way into shops past closing time.

OP posts:
Mayrhofen · 17/12/2018 22:12

DD used to work at one of the young fashion chains, she got this all the time. She said people even used to nip under half closed shutters and would bang on the shutters before opening on Boxing Day sales.

Polarbearflavour · 17/12/2018 22:12

It’s very much this attitude that because you work in customer service you don’t count as a human being with feelings or a home to go to!

It’s bizarre. When I was in reception class in infant school, I thought that my teacher lived in the school! I think some customers think staff are robots and are always in the store / being recharged in the back room.

Lazypuppy · 17/12/2018 22:14

I was a retail manager and k changed my staffs shifts so they worked 15mins past closing time to not only tidy but also incase this situation happened.

So they would work 9:15-6:15 instead of 9-6. Only need 1 manager and 1 member of staff,everyone else could start at 9 or whatever.

Can you do that? As manager surely you'll be in charge of your rotas?

Chouetted · 17/12/2018 22:15

@MutedUser Not the point of the thread, but please don't do that. Its not fair, and it's disabilist. I get pretty upset when I walk into a shop, accidentally speak too loudly, say, when asking "where are your X?" and get refused service "until you stop shouting" . And people are always so very aggressive to me about it, as if its some personal affront to them that I misjudged the volume of my voice.

BackforGood · 17/12/2018 22:16

However saying that, we have a big sign over the fitting room on Boxing Day stating that the fitting room is closed and people will still clamber through it, push it aside etc to gain access to the fitting rooms. Many people just seem to think that rules don’t apply to them

Eh? You are selling clothes, but people can't use the fitting room you haven, to try them on, to see if they fit / look nice or not before they buy them ? Confused

Whereas there is never any reason to be abusive, I think you - or whoever is making decision for your shop - ABU, tbh. If a shopping centre was advertising it was 'late opening for Christmas' and I'd arranged to get out of work early, get someone else to pick up / feed/ look after the dc, battle through the traffic to get there, managed to park, and then found the shop was shut, I wouldn't be too impressed. Unfotunate that you are the person passing on that news and can see you don't want to be blamed as the messenger, but surely you can understand why they are annoyed ?
Same with the stopping people going in during opening hours tbh. I know it's annoying, but you (as a whole staff) need to go back to management and let them know that the shop can't be open until 5pm (for example) if they are only paying staff until 5pm. They need to know that there is a 15 / 30 / however long it takes buffer time after customers can come in to the shop and the time staff are paid to work until, until they go home. That is your issue not really the customer's.

Original poster
Bananafritter · 17/12/2018 22:19

I had a man this evening tell me it “wasn’t very christmassy” of me to not let him and his wife in at closing time!

Lazypuppy - that sounds like a good solution! I’m not a manager unfortunately- but I may suggest it

OP posts:
MutedUser · 17/12/2018 22:21

Chouetted say what now. I’m disabilist for not allowing people to roar in my face when I refuse to return an item or when I don’t have something in stock. Or people calling me a bitch cunt you name it. That is bizarre it really is . I wasn’t talking about people who have loud voices asking where something is. Geez mumsnet get stranger by the day .

smartcarnotsosmartdriver · 17/12/2018 22:21

@Bananafritter don't you realise? Everything is your fault? You get paid probably nowhere near enough to be blamed for all of their problems. Something out of stock? Your fault! Something faulty? Your fault! Shop shuts earlier than they would like? Your fault! Oh and you can't point out that it isn't your fault because you're the "face of the company". I do not miss retail.

ChesterGreySideboard · 17/12/2018 22:26

Eh? You are selling clothes, but people can't use the fitting room you haven, to try them on, to see if they fit / look nice or not before they buy them ? confused

I’m guessing it’s Next. Standard practice in their sale.

TheHobbitMum · 17/12/2018 22:27

Most shops I've ever worked in have shut 5mins early as time after isn't paid. In my present retail job we've only recently started to be paid for the time after closing as contracts were changed so we are paid by the minute not 30mins/hourly blocks.

I honestly don't understand why customers can't be civilised to shop/supermarket staff. What really pisses me off though is those who come into a supermarket a few mins before close and try to do a full shop. We have announcements to inform them that the store is closing and they still get shitty when we explain they have to go to the tills. Do a full shop with plenty of time to spare FFS

MutedUser · 17/12/2018 22:27

It is not the OP fault that her head office set the hours and many of the people working in headoffice are clueless about what shops need. Also to suggest that headoffice will just accept that all shops need to pay staff for half an hour after closing and that they will listen and grant this is madness. Highstreet shops are dying off with online shopping can’t afford to pay staff more than they are .

Original poster
Bananafritter · 17/12/2018 22:28

I just wrote a reply and deleted it all! Oops.

The reason the fitting rooms aren’t open on Boxing Day are for the same reason returns aren’t accepted on Boxing Day (for most shops in my experience)

Boxing Day is absolute pandemonium as it is, without the added problem of processing clothes at the fitting room and till to get them ready for the shop floor again.

Boxing Day is already the hardest day of retail, as everything needs done on Christmas Eve (which is crazy in itself). I suppose the trade off for cheap clothes in the Boxing Day sale is having to try the stuff on at home.

Again, I suppose these things can be annoying if you don’t understand why but just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean you can ignore the rules

OP posts:
Aridane · 17/12/2018 22:28

Being annoyed is no excuse to be verbally abusive to minimum wage retail staff.

So,would it be OK if they weren’t minimum wage staff??

Chouetted · 17/12/2018 22:30

@MutedUser You didn't say "roar in face", you said "raised voice", so i took you at your word. I'm genuinely glad it sounds strange to you, because it is, sadly, a reality that I have experienced. Not frequently, but often enough that I thought you were alluding to that sort of policy. Some places just really poorly train their staff, or don't train them at all.

CollyWombles · 17/12/2018 22:31

No YANBU, working in retail is horrible, nothing like it for putting you off people as a whole! Over the years I have had all sorts of abuse from entitled people that think retail staff are nothing more than servants and beneath them. You don't make the rules, so all you can is calmly refer them to an appropriate point of contact for their complaints and do your best to get the heck out of retail.

I strony recommend destressing by looking at all the funny memes online us retail staff would love to say to abusive customers but don't.

UnknownStuntman · 17/12/2018 22:34

I would bring back national service. Make everyone work in retail for six months. Maybe after having to deal with the general arseholery of the public en masse might make individuals treat retail/CS staff better.

MutedUser · 17/12/2018 22:35

Chouetted their is a massive difference in having a loud voice and raising your voice in a aggressive manner . Which no one has to accept and I will continue to ask people who are abbusive to leave . If a member of staff has asked you to leave because you have a loud voice and you were simply asking a question that is not on.

MutedUser · 17/12/2018 22:36

*there

tillytrotter1 · 17/12/2018 22:36

Wherever you draw a line some smarty will try and abuse it.

I recall vividly Asda, Astley Bridge Bolton, 15:45 Christmas Eve, closing for 16:00, (I was looking for the reductions you always get around then!) One woman was going crazy at some helpless member of staff Why don't you have any fresh sprouts, don't you know it's ?????????? Christmas!!!!!
You can never over estimate the stupidity of the general public!

twattymctwatterson · 17/12/2018 22:42

Of course a thread about retail staff being abused by customers is full of people telling the person who has no control over policy that this wouldn't happen if only they had better signage, later opening hours and continued to allow people into the shop until the minute they close (which would mean people queuing to be served after closing time). It's never understandable or acceptable to abuse someone doing their job.

LannieDuck · 17/12/2018 22:45

YABU - if the opening hours are 9-5, I would expect to be able to go into a shop up to 5. But that's not you being U, it's your managers. If they want shop assistants to tidy/clean up after the shop is closed, they need to pay you an extra 15 mins to do so. Or officially close the shop earlier.

I've also had a poor experience with changing rooms being closed early. I was happily wandering around completely unaware that this particular shop closed 30 mins before all the other shops in the centre. I had a massive pile of clothes to try on and went over to the fitting rooms to find them closed. No announcements at all. If they'd given me some warning, I'd have stopped browsing and tried on the 1 or 2 things I'd already picked up.

KonekoBasu · 17/12/2018 22:49

I worked in a large department store ten years ago. Full time workers got paid an extra 15 minutes for cashing up. Part time workers got nothing, and as my supervisor hated me I often cashed up every day. Minimum of an hour and a quarter unpaid every week, more if there were imbalances or last minute awkward customers.

The op is not bu.

jxnx · 17/12/2018 23:31

Reminds me of working for the post office at Christmas the queues we were paid until 5pm (closing time) and at 5.10pm people still joining the queue ignoring the signs, barrier and verbal we are closed.

slashlover · 17/12/2018 23:31

YABU - if the opening hours are 9-5, I would expect to be able to go into a shop up to 5

If the hours are 9-5 then you should be out the door by 4:59:59 at the very latest.

FuckingYuleLog · 17/12/2018 23:46

Surely it’s common sense that if a shop is closing at 7 you need to eat there a bit before. If you walk in at 7 the shop isn’t going to be able to close at 7 is it? Not letting people in who are just going to be turned straight away is sensible imo.

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