Tired of the situation and unfair labor practice or standard for the markets.
It has come down to this. I have been with kroger about 2 weeks shy of 25 years. All in the meat department. The last ten years has been the worse as far as the help situation, at least in the Dallas Area. One learns to deal with it and you have the choice to do the best you can and above or just get by and say the hell with it. Have seen many time where management fears doing what is right or called for because of two words. OVER TIME. Case in piont that I face at 526 is this. Have one kid that needs to go and not be on the team but management will not follow up and do the documentation, discipline, suspension (s) and /or termination when it is called for. It is not a matter of the union that scares management ( not just my store but other store also) as it is the understaffed and paying overtime in the markets.
Take one case in my store alone. One clerk that has a history of miss dating , product left out over night, tardiness, no-call/no-shows and unexcused absences. In the last two weeks we have documentation to be done on quality of work but it is not done. $1100 worth of damaged product and miss dating and they can not terminate him because they have never done documentation when asked in the past. Ten straight days of unexcused days off with two of them as no-call/no-shows. Those was documented and could be enough for a suspension or termination. But nothing is done. Why? Because it is a holiday weekend, one other cutter is in the hospital and another key member will not be back intil Sunday from knee replacement.
Forty two hours of overtime was from the result of this one clerk not wanting to show up for work. The excuse was car trouble. Could almost be understood except he lives where there is public transportation. He was left to work Wednesday and on Thursday called and said he may not be able to work on Friday and Saturday because of still more car trouble. Have no problem covering the shifts and working the overtime when some one has a legitimate excuse for not being able to come to work but at what point do you draw a line and say enough is enough because management will not do anything about is because of the OVER TIME it will occur.
Now two things will happen here. The unions will be made the bad guys here because they will get the workers job back because Kroger is afraid to do the documentation/ discipline in a timely and proper manor. The second is that when other workers ( thru out other departments ) Are disciplined properly then there union reps will be able to get their jobs back because of the unfair practice of not disciplining one individual fairly and letting things go in the order of short handedness and over time.
Now do not get me wrong. I love this job and Kroger. I have put 25 years in and intend on another ten to fifteen before I retire. But when will there ever be fair and equal treatment for discipline of employees ? Or will it be that Market managers will have to be forced to cover the shifts, maintain standards with less hours ( because there is no consistent discipline ) and grow sales and OSAT scores all why developing poor and fatigued attitudes over time. There is and always be a difference between working short handed , from lack of help, and working short handed because management at any store will let a situation continue like this.
The opinion of this is all my own and may not reflect that of anyone other than my own. Or Does it?
Employees put up with it because most of them aren't familiar with the contract or don't care. If employees would file grievances and know the contract inside and out and speak up things might change. Until then, management does what they want, treats people different, they have favorites, bend the rules etc.
