E-Schedule will supposedly be implemented by the end of October in the division I'm in, and I've noticed it be mentioned on here by some that the whole point of E-Schedule is to limit a person's hours to below twenty-something if that person is part time. Obviously Kroger as a company will never admit that if that's the case, but I'm curious to hear from those that have E-Schedule if that seems to be what's happening at their stores. If a CSM is properly trained on how to use E-Schedule and a person is fairly high when it comes to seniority and also has almost open availability, then when the CSM runs E-Schedule, that person should still get between thirty and forty hours a week, shouldn't he or she?
I have to say, I'm kind of not looking forward to this change. I'm not interested in having my work schedule available online because for one, there might be a difference in the in-store schedule and the online schedule. It's also not that much of a convenience that I can change my availability/request days off online as opposed to in-store, either. Instead, all I have to look forward to is potentially weird shifts and a potential cutback of hours. Maybe that won't happen, but what I've read here about E-Schedule doesn't exactly leave me with an optimistic feeling of everything's going to be same regardless of whether the schedule is being written by Sked or E-Schedule.
Limiting hours has nothing to do with the rollout of eschedule. If they want to cap everybody's hours they'll do it regardless of what program writes the schedule. I wouldn't worry about the schedule changing because it doesn't get posted online until the time that it is contractually obligated to be locked in anyways.
I work part-time and I'm always offered more hours up to 40.
I used to work 40 hours before my college classes started. I voluntarily cut my hours back to 15 so I can have time studying and commute.
Then E-schedule rolled out and I was bumped up to 20 hrs. (though this week will be 21 since I switched days with someone so I can work a certain day).
I think the whole keeping people under 28 hours isn't a company policy, it might be a store policy but that's it. I've had 40 hours 3 weeks in a row (vacations and stuff) but even without vacations I've gotten 30 hours on some weeks. I do get bumped down to 20 some hours sometimes, but still.
At my store in Michigan, all the part timers saw a loss in hours, not to mention the schedules were not in conformance to seniority. Heck, some people got dropped to 8 or 10 hours. From what I've been hearing, this has been happening at the stores all around me. So, maybe dropping below 28 hours is indeed the new standard.
I think the whole keeping people under 28 hours isn't a company policy, it might be a store policy but that's it. I've had 40 hours 3 weeks in a row (vacations and stuff) but even without vacations I've gotten 30 hours on some weeks. I do get bumped down to 20 some hours sometimes, but still.
No, it has to do with Obamacare. Something about companies having to shell out significantly more for the insurance for people who average over 28 hrs, even if they are still part-time.
I think the whole keeping people under 28 hours isn't a company policy, it might be a store policy but that's it. I've had 40 hours 3 weeks in a row (vacations and stuff) but even without vacations I've gotten 30 hours on some weeks. I do get bumped down to 20 some hours sometimes, but still.
No, it has to do with Obamacare. Something about companies having to shell out significantly more for the insurance for people who average over 28 hrs, even if they are still part-time.
Correct. So, the company doesn't even want to chance it, so they're trying to make sure to average everyone out below 28 hours as much as possible.
I believe e schedule is a tool to limit part time people because every time we try to give people more than 28 hours it warns us that we are giving them too many hours but you can override it though.
I've also heard managers can only override the schedule so many times before they receive some kind of penalty.
I've never heard anything about that. I have to make overrides all the time when I do the schedule, nothing has ever been said about it. Whoever told you that is either ignorant or trying to scare someone.
I've also heard managers can only override the schedule so many times before they receive some kind of penalty.
I've never heard anything about that. I have to make overrides all the time when I do the schedule, nothing has ever been said about it. Whoever told you that is either ignorant or trying to scare someone.
well I have heard the same thing in my store. That a dept head or manager can only override so many times then some kind of action is taken. I dont think calling someone ignorant is an appropraite thing to do. We are all learning this
The purpose of E Schedule is to make sure the right people are working when they needed for customer service. The 25 hour thing is to make sure that no part time employees qualify for insurance when Obama Care goes into effect. If, as a part time employee, you have been getting more than 25 hours a week, you can expect thet NOT to happen starting around 2014.
I've also heard managers can only override the schedule so many times before they receive some kind of penalty.
I've never heard anything about that. I have to make overrides all the time when I do the schedule, nothing has ever been said about it. Whoever told you that is either ignorant or trying to scare someone.
well I have heard the same thing in my store. That a dept head or manager can only override so many times then some kind of action is taken. I dont think calling someone ignorant is an appropraite thing to do. We are all learning this
I called whoever originally made that statement ignorant, not the previous poster. Calm down. I've gone through all the training to make a schedule, heard the do's, don'ts and can'ts...no one has EVER said anything about amount of overrides. The only thing you can't have is a hand written schedule.
I just started a month ago and have known no other way than with eschedule. This week I have 34 hours, and am scheduled for 5 of the 5 days that I am "available" and yes i'm part time.
Thanks for all the replies. Definitely gives me a lot to think about. This is the first week our store will be utilizing E-Schedule and a lot of people I talked to are nervous because apparently our CSM was visited by two people from corporate and they sat down with him to do the schedule this week with the new software and word is they told him to eliminate some shifts that people are scheduled for every day and to basically punish those that have limited availabilities due to school/second job/other obligations by giving those hours to people with more open availabilities. One person I talked with said the store manager told him his morning shifts are no longer guaranteed even though he has seniority over pretty much everybody since he's been working at the store since 1995.
Don't really know what to expect, but I really wish the schedule would just be posted and people could see what it actually looks like. If it's really bad, it might finally be the last straw for many of us that work there because the pay is already poor and if the hours get cut way back, the paychecks aren't going to cut it any more. I, like others, need to work a minimum of thirty hours a week just to bring home a decent paycheck. If corporate wants to eliminate shifts and bring down a person's hours just because he or she might not be available every hour of every day to work (should a person really be punished just because there are maybe two hours out of the whole day he or she can't work?), then our store had better prepare for a big hiring fair because a lot of people will quit.
I think the purpose of E-Schedule is simply for the explicit glory of technology. It doesn't actually matter whether it actually works or is a good idea.
Kroger has a serious hard on for technology. Lanehawk, Quevision, CAO, Advantage Checkout, etc. It doesn't even matter.
If corporate wants to eliminate shifts and bring down a person's hours just because he or she might not be available every hour of every day to work (should a person really be punished just because there are maybe two hours out of the whole day he or she can't work?), then our store had better prepare for a big hiring fair because a lot of people will quit.
That's the whole idea behind it and key retailing-- to get people to quit. Kroger wants to go to revolving door of employees so they never have to pay more than minimum wage and they don't have to pay any health insurance.
If corporate wants to eliminate shifts and bring down a person's hours just because he or she might not be available every hour of every day to work (should a person really be punished just because there are maybe two hours out of the whole day he or she can't work?), then our store had better prepare for a big hiring fair because a lot of people will quit.
That's the whole idea behind it and key retailing-- to get people to quit. Kroger wants to go to revolving door of employees so they never have to pay more than minimum wage and they don't have to pay any health insurance.
So instead, every time someone is hired, spend $1,000 (on someone that will either quit shortly thereafter or be fired) and then spend another $1,000 over and over again. That would seem to burn a bigger hole in the company's pocket than anything. At least, approximately $1,000 is the figure I've heard thrown around at my store concerning new hires. Kroger has good reason to fear competitors like ALDI and Costco when it continues to blow money left and right while tearing down the morale of the employees and caring less and less about the customers that have made the corporate executives filthy rich in the past.
Idk what advantage checkout is but Lanehawk is this system of cameras under the checklanes that identify items under carts so they can be caught and rung up.
GenesisOne wrote:At least, approximately $1,000 is the figure I've heard thrown around at my store concerning new hires.
It's actually supposed to be closer to $3-4k
Ouch. I guess it still must be cheaper to have a "revolving door workforce" than maintain a stable one, then. I'm sure corporate has done the math and determined it's cheaper to essentially employ a temporary workforce as opposed to a long-term one.
On the subject of E-Schedule, I got a nice surprise today, as did a few others, but the majority of people that I work with aren't happy, and I can understand why. Today was the first day the schedule was posted using the E-Schedule software and it didn't change much in terms of hours or shifts for a few of us, but the majority of people I work with saw their hours really drop. I feel bad for them because I saw how unhappy they were, but I'm really relieved I'm still over thirty hours for the coming week. Hopefully that means my hours will remain relatively stable, even with the new scheduling software.
