River Island

tigertiger_3

Hi, went to River Island today for few items taking my little one with me....who while up stairs in the changing rooms wanted to have a pee ( being potty trained ) explaining to the assistant I asked if he could use their toilets...NO..company policy !!!! The poor mite then peed himself as I could not get out of there any quicker.......struggling down the stairs with the buggy ( x2 assistants passing me on the way)

Well done river island 10/10 customer service ....NOT!!

Had to get this off my chest!!!!!!

Revenge_of_the_Red_Devil

Unlucky! Feel sorry for you - I know how awkward those kinda situations can be!

tigertiger_3

Oh well.....I should have let the little guy pee all over the floor and said ' go on then wipe it up ' he he he...........

Quackers

I'm a retail manager (on a bit more than £5p/h though ) and I'm afraid I wouldn't have let you use our toilet either.

It IS company policy. Why?

Because if a child would have fallen over a box of stock or a coat hanger lying on the floor there's a pretty good chance that the parent would want to put in a claim for compensation.

I've been working in retail for years and we used to have no problem letting little ones use the toilet as long as their parents came.

Times have changed - we have become 'compensation freaks' and to be honest, its just not worth saying yes for fear of something going wrong!

You really cannot go blaming the staff - it was just an unfortunate that your son got caught short.

Boomdocker

Im afraid we have been advised the same at our place of work. Its the public loos with the parent taking them only or nothing. Sadly compensation culture has taken over from common sense.

So sorry to hear about what happened to you little lad though.

Quackers

ts_aly2000 wrote:

Such forward thinking intelligent people these shop managers on £5p.h. All that weilding responsibilty and power, and no decisions to make. Must be so rewarding and must offer such a sense of human achievment at the end of each day. Being nice to others is about all there is left and some people can't even manage that they're so miserable and thick.

I'm a lovely retail manager thank you very much.:p

There's nothing quite like tarring everyone with the same brush is there? :rolleyes:

tigertiger_3

Still think it was absolutely c**p, company policy or not my little one could actually see the toliet as the door had opened (and there were no boxes.etc..all very nice, clean and spacious)...how could the assistant be so cruel even when he was saying toilet toilet!....what about compensation when a child wees on the floor and another customer slips on it???????????

I dont work in retail, but work in a busy department where there are a lot of public around and if a mother came to ask me if they could use a staff toilet I would be willing 100%...I would go into the toliets with them for safety. Risk assessed or not.

grex9101

Sorry, but you either put the little one in nappies for shopping trips or you check out the nearest public loos.

What would have happened if the shop DID NOT have a toilet?

Exactly, the shop acted within their rights - it's a fact of life i'm afraid.


And I bet if anything had gone wrong, you'd have sued the shop?! Would their insurance have paid out? NO - you would have been an unauthorised person in that area.

sarahlouise210

grex9101 wrote:

Sorry, but you either put the little one in nappies for shopping trips or you check out the nearest public loos.

What would have happened if the shop DID NOT have a toilet?

Exactly, the shop acted within their rights - it's a fact of life i'm afraid.


And I bet if anything had gone wrong, you'd have sued the shop?! Would their insurance have paid out? NO - you would have been an unauthorised person in that area.

Oh it sounds so easy in an ideal world ! If you put a child that is potty training in a nappy then what is the point of training them? It is easy to say you should find a public toilet - have you tried it with a toddler wetting themselves while you try and make your way out of a crowded shop and then to the nearest toilet which will be ages away. Little children do not know that they need to go until they actually need to go - the world has gone mad! And not everone is the sort of person that would sue if an incident occurred.

hollydays

Some rules were made to be ignored.
I would rather use my own common sense and initiative and risk getting taken to task for it later.Have we become a nation of yes men (and women).

zappomatic

I hate this culture that is coming in where shops won't do something for a customer or let someone in need use their toilet for insurance reasons. The world is going mad but there are still some out there where common sense rules the day.

Here's the official Waitrose policy (lifted from the Branch Operating Procedures manual):

If there are no customer toilets in the branch, make sure that all Partners are trained to deal sensitively with requests to use the toilet and that an appropriate person escorts the customer to and from the staff toilets instead.

Young children shopping with an adult should be accompanied by the Partner and the adult.