Stores closing earlier than advertised time

Helix

I'm sure some customers do it on purpose and get a kick out of it. There was always one guy that came in at closing every night, he went through the normal tills and always wanted cigarettes from the Kiosk brought over, most of the time we had already started to put the shutters down on the Kiosk and then had to go through all the trouble of opening them again.

At first I thought fair enough maybe thats when he finishes work, but then he started doing the same thing on a Saturday and Sunday too when we closed earlier.

Middy

On the days I work til the store closes and on the kiosk, we are told to start locking away scratch cards, signing off the lottery terminal 5 minutes before the store closes. Then 2 minutes later, pull down the hatch. This means that those in the store at closing time are forced to go on the self scans and not messing about getting fags etc after paying for their food.

If we get a customer with a trolley, we put them through self scan, but switch off the bagging area scales so they scan their shopping quicker. Also its serves as a 'serves you right for coming in 10 mins before closing doing a trolley of shopping' tactic.

Before you ask, we are not allowed to switch off the bagging area scales during normal trading hours. Its going on the 'blue screen'.

pullenuk

I remember christmas eve when I was working on alcohol. This was my usual day off but because it was close to christmas I had to work to make sure the shelves were full.

We had to close at 7pm, ALL STAFF HAVE TO LEAVE THE BUILDING BY 7:15PM. No buts. So naturally we shut the doors at 6:30 as the store was full of customers doing massive shops (idiot ones I'm afriad, doing your christmas shop in the last hour before christmas is a bit silly!) Apart from people moaning, we stayed firm and refused entry. However at 7pm we still had people walking around the store so the store manager made an excellent PA call. "We are closed, all staff would like to enjoy christmas. Please go to the checkouts NOW. Our checkouts will be automatically switched off at 7:15pm, if you haven't paid for your shopping by this time, we are unable to process it, therefore you will not be allowed to have the goods. Merry Christmas!"

At 7:15pm people were just going to the checkout not taking it seriously. Sadly right on cue, off went the checkout systems. The manager got back on and said "Checkout systems are switched off, no more payments are accepted and we cannot give you what you have shopped. Please leave the building as we must secure it for Christmas and allow our staff home to their families."

Total classic and huge respect to the manager. About 50 customers didn't get their shopping, serves them right. They had several calls telling them to go to checkout, several staff helping them in the store getting bits for them encouraging them to hurry up and telling them they MUST pay by 7:15 or won't get it.

In the end the store wasn't secured until 7:30. We had to kick everyone out of the building as we had to enable the security systems.


Trading laws MUST be obeyed, if a store is closing, they only have a small amount of grace time and thats it. If they trade pass that time, they can lose licenses and be fined. Any fines they have to pay is actually paid by the customer!!! The money comes from the customer, so you will be paying the huge fines in prices of the products you are buying. Stop moaning, if the shop says close at 4pm, don't go running in at 3:55 and expect to complete payment by 4pm, usually its not possible!!!

moggymutt

Pullenuk, I think your manager was spot on, it's really not nice to be working late on Christmas Eve at the best of times, but idiots not letting you leave is not on. Good for him.

janiebaby29

thank goodness someone had the sense to say that , i too work on a sunday and customers really do not take a blind bit of notice of tannoy calls ,
i only get 20 mins break in a 10 to half four shift and i wanna go home ,
we too have familes and homes to get to

~Jem~

munchkette wrote: »

Old thread but I was fuming this evening after going to my local Tesco metro and finding the doors closed 10mins before closing time.

I get that staff are people too and they have homes to go to but that is not my problem as far as I'm concerned. I really don't see why half of this thread has been dedicated to retail workers complaining about customers coming in at the last minute and being inconsiderate. What time you start or finish is none of my concern. That is between you and the shop. My concern is if the shop states the opening hours are x until y hours. I expect to be able to enter the shop to purchase goods up until y hours. If not then it should be clearly stated on the door that the shop closes it's doors ten minutes early.

As someone below your post stated, there's 2 sides to the story.

BUT - as a customer, you only see ONE side of things.
Those who work in retail also go shopping so see BOTH sides, so in fact, we, as retail workers, have more right to post about anything to do with retail!

You can always tell when someone has never worked in a customer facing role as they always come out with a similar quote as 'it's not my problem'.

And for the person saying 'all stores should be the same', it can't happen. All stores are different and it also depends on the time of day/time of year/local events/the weather etc etc.

Untill you've worked in a shop, you have NO idea!

choclover

I work in a local shop which closes at 10pm, once the scratch cards (at around 9.55) have been put away and the shutter down on the cigarrettes we won't open it again. We only get paid until 10 and once the door is locked at 10 it takes us about 15mins to finish up, so if we have a hanger-on it uses up our own time. Makes me very :mad: when someone lingers at 9.55 with a basket full of stuff!

Middy

At my work, the regular Sunday checkout supervisor has employed a tactic which has worked - close the manned tills and cash them up. So if any customers do swan in at 3:40pm and do a shop, they have to go through self scan once the store closes. No exceptions! We do then put the self scans into a mode where the bagging area scales are switched off so it halves the time of scanning. It acts like a 'serves you right' ploy. Before anyone asks why can't we open another till once the store is closed is that head office will tell us off! Esp with a till that was never signed on during the day.

Some Sunday laggers are now starting to come in earlier.

chopps

All it needs is for shops to avoid confusion and put up clearly understandable closing time notices such as :
'Store closes at 4pm, last entry 3.45pm and pay the till staff for any extra minutes worked after 4pm. Simple.

The confusion arises when they just say 'open from 9-4' but some will close the doors at 3.45pm. and others anytime up to 4pm.

geordie_joe

chopps wrote: »

All it needs is for shops to avoid confusion and put up clearly understandable closing time notices such as :
'Store closes at 4pm, last entry 3.45pm

it won't work, you will still get people complaining that they arrived at 3:46 and couldn't get into the shop. Saying "other people were still shopping, why did they stop me"?

chopps wrote: »

and pay the till staff for any extra minutes worked after 4pm. Simple.

They won't do that, it's cheaper to stop paying staff at a certain time and then pushing them into working longer.

Plus many staff just want to get home, they don't want to stay to earn an extra few minutes wages. Also many are on means tested benefits, such as housing benefit. So if they stayed an extra half hour, and got paid an extra £3, they would get £3 less housing benefit so be no better off. They would still see it as working for no financial gain.

chopps wrote: »

The confusion arises when they just say 'open from 9-4' but some will close the doors at 3.45pm. and others anytime up to 4pm.

No, there is no confusion, there is a problem. That problem is people thinking shops should stay open for as long as it takes for them to do their shopping, even when they rush in at the last minute with a huge list.

To end it what is needed is a huge sign. One that says "Our tills shut down automatically at 4:00pm, so if you haven't paid for it by 4:00 pm, you're not getting it."