Question about scheduling in fast food industry

[PatriotsGirl]

difficult child has only been being given about 3 days a week and they are not 8 hour days, either. She just found out she only has two nights this week. Obviously she needs to find another job.

Is that normal? To be given such little hours? Is it because she is new?

 

[Hound dog]

Likely it is due to business.

Our fast food places aren't doing such a booming business except at certain times (some of them not even then). Many employees aren't getting 8 hr days......hmm most that I know in fact. Most are scheduled for the rush times and the places are staffed with skeleton crews the rest of the time to save money.

 

[BusynMember]

Things aren't good now. Therefore, at least here, there is even a fight for hours at fast food places. You used to be able to just walk in to McDonalds and get a job and work as much as you wanted (for a low rate), but now, as jobs are not readily there, every job has takers.

 

[Signorina]

Probably not very busy and the new hours calculation for the ACA & the health care tax credit may come into play. We're keeping part timers to 19.5 hours p week or fewer and full timers to 37.5 or more based on the benefit guidelines. We're cutting out the 20-30 hours p/week positions because we can't afford to split a full time position among two or 3 people which used to be our preference & worked well for all involved.

 

[DDD]

I totally realize that this response is "a little" off topic but I think this is crazy. Little difficult child was "hired" by UPS along with his only friend. They were hired, given uniforms.........and THEN.....told that they will be called when needed. It is their responsibility to "meet up with the driver/truck" in a location by eleven. Weird part???? The location may be in a nearby city or a rural area outside our rural city. SO???? two young men in one car may be told to meet in two different locales and then dropped back "at the car" at seven PM. Hmmm...there is one old car and two young men. I don't know if I'm eager to hear how it goes or not??? difficult child (the Aspie) is the one with the car. His friend has a strong work record in customer service. Yikes........let's hope Divine intervention makes this work. DDD

 

[Signorina]

DDD- I heard they were putting on private contractors- is that what happened? Are they. "Runners?"

 

[dstc_99]

Short hours are real common not only in fast food but sometimes in retail as well. They bring in people to cover the busy times and then keep the long term well trained staff there as skeleton crew in between.

As for the UPS thing it sounds like they are as needed workers. The cost of the training and the uniform is probably less than the cost of overtime so UPS wins in the long run.

 

[Josie]

My daughter is a fast food worker. She is also only getting two nights a week now and she would like to get three. When school first started, she was getting 5 when she only wanted 3, but now they have hired more workers. They have also scheduled her for nights when she asked to be off and her schedule is different every week. I think it would be hard to have to juggle two jobs with such an unpredictable schedule but she knows some who do.

She used to have another job at a different sit-down restaurant. They would put her on the schedule, then send her home after an hour or two, if they weren't busy. She had to pay to park so it wasn't even worth working there.

She is a high school student so I am not unhappy that she is only working 2 nights per week.

 

[DammitJanet]

When Billy was only part time at RS, he only got 2 or 3 days a week sometimes and most of the time he got less than 20 hours a week. Now that he is manager I have a better idea of how scheduling goes because he has to do the schedule.

Stores are given a certain number of hours per week to cover the store. Lets say the store is open for 12 hours a day 6 days a week and 6 hours on one day. That means that the store is open 78 hours. They may have one or maybe 2 full time people so that means 80 hours are covered. But of course one wouldnt want people to be alone in the store. So then they have a couple of part time people. Those are used to cover the more busy times of the day. Now the managers time doesnt count here. Billy might have to work the entire 78 hours if something odd came up. The powers that be decide how many hours a store can schedule. If I am still using Billy's store that means each full time person works at least 37 hours a week. He tries to make that work out so one comes in the morning and one is at night. Then he fills in with the part time workers. Most Sunday's Billy works all day...the 6 hours and he has one part time person come in for the six hours. Billy is supposed to take one day off per week and he tries to always schedule that for Monday's in case he has an appointment. I think his total allowed hours per week are about 160. It may be a little less.

 

[Nancy]

That is very normal here. My difficult child had so many jobs where they promised her hours and she ended up getting maybe 15-20. Food industry is the worst. They want you for the lunch and dinner hours and that's it.

 

[AnnieO]

Yes, it's normal... I worked fast food a long time ago and rarely got the hours I needed. Praying she finds something else.

 

[PatriotsGirl]

Thanks everyone! She is taking it personally. There is a girl there that doesn't care for her much and that girl is the room mate of the manager that does scheduling. I tried telling her I thought it was pretty normal but she claims there is another new girl that gets a lot more hours than she does (she may also be more flexible and able to work days). I will show her these replies!

She is trying to get into Carter's Warehouse. They have 12 hour shifts - Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Which would mean that I have the baby every weekend, but, she would be working full time and bringing in decent money. She has filled out the application and will be calling today to follow up. Fingers crossed for that one...

 

[AnnieO]

Oooh, crossing fingers there too! Anything is better than fast food. ANYTHING.

 

[PatriotsGirl]

So much for the warehousing job. They said due to her lack of work experience, the staffing agency would not be able to help her...

I told her she is just going to have to look for more fast food jobs and do online schooling next year. She is obviously not going to get anywhere without something...the job market stinks...you have to know someone to get in anywhere these days...

 

[InsaneCdn]

Around here, it takes about 6 months of fast food industry experience to form a "base" of experience before you can move on. Long enough to have a solid reputation for showing up on time and putting out, customer service attitude, etc.

 

[DDD]

difficult child and friend were told to be ready for "hard work" today. I'm eager to hear from GFGmom how it went. Geez I hope he was able to keep his "weird" opinions to himself and capatilize on his physical strength. Cross fingers please.
DDD