Lowes Not Exactly
Lowes Not Exactly
The morning after the Bean Counter informed he could thrive without my services and not quite nicely, I received an offer from Lowes out of the blue to apply as a cashier. I finally decided to do so and went to my Saturday interview. It turns out the interview was for Monday not Saturday, but they were more than gracious. The Assistant Store Manager indicated but for a drug test he would put me on the floor immediately. Also volunteered a slight increase in pay over what Depot provided. He asked if I would return on Monday for the test.
Monday morning the test for drugs conducted, I was told I would hear back in a week or so. The week became forty-eight hours and despite smoking a Honduran cigar with Connecticut wrapper for my 70th birthday and becoming sick as a dog from doing so, no drugs were found in my system.
On Friday I arrived for onboarding. Orientation has now been transformed into an endless orgy of incomprehensible complexity. Four and a half hours later I was still trying to digest the documents to follow plus do a batch of training that was going to take another three hours. I only want to run a register not design and build one. Even the simple tax withholding form is now a complex cluster.
Returning the following Monday, I decided to not move forward. Despite assurances of being at work Monday the HR person was MIA. Reminded me of Depot. The actual store manager spoke with me briefly. I explained I had not clocked on so I was not an expense and that I had decided to forego the position opportunity. No particular order of importance but the reasons included but were not necessarily limited to the following.
Reason 1 Binding Arbitration. Alabama is an at will state. A manager can fire you because he decides he needs to fire someone one day and I am the next employee he sees. The American Arbitration Association format assures the employee bringing the action or having an action brought against him by the employer Lowes will spend in the neighborhood of $15,000. Retired insurance execs must be well paid you know. Risking this expense potential against a low wage job made no sense.
Reason number 2 was the endless indoctrination and subversion you had to tolerate as an employee. Wokism institutionalized as training is nothing but heartburn. Further, I had three more hours of training to do before going on the floor and that much or more due the first week of employment. Are you serious? I do not want to go to school or be transformed. I simply want to run a cash register, encourage customers to come back and help other employees. Not part of this curriculum.
Reason 3 The app. As an employee I could not enter a website to access my wage and schedule information. I had to use the app. It is my understanding (reading twenty plus pages of size 4 font on a hand-held device is unlikely) under the app terms and conditions that they could track my whereabouts, access anything I had on the device and sell that information to a third party for a profit. All that for a low paying job. Oh and the buyers aggregated data probably to someone like Red China.
Surrendering what little privacy that remains did not seem reasonable nor prudent. The manager said I could access and print out the schedule. I explained that it was not 1970 anymore and I wanted to have it on my device downloaded from their website. I could also review it in private and not have to spend my time at the store. He replied they wanted me with them. I responded give me access to my schedule via website not through a tracking device for profit.
Reason four is Lowes has no time clocks. You sign in on a computer terminal available on the floor. If there are none, just punt especially on Saturday afternoon. When customers see someone on the terminal they assume he is an employee and there to help. Before helping I prefer to actually look like an employee with proper apron worn. Why they don’t put a terminal in the locker room remains a mystery.
Not that it matters but they had no crushed ice machine and no lockers. They had metal baskets. They had a coffee maker but you provided the coffee. They did offer the 401k for any new employee and although figured differently, the employer contribution basically matched the Depot program. Over my objections they also paid me for my one day of training futility. Based on the totality of all this I decided to not move forward.
Exhibit 1 Typical Wok drivel normal people must endure for the privilege of working for ten dollars an hour. Redefined and applied no one gets ahead and less left behind except for those with the right plumbing, melanin and / or lifestyles.
Exhibit 2 is a very lengthy employee handbook. Very well done.
Exhibit 3 Harassment only applies to certain groups and usually comes specifically from white Christians. Open season on the rest. Lowes is committed so are the insane.
Exhibit 4 More corporate pabulum. For instance fair and equal are subjective terms that deny objective measurement.
Exhibit 5 Binding arbitration requirement assigns your rights and duties to a tribunal. Is that what Lowes means by fair and equal?
Exhibit 6 Resource Guide of 56 pages. Are you serious? At least Lowes has an understandable mission statement unlike Depot.
Exhibit 7 Notice of Policies. They remind the employee they are fellow servants in Alabama and nothing more.
Exhibit 8 Lock stepping with the fourth branch of government. You will obey because the CDC says so. All of this for a low paying job? Thanks for the offer but I am not participating nor should any other sane person.