Walmart raises minimum wage to $11, promptly closes select Sam's Club stores without warning - Sensationalist Headlines

Oh shit, I have today and tomorrow off. I'll need to check in tomorrow to see if my Sam's Club is still open. I hope mine didn't close, cause college starts next week and I need to pay my tuition. Been working there for about a year and the people I work with are great. Interesting how Walmart employees are now making more than Sam's Club employees. Since I'm both a cashier and a Supervisor I've noticed they had started to cut hours after Christmas, so I'm wondering if those cut hours happened because of this.

[QUOTE=Protocol7;53045213]It's stupid too because you'd think to some extent having happy, well-compensated employees would have a direct positive impact on your business. I'd rather be in that sort of store than a dreary messy store with employees who clearly have had enough shit.[/QUOTE] This. Often times, I can't help but wonder if Wal-Mart employees don't keep shelves stocked, help customers, or act friendly because they flat-out stopped giving a shit a long time ago.

I got a friend in AZ affected by this, majorly, in the "lost your job overnight" way. He worked for a company based out of Sam's Club and the [I]entire[/I] Arizona branch was liquidated. His boss didn't even know what was going on til everyone got there and the place was locked up with the police there, for some reason. He has no idea what to do now. This is terrible.

[QUOTE=Zero-Point;53045312]This. Often times, I can't help but wonder if Wal-Mart employees don't keep shelves stocked, help customers, or act friendly because they flat-out stopped giving a shit a long time ago.[/QUOTE] Former Associate, can confirm. Walmart drives their associates to madness in a heartbeat. Doesn't matter how enthusiastic and such someone is when they first hire on, within a month, they're barely able to tolerate clocking in anymore. They're overworked, underpaid, treated like garbage by corporate and by customers, take the brunt of any customer complaints, and generally resent life in general fairly quickly. It's soul crushing. When I was in that vest-of-shame we had a 15 minute grace period wherein we could clock out early and the computer wouldn't flag us for it. If management caught you in the act they'd still write you up for it but the computer wouldn't flag it and for some reason they never bothered to check hours(They'da seen me missing 15 minutes every day if they did). Needless to say, when I was in the Meat Dept and closing, I would ride that fine line like a rented mule. I was ALWAYS alone by 5pm regardless of who else was scheduled that day, so there wasn't anyone else in the department to drop a dime on me, and I made a bit of a cat-and-mouse game out of dodging one of the managers in doing so. Figured I was gonna lose it eventually, but I ended up winning, as she never caught me before I left of my own volition for better employment. She knew, too, I know she did, because right around 7:45 or so she'd find a reason to be near the grocery doors, or be walking that way...one time I actually slinked off through the housewares and clothing departments to zip out the GM side door, slid halfway up the lot, then came back to grocery side to get in my car because she was in the fucking foyer on grocery side. 'Twas fun, I'll admit. Only fun I ever had on that godforsaken shithole of a job. I also stretched breaks as much as I could. 15 minute breaks were really about 20 minutes, and I'd saunter lazily to and fro, often taking winding, indirect paths and only starting the mental timer when I actually sat down in the breakroom. Lunch was scheduled for 30, but I'd often buy my lunch, then clock out at the timeclock right there before the breakroom and stretch that by 5-10 minutes as well. And, again, lazily saunter back, often taking indirect paths. When it's all said and done I probably ended up with an extra 20 minutes or so of breaktime that I wasn't supposed to have. But I felt I needed it, because fuck WalMart. Though, the stocking is less 'We DGAF' and more 'We don't have any of it to put out'. Store replenishment is a complex miasma of bullshit and whimsy that sees us getting half a pallet of freight we've already got two pallets of in backstock and overflowing shelves of on the sales floor while the item directly next to it has been sold out for two months straight and won't replenish despite employees constantly scanning the shelf label with the telxon and being all 'HEY WE BE OUT OF THIS SHIT'.

[QUOTE=sgman91;53044368]As I'm learning more and more, Business Insider is a horrible source. They have this bad habit of taking articles from other sources, leaving out important parts, and sensationalizing others. If you follow BI's links to the real sources, you'll see that Walmart is paying everyone who got laid off for 60 more days and that they are all eligible to transfer to other stores. ([URL]http://www.khou.com/news/local/multiple-sams-clubs-close-without-notice-in-houston-across-nation/507151005?sdkjhsdks[/URL])[/QUOTE] BI is fine. Reuters missed the 60 day thing too and I don't think you'd call them a horrible source either. In any case here it is straight from the [URL="https://news.walmart.com/2018/01/11/sams-club-shares-changes-to-club-fleet"]press release[/URL] [editline]11th January 2018[/editline] [QUOTE=Silence I Kill You;53044311]They did that when the shut down the VC Summer construction site. Told everyone they had 30 minutes to grab their stuff and get out of the gate. It's done to prevent people from breaking/stealing/etc...[/QUOTE] Job sites aren't stores. When my company was closing a nearby store it was known for weeks beforehand. Managers got the notice who passed it down to associates and people who shopped at the store were well aware of when it was going to close. The employees were simply rotated out to nearby stores, maintaining everything the way it was other than the obvious commute change. There is no excuse for Wal-Mart, a company far more resources than mine, to have done the bare minimum, but "they are afraid people will steal things" is absurd.

[QUOTE=Keychain;53044487]Yeah fair enough. Shouldn't ever underestimate how long it can take to find another job.[/QUOTE] I've been looking for a year for a better job. Applied to hundreds and I've gotten nothing.

[QUOTE=TestECull;53044980]The walmart I worked at would tell you to fuck off early on the last day of your workweek if you accrued >40hrs. Coincidentally, it was by the exact amount that you crossed 40h. And they'd write you up if you forced the issue enough times.[/QUOTE] Your store would actually let you leave early? My store won't let us go early to burn OT, we got to do it during our lunch. Worst part is that we're scheduled with a 1hr lunch every day. You can take a minimum of 30 minutes but you can't leave 30 early; so if you were to do that you'd still have to burn that 30 sometime during the week. I've had over 2 hours for lunch a few times. Bonus: because the scheduling is automated (at least that is what we've been told) I get things like this week I was originally scheduled for 8 days in a row along with a 1-10pm shift with a 5am shift the next day. The only way they wound up being able to fix it is by having me do: 1-10pm , 8am-5pm, 5am-2pm (5th day in a row), off. My store was recently put into a new market and the new market manager chewed out my store manager for not hiring people in order to get a bigger bonus. Suddenly we got a bunch of new hires, go figure. Now if only they'd fire the person in receiving who was, from what I hear by the vendors, voted the worst receiving associate in all of NJ.

I worked for a smaller Sam's Club a long time ago, it was a great place for the most part. You had the typical bullshit work drama, but all the people I worked with where pretty amazing and we had a damn fun time working. Most of managers were great and the GM I had was pretty cool to me, she spent a lot of time personally teaching me things that were not apart of my normal job so I could be promoted easier. I ultimately quit and took a job more inline with my goals at the time and they were sad to see me go but were very supportive. When I lost that job they were quick to let me come back and work for them. My bonuses were pretty good too, little over around 800-1000 bucks usually. Our managers spent a lot of store money doing BBQ's for us. I got very good raises, usually the max. Bad employees were let go very quickly and they tried to hire the best fits for the store. It honestly showed for the most part, there were a few dickbeaters but everyone else was awesome so it was easy to deal with them. The company has a lot of things to work on, but ultimately how your experience goes is based on who you worked for. I guess I might be one of the few people who actually enjoyed working at a Club.

[video]https://youtu.be/DkswRyaOxt8[/video] This is the thread music right here. But seriously, the way corporate america is still sucking up to the GOP and Trump is fucking disgusting.

[QUOTE=Shock_Coil;53045612]Your store would actually let you leave early? My store won't let us go early to burn OT, we got to do it during our lunch. Worst part is that we're scheduled with a 1hr lunch every day. You can take a minimum of 30 minutes but you can't leave 30 early; so if you were to do that you'd still have to burn that 30 sometime during the week. I've had over 2 hours for lunch a few times. Bonus: because the scheduling is automated (at least that is what we've been told) I get things like this week I was originally scheduled for 8 days in a row along with a 1-10pm shift with a 5am shift the next day. The only way they wound up being able to fix it is by having me do: 1-10pm , 8am-5pm, 5am-2pm (5th day in a row), off. My store was recently put into a new market and the new market manager chewed out my store manager for not hiring people in order to get a bigger bonus. Suddenly we got a bunch of new hires, go figure. Now if only they'd fire the person in receiving who was, from what I hear by the vendors, voted the worst receiving associate in all of NJ.[/QUOTE] Oh they'd do that too, as an alternative if the OT was half an hour or so.

[QUOTE=Reds;53045170]The part that I find really annoying about companies is that they could treat their workers well with reasonable hours, pay, and expectations, and probably still make absolutely ludicrous profit margins. But they don't, because you need even more money for the endless black hole of making more money for the sake of more money.[/QUOTE] Welcome to capitalism sans regulation People still find it hard to believe somehow that companies will always be driven by self-interest and profit first and by the welfare of their workforce (and by extension the welfare of the vast majority of average Americans)... somewhere much further down the line

[QUOTE=Blazyd;53044269]Depends what kind of work contract you signed when you got hired. A lot of jobs nowadays are "at will" which means you can be fired/terminated at any time for any reason.[/QUOTE] You would not be able to get away with that here in Australia. That's messed up.

I'm a technician at a 'call center' and we work exclusively with Sam's Club. Came into work today, we started calling stores because half their shit was offline and then hit the standard "We'll be open tomorrow!" message. None of us knew until we looked at the news, not even the guy who manages all of our teams in the US who is a step away from the CEO. We texted him about it and he texted "What the fuck" back. So our 26 million contract is now spiraling out of control. That's cool. No more paid overtime I guess.

[QUOTE=Cyke Lon bee;53044320]See that part where I said "I think". I saw the picture on imgur like 5 or 6 years ago. I don't remember any specifics, just that the signs were offering $26 or $28 an hour. And Walmart isn't going to advertise a store manager, or other normally $30/hr position, within the store or online. They tend to hire from within for that since the candidates for that are already pre-brainwashed. But this picture is from Williston North Dakota about 4 years ago once the oil boom was starting to die down. [t]https://i.pinimg.com/originals/6b/42/55/6b4255f9aa58467d65be00465985c49d.jpg[/t] Next time I'm in Williston I can take you a picture of the Big ol' sign they have in front of the store begging people to work there for $15 when everywhere else in Williston is paying $20 an hour. A reasonable apartment in Williston will cost you anywhere from $600-$1,000 bucks a month depending if you want underground parking or a washer/dryer in the unit. About the same, a little cheaper honestly, as what I'm paying in Bismarck ND where the wages are much lower. Either way, it's not about cost of living. It's the fact that Walmart [I]can[/I] pay those wages and still operate well above their bottom line.[/QUOTE] This makes me so goddamn mad. a few years ago I worked at one of the busiest walmarts in the country, in the spring time it is actually THE highest selling walmart for alcohol products (spring break city). I started at 9.40/hr, a year later and having gone from cashier to customer service to money center rep, I left at *drum roll* ten dollars and 50 god damn cents. Fuck walmart in the ass. [editline]12th January 2018[/editline] [QUOTE=sgman91;53044944]Please don't make stereotypical assumptions based on a few anecdotes. If you're a semi-decent employee, there's basically a zero percent chance of getting fired with no warning.[/QUOTE] My coworker just got fired the other day for asking my boss if he could reset her online payroll account one too many times. Sorry it's anecdotal, but this shit does happen.

I make 10.71/hr at meats. My store still doesn't know what is happening with raises for this past year. I asked personnel since both my anniversary and the new financial year past, they just said "We don't know, we haven't been told anything about it yet." Corporate is probably waiting to see how things are going to go with the new governor and his want for a $15/hr minimum.

[QUOTE=sgman91;53044944]Please don't make stereotypical assumptions based on a few anecdotes. If you're a semi-decent employee, there's basically a zero percent chance of getting fired with no warning.[/QUOTE] I don't want some wonky "if you", I want laws. Security.

[QUOTE=Keychain;53044462]If they are getting paid after the fact than it doesn't really matter does it? If anything, you're getting paid just to find another job. Seems like an even better scenario than getting a 60 day warning whilst still employed. Since full-time employees would probably struggle to balance between continuing to work and job hunting.[/QUOTE] What happens in the USA after those 60 days? You have 0 income? or does the government pay support for a while?

Not necessarily wal-mart, but in tesco as a cashier in hungary we get (USD) ~3$/hour.

[QUOTE=ichiman94;53046176]Not necessarily wal-mart, but in tesco as a cashier in hungary we get (USD) ~3$/hour.[/QUOTE] That must be under very certain circumstances or are Hungarian workers protection laws really that backwards? I know that regardless of the law, the practical situation can be different but still. I work at a restaurant in Sweden myself and my employer is breaking several laws all the time.

Student workers got 30 cent increase in per hour pay only for december, it's less now. It's just that the pay here is laughable compared to everywhere else. Not mentioning the complicated tax system, most things having 27% tax. Yeah, as the pay is low all the grocery is cheap too, free healthcare and free college, but you can't save a penny without help. Professional qualification doesn't grant you much future, and for some people, working aboard was the solution. Edit: I don't know about how much living in US costs, but $11/HR would be a dream job here. I remember when a slovak came into our store the week after black friday. I was juggling stuff, he looks at the numbers and say "The beer costs 0.70$ ? In slovakia that would be less." then he goes on "on black friday I already spent 1150$ !". How much did he have to pay for all the stuff he bought at me? 270$ . 270$ worth of a bunch of groceries. That's twice as much as I got for pay for november! Now that's depressing.

[QUOTE=ichiman94;53046176]Not necessarily wal-mart, but in tesco as a cashier in hungary we get (USD) ~3$/hour.[/QUOTE] Isn't the cost of living in hungary substantially lower? We had a machinist here that was probably making north of 30$ an hour retire and move back to croatia and he's basically a millionaire because of it

[QUOTE=ichiman94;53046488] Edit: I don't know about how much living in US costs, but $11/HR would be a dream job here. [/QUOTE] $11/hr is hovering around the poverty line over here. Living wage [I]starts[/I] at $20/hr, and that's for a rural bumpkin like myself. Live in one of the big cities? Living wage ends up closer to $30 or $40 per hour. [editline]12th January 2018[/editline] [QUOTE=taipan;53046108]What happens in the USA after those 60 days? You have 0 income? or does the government pay support for a while?[/QUOTE] Government support? US? You're a funny funny person! NAh they just tell you to fuck your hat and you're on your own. Bootstraps, bitch. That's what they'll say.

[QUOTE=taipan;53046108]What happens in the USA after those 60 days? You have 0 income? or does the government pay support for a while?[/QUOTE] In the US, if you lose your job through no fault of your own then you qualify for unemployment benefits. My sister is facing a similar prospect where the Teavana she works at is getting closed down because Starbucks is (rather stupidly IMO) shutting down the entire chain of Teavana shops nationwide. She did the research and determined that she would qualify for unemployment because of this.

[QUOTE=Kartoffel;53047650]In the US, if you lose your job through no fault of your own then you qualify for unemployment benefits. My sister is facing a similar prospect where the Teavana she works at is getting closed down because Starbucks is (rather stupidly IMO) shutting down the entire chain of Teavana shops nationwide. She did the research and determined that she would qualify for unemployment because of this.[/QUOTE] Unemployment benefits are an absolute joke. It's barely enough to cover jobseeking.

[QUOTE=taipan;53046108]What happens in the USA after those 60 days? You have 0 income? or does the government pay support for a while?[/QUOTE] You get like a month or so of unemployment that was being taken put of your paycheck.

[QUOTE=PaChIrA;53044961]Walmart is a shitty company to work for, I used to work for them for almost 3 years until I got fed up with all the dumb bullshit they keep doing to make our jobs difficult (I was CAP 2, truck unloaders and shelf stockers). They add all sorts of processes you have to do to make things more difficult, stretch us out more, give us more things we have to do and then bitch us out every day wondering why we don't get every fucking thing done. One day I just got so sick of it and walked out.[/QUOTE] I know all about the CAP 2 life since I also worked it for nearly three years. Every hour is pretty damn grueling considering that you have to put up with both customers and management. I'm not surprised that a bunch of locations closed without warning.

$11/hr was more than I was getting as security, with that being only 8.45 an hour, which is just a penny over the minimum wage in NJ I think. Also, I experienced the reason they tend to close without notice. Was patrolling a construction site when some workers basically got laid off by the contractor and told to leave immediately. I was by the gate, and I see one of the guys loading a spool of the elevator wire into his Corolla. It was apparently worth somewhere in the tens of thousands.

[QUOTE=Doneeh;53056839]$11/hr was more than I was getting as security, with that being only 8.45 an hour, which is just a penny over the minimum wage in NJ I think. Also, I experienced the reason they tend to close without notice. Was patrolling a construction site when some workers basically got laid off by the contractor and told to leave immediately. I was by the gate, and I see one of the guys loading a spool of the elevator wire into his Corolla. It was apparently worth somewhere in the tens of thousands.[/QUOTE] I worked security for a while too. Usually they give mass notices like this because once the word gets out it is a rough experience, people get emotional, and scared. The company is worried about theft and stuff like that so they try to minimize it. [editline]16th January 2018[/editline] [QUOTE=ballads;53056853]I don't understand this shit apparantly im getting $200 bonus because I make $11.50/hour even though I just started 2 weeks ago[/QUOTE] Usually with Walmart they give you a bonus based on how long you've worked and it is calculated. I've made over 1k bonus before working for Sam's Club due to being full time.

[QUOTE=Cyke Lon bee;53044974]What lower class city has a walmart offering $20hr thats not a salaried management job.[/QUOTE] Cornwall, Ontario (Canada)