Things Remembered Cole Corp A Company that rips off employees and intimidates them in front of customers Tempe nationwide

Retail jobs are a dime a dozen, low pay, crap hours, dumb managers, if one dones not work out for you, go find another one, mostly they are all the same. I have worked retail during the holidays and that is the only time I would ever work retail!!

Regarding getting "screwed" by having people hired after you being promoted before you: Promotions do not automatically go to the person with seniority. Having noted many misspellings in your complaint, I'm not really surprised, as engraving must be perfect, with no spelling, grammatical or punctuation errors.

To claim that your manager was pocketing your overtime is ludicrous. Managers are paid salary and get only what is called "MOT", or manager overtime. For example, let's say that a manager makes $200 a week, or $5 per hour. If that manager works 45 hours in a week, payroll divides the $200 salary by 45, ending up with $4.44. They then divide that in half, getting $2.22, and that's what the manager is paid for each of those 5 extra hours.

Managers are under constant pressure to keep payroll within the hours allotted for their particular sales goals. It is not your manager who refused to pay overtime; it is the company who demands that if overtime is needed, then the salaried manager must work it.

Registers hold only 90 days worth of information before it is purged automatically. If you didn't keep your clock in/out slips, you had no proof.

TR now has a break policy in the Policy and Procedures manual. It includes what to do if you are on single coverage for more than 5 1/2 hours and need a break. If your store is so busy that you can't find 10 or 15 minutes to sit down, you should have more hours on your grid, especially if your manager had "5 family members" working there.

It sounds to me like you had a bad manager. I've been a store manager now for 23 years; I am the one who has come to work sick and vomited right in front of customers. I am the one who comes to work with bronchitis; I'm the one who endured severe back pain every day until the day I couldn't walk any more. I was out for ten months, and my job was held for me---it was still there when I was able to come back. I'm the one who has had to work open to close alone. Most of the managers in my region would do the same. We do it because we like being part of the special, emotional moments in people's lives.

Is Things Remembered perfect? No. Big-time no. But the writer of the complaint sounds to me like someone who doesn't realize that having a JOB means having to WORK.

I am a former store manager for Things Remembered having worked for them for 5 years starting as part time seasonal and ending as one of their "Best of the Best" store managers for profit and sales growth.

Things Remembered, like most other retail stores, has a limitted payroll grid that provides for only "single coverage", one employee on shift at a time, for most of the year. This does result in Things Remembered being in violation of most State labor laws regarding breaks, lunches, etc. The person most effected is the Store Manager who works 40+ hours per week and gets paid less than 50% wages for 'overtime' (the more overtime you work, the smaller the percentage of your hourly pay you receive for each hour). Assistant Managers take the next biggest hit since they generally work 30 or so hours per week, with the remaining part time employees averaging 10 hours per week TOTAL for all remaining employees (if you don;t want to work Friday night every week, don;t take a part time job in a Mall). And yes there is far too much work to be done for the number of man-hours provided: sales, engraving, key cutting, and the endless polishing of display items.

The employee that expressed problems in this previous report would have been aware of the payroll issues, the hours limitation, and the single coverage situation prior to accepting promotion to Asst. Manager. They also would have known whether or not their Manager was responsible and pleasant to work for.

The simple fact is that part time (or even the quasi-full time 30 hour per week) retail work is NOT pleasant, regardless of the employer. The same complaints of hours, overtime, too much to be done in too little time, etc. that are made in this report apply to almost all retailers including larger companies like J.C Penney's and Belk (based on my own experiences with both).

The former employee who issued the complaint did receive their unemployment compensation, and if they are a quality emplyee would have NO difficulty in immediately obtaining a new job with equivalent pay, benefits, hours, etc. in one of the other 80 +/- retail stores in that mall. Such is the nature of specialty retail. As far as the stated "abuse" issues the former employee raises, employees are responsible for their own protection. If the abuse was as stated, complaints should have been filed with the state Labor Board at the time these incidents were occuring rather than simply some online posting after the fact. All employees have a responsibility and an obligation to protect their own well being.

Was Things Remembered totally in the right here? Probably not based on my own experience with the company. But did the employee take reasonable steps to protect their own interests? Apparently not, at least not while still in the employ of Cole National.