Background info

I work at The Company, a clothing and footwear chain. There are many stores all around Australia. As a casual, I work at just the one store at the moment, though we have been known to move around where the shifts are. So in the past, I've worked at other stores in different regions, and may refer to them in my posts.

We all refer to our stores by the suburbs they're located in. I've given our stores names of towns in Australia: Howlong, Innaloo, Beverly Hills (edit: formerly, Poshville, my own concoction), Mooball, Poowong and Nevertire. My store doesn't have a name yet, I refer to it plainly as 'my store' or 'our store'. I work in a retail store, though there are other types of stores as well, I won't go into that now, may give me away!

Next roster week, I'm working at Innaloo with Caroline, so that should be fun. Working with Caroline, that is. I've never found Innaloo too much fun.

The Company's retail stores' backbone is formed by the casual staff. Each store (is supposed to, anyway) has a manager, who works there full time, and the casuals fill in the extra hours and can work anywhere from 2hours at that store to 20-odd hours. Casuals also fill shifts at different stores within the same region, and it's not uncommon (though annoying) for casuals to work at one store for a few hours (lunch cover) and then drive to another store to do a few more hours (lunch covers, usually) when we are short staffed.

A lunch cover is another staff member coming in specifically so the manager (or other casual working a full shift) can have their law-required break. We can work a maximum of 5hrs without a break. Minimum shift is 2hours. Our breaks are 30mins, unpaid. So sometimes a staff member (manager or casual) will work all day, say 10-5 (like I do on Sundays) and then another casual will come in for 2 hours (say 1-3) for a lunch cover. Also ostentatiously to help out as it's busier around lunch time as well, but I'm sure if The Company could get away with it, they'd have no qualms about making someone work all day by themselves and only getting a cover in for half an hour and then continue working alone.

What else doesn't make sense about my posts....
Our many store tasks- like unpacking stock on the floor, which means that we have boxes of stock in our store in the view (and way) of customers.

In order to make us more efficient and for The Company to get more bang for their buck, we don't have large back/storage rooms to store our stock, and we don't have staff that are specifically stock unpackers. So all our deliveries are brought through our main entrance and dumped on our floor. Customers in the way? "Excuse me" Can't reach the stock behind the 40 boxes of stock in your 10square metre store? Oh well, better start moving them then. How do you think we all got those big muscles?

So we're expected to scan in and unpack stock whilst serving customers as well. Merchandising can be a pain as well, when you have so much stock to deal with and are simultaneously trying to fit in new styles as well as scanning in more styles. Insert Forrest Gump voice here: "The Company's like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get" Another post dedicated to the joys of stock later.

Well, that's it for now, it's past midnight, and I've got another long day ahead of me tomorrow, not to mention study as well. Thinking about it is getting me worked up. Night.