Working at Sobeys — Reviews by Employees

i worked for sobeys for 16 years , im only part time. a year or so ago they put forth this pilot program to make employees within the store full time. well i work in a specific department which the manger is the only full time employee. being second in charge I was on the list for full time , but being in this specific department there is not enough hours to make me full time so there for i was turned down. in the mean time they offer other people in other departments that are only with the company 1 , 2,,3,,or so years fulltime. i wasn't even told by my store manager that i was on the list nor did i know the i was garanteed 30 hours. i went to a meeting and sat there like a damn fool while everyone else there knew what they were there for. so when the company says they are there for you ,that is a bunch of bull shit. and as far as the hr goes they only do what benifits them not you. .so saying that i will surely miss my co works but not the company.

This company is not as good as people might think. The pay starts out well but never changes. you could be an employee for 12 years and still make the same amount of money. Wage went up in NB but our wages stayed the same. So when u start it looks good but after a few years you will be making the same the wages never change. You will never get ahead never.

I started at Sobey's this year literally right after their big 24 hour changover in some of their stores in Alberta. Needless to say, this transition does not appear to have gone as swimmingly as Sobey's would have liked to.

Nonetheless, I was hired on to work nights at an Edmonton location, making pizzas and re-stocking the a la carte dept. for the day shifts. A few other duties were involved, but nothing that shouldn't have been expected. Sounded fair enough, right? There was alot to learn but nothing that couldn't be picked up in a week's worth of shifts.

Unfortunately, things did not go this way and I was told I had to learn literally months worth of job work in 3, yeah, three training shifts. This included running both the deli and the a la carte dept. all night; all while prepping a hundred different types of food (for their BS 'fresh' meals) and making about 50 pizzas per night (which would just get thrown out the next night). Oh, I forgot restocking too.

I am by no means a stupid person, but learning how to operate two distinct depts. with NO prior experience in either takes more than three days, I don't care what hours the managers are told dole out for training hours - guess you guys might have to take a little cut on the ol' bonus at the end of the year if you ever want your employees to know how to do something right. Hell, I did not even apply to work in either of these depts. specifically, but a job is a job, right? Not always, friend.

Oh, and in the short time I did work at Sobey's, I was not glanced at ONCE by a manager, no introductions, nothing but a sneaky appraisal of how you were doing/whether you were coming back tomorrow behind your back - other than the ever-present reminder that there are cameras EVERYWHERE, so don't steal.

Additionally, I was NEVER given any sort of company orientation whatsoever - no WHIMIS, no sanitation procedures, no emergency contact info, not ever a goddamn punch card - nothing of the sort.

I mention the little sanitation issue only because one night I was told to pull still-bleeding chicken carcasses from a big box and skewer the little guys with nothing more than a pair of torn gloves (they don't believe in people with large hands, apparently). Then, if required, I was to come a runnin' to pull cooked chicken off the bone and/or help a customer in the deli without being given 30 seconds to properly santitize my potentially E-.coli or salmonella-ridden hands from infecting John Q. Public's sliced ham. In hindsight, I guess the pink gas station-issue soap you get probably wouldn't kill anything anyway.

Salads are simply stirred for days on end to 'look' fresh, rotation is laaughable, especially if it reduces their precious SHRINK by 0.0001%. Do yourself a favor and buy your salads somewhere else because the store is like one big illusion to the uninformed shopper.

Oh yeah, so in the end, I quit due to health issues and their pathetic operating policies, such as how I was supposed to be fully trained by my 3rd day. Middle management puts up with alot of BS and the ONE of those that I did meet was a very patient individual during my training.

I wish I could say the job was great, the pay wasn't half bad, but the constant threat of SHRINK that we cannot avoid and the threat of reprimand (in the form of hours slashed to nothing) was too much of a strain on one's mental functioning.

P.S. Nobody likes to talk about what they make at places like this, well I can honestly say that I would go dig ditches for the same $12-13 bucks/hr I made there.

Helpful hint: WHEN you DO quit this place, remember to return your uniform because I had at least $100 taken from my cheque due to me not being able to return the stupid outfit in time (health reasons).

Pay: Decent, except you only get a raise when you threaten to quit

Respect: No one respects nobody, we hae unexperience people trying to supervise people who hae been there twice as long and no one seems to listen no body
I also had an old manager who enjoyed telling me about his hatred towards black people and his relationship issues.... like i really want to here that at work, we just hired a black person a month ago and ive been a cashier there for 2 years

Job security: Its ok i guess like a said before if you threaten to quit they get all scared because they know there screwed if they let a bunch of high stoners run the front end so they give a raise, throw in some free movie tickets
A co worker got hit on the head with a box by a department manager and threatened to call HR he recieved 2 free movie tickets
And don't even bother to call HR at my work because if you ask one of the office emplyees for a phone number they will tell the store manager right away and you witll have to deal with them the next day.... why did you call hr?

Work/ life balance: none they call you when ever your not working and even when you book time off. Even though theirs plenty of other people to call....

Career potential/ growth: zippo, zilch nadda unless you are a stoner, have absolutly no experience or are ESL I have been lied to by a department manager about the requirements for a promotion he said you need a university degree even though no one has one
Oh and I noticed a paper in the lunch that said if you have any compaints or an opinion on something then talk to you department manager, he told me that I was crazy and that I should go to a psychiatric hospital then promoted 2 people with no experience who have worked there less time then me. Great career potential
Location: No complaints

Co Worker Comeptance: I can tolerate some employees but not some who get promoted after only being there for a month and then walk around like they own the place

Work environment: Blows,no one cares

DONT work for sobeys it will drain you..... if you get a call back dont go to the interview just avoid sobeys altogether it is the worst most screwed up coporation ive worked for

i find sobeys is a good place to work as long as you can put up with the cranky people. i work cash and personally i think that standing for 6-8 hours does be a pain BUT it's worth it for the pay. Even tho im just above min. wage it's a great environment and good people to work with that help you with anything if they can.

Pay: I got paid in minimum, sometime under 3 bucks a hour for over time and overnight benefits. Sometime I don’t get paid for overtime or overnight shift benefits. That was the worst paid job position I ever been in.


Respect: I kept getting mistreated by employees, especially with this Indian woman who worked as cashier. She requested the price check over the announcer speaker and I didn’t realize that she was calling my name. A minute later, she approached me and exploded at me for wasting her time and embarrassing her in the front of her customers. I sort of yelled at her with signing language that I’m DEAF. She stormed back to her line and squatting the bad things about me at her customers! That was the worst insult I ever received from my entire life!

Other thing is, when I’m not working ( off schedule ), they kept calling me in for work, especially when I’m out of Toronto for a weekend, they gave me a trash talking for not being committed on the job. Committed to keep the job for on call job position, my ass. They even tried to call me in Sunday morning, while and before I’m in church!


Benefits: No benefits, no vacation and I asked for a week off request a month before Christmas, a week off for Christmas holiday with family was denied! They expected me to work on 23rd, 24th, 26th and 27th on Christmas week.


Job Security: Eh, the police kept coming in and asking me for managers. I do caught some thieves around the store and I never received a thank you or a praise for my hard efforts. Instead, I get like this “That’s cool, now get back to work!”


Work/Life Balance: They always try to call me in for replacing someone, and sometime I cannot make the call, and I get shitwhacked for it.


Career Potential/Growth: Funny thing you asked, first few months Spadina Sobeys was doing allright until managers, who was foolish enough to realize that this store was losing the money because of too many spoiled/unnecessary orders. I don’t do the ordering, my supervisors and managers do. The next thing I knew is that they cuts back the hours and wages for every employees. some of us resigned / quit working for sobeys just because of that.


Location: Sobeys #934 at Spadina & Bremner.


Co-worker Competence: I kept getting mistreated and disrespected by those employees, no matter what my performances are. One time, I was working for a week as overnight shift, they kept cramming the skids in the fridgerators and left the messes for me to cleans up, especially when I requested them not to, and they ignored me.


Work Environment: Some of customers managed to have some guts to being rude at me, for not respecting my disability, by not doing the written communication. I had some customers who could do the sign languages, and I managed to satisfy them with their needs at no conflicts. Some of employees and employers doesn’t wash their hands after their breaks, and they put the perishable items back in the box and display after it fell on the floor. Some of them doesn't follow the sanitization procedures at all.

Health inspectors, if you are reading this, better prepare the surprise visit, and see it for yourself. the area aren’t always clean, and they are full of it.


A friendly tip, for a first time working at sobeys, you are better off not working there at all in any places. They are expensive, high expectation and they’ll shitwhack you if you don’t do what they want, EVEN in small details!

Best Experience: I’ll just name a few workers I have been happily worked with:

Tino C., Nick W, Nandezhda, some Indian dude at hot/cold dept, Peter G, Martin M, and Alev.

Alev and Tino, you’re the best and understandable employers I ever been worked with, so I wishes you the best for your future!

I'm working in the Kosher Sobeys in the produce department and I hate my job up to this day! The only thing that I like about the job is the location. Literally a 5 minute walk from my house and I'm there. The people there are just plain rude and disrespectful, both the customers and the employees. The managers there have grade 1 education and are complete morons. The meat department manager is an old pervert who scratches his ass in the backroom all the time and grabs the employees' asses including mine. The deli women there are just a bunch of fags and they don't even speak English there. Management there is just plain dumb. My manager is a complete jerk who goes outside every 5 minutes for a smoke break and doesn't even help out in our department. Other times he'll just stand around talking to the two guys in the department who are always kissing his ass. This joke of a company is useless. This is for all of you great people out there, if you want a part-time job, don't even consider stepping foot in this place. They'll just use you just as much as they do to me possibly even more!

Sobeys you can go straight to hell!

The Gravenhurst location is a complete joke.

Pay:
I live in a town that has a very high cost of living. Because I am a university student, I live with my parents. If I didn't, it would be impossible to live on the wages from my full time job. Plus, the pay scale is extremely unfair. I have worked there for 5 years (since I was 14), and got a $1.00/hr raise when I turned 18. People under the age of 18 get a lower starting rate than people over the age of 18. This means that when I was 17, and had worked there for three years, I was making less money than the highschool dropout that had worked there for 2 days, whom I was also training. You must work 1025 hours to get a 25 cent raise, and these hours get reset every year. This means it is basically impossible to get a raise if you work fulltime in the summer.

Respect:
My supervisor has openly admitted to sleeping with my boss, which means she can (and does) do/say absolutely anything to anyone without getting fired. She made my life a living hell when I started there, by being excessively mean, controlling, and just plain rude. She talks about her sex life on a regular basis, in excruciating details. She is very dirty, and has literally two inch long, brown curled nails, and does not wear gloves. She has long hair, but she refuses to wear a hat or hairnet. She takes breaks whenever she wants to, usually when someone she likes is also taking a break.

Benefits:
I have none. You must have worked there fulltime for 3 years. Although I have worked there for 5 years part time/fulltime in summer, I have nothing.

Job security:
By some miracle, they recognize that I work harder than 90% of other employees, and have never come close to firing me. However, I know people in the same position as me, who didn't get their job back during the busy summer months.

Work/Life Balance:
I work until 9:30 one night and then at 6 the next morning. They do not care. They refuse to give me a set schedule, even after 5 years. Employees just starting get all day shifts while I am stuck with mostly nights.

Career Potential/Growth:
I mentioned the raise situation earlier. I have no chance of becoming a supervisor, and even if I did, there is no pay raise associated with it, so why bother?

Location:
It's ok.

Co-worker competence:
I work closely with a group of 5 people. Two of them are good workers. Unfortunately, the other three, including the supervisor I previously mentioned, are more actively involved with me. My partner is the laziest, slowest, most boring, bossy, controlling perfectionist I have ever met. He literally does 1/2 the work that I do in a day, but he won't get fired because he is the supervisors nephew. He screams at me for doing things differently than me. He is an arrogant, self righteous, smarmy rat. As for the rest of the store, I am not exaggerating when I say 80% of people over the age of 20 are alcoholics. The other 20% are somewhat nice.
Work Environment: Proper cleaning procedures are not taken by any of the departments. People don't care about the expiry date, they just re-date things to their liking. I have seen mould scraped off the icing of a cake, and the cake been resold. I have seen a cooked chicken fall on the floor and be sold. Hygiene is just not up to any standars, EXCEPT on the day the health inspector comes, of course.

All in all, I really hate my job. I am treated like dirt, and this is just by my co-workers.

It sucked. The most tiresom, boring, awful, loser filled job ever