LOW pay one time raise after 90 days and completion of computer based training
Getting paid $7.79 /hr with no breaks and only get "lunches" when there is no cars to service to keep labor down. To also keep labor down you work of the clock if they get behind. Scheduled hours are not the hours you will always work. If there are no cars someone goes home to save money. You might end up taking a 3 hour lunch. You will eat and work at same time if there is no time for lunches.
No benefits unless you are in management.
Constant dirty, loud, and hot & humid work conditions.
Constantly being rushed to do jobs with broken equipment or missing tools for the job at hand.
Ripping off customers for less than advertised fluid capacities. IE requiring 4.2 quarts and being told to only use 4 or use different oil than the one sold on paper to save money.
Don't always think you will use new oil filters you don't. Managers blame car issues on the customers to prevent issues for issues.
Standing on the corner waving sign to get customers. Being all in black on a hot day is torture
Numerous EPA violations, due to aging, broken equipment that leaks on the floors. Having to pour chemicals mixed with mop water down drains to city sewage. Tanks are full or everything is just poured into the oil and coolant only tanks, like heavy duty concentrated degreasers, various oils and lubricants, transmission fluids, coolant and fuel that spill during services . Being told to dispose of used rags from services or cleaning into city garbage that are contaminated with oil, transmission fluid, and fuel and cleaners.
"Burn sleeves" keep hot fluids on skin and hurt a lot. The are usually slippery floors even with the proper and required shoes, during work hours. Leaky lower bay make it worse.
Contaminated fluids are told to be used for services, thus reducing the effectiveness and point of getting said services that you will then have to "sign off" on. IE A bucket of differential fluid getting water in them and contaminating them. Getting told by management to use them after a few squirts or bleeding out to get it to look right during inspection.
Upper Management has conference calls and franchise wide communications, with store managers to publicly have "chest beating" or "putting in the spotlight". They do this to either boast about 1 person and berate others for not meeting that days goals instead of doing it in person.
They make multiple calls a day for "numbers" to see if they sold items. This is to enforce that either numbers come up or you lose your bonus. Also this will have someone home or on extended lunch to reduce labor and cost of goods to make budgets, that they want met. They constantly move managers around from other stores to get try and get better "numbers". If they are not met, employees get a rough time for not getting car counts and extra services, because this is how their bonuses work there.
Store Managers are salaried, and forced to be at at work all times when scheduled. They are unable to leave for food or drinks, even if they work all day from 7:30 am to 7:30 or later on some days to save on labor costs since they don't count against numbers. Assistant Managers are also in this position if they work on store managers day off.
Having to pay for, and maintain all company uniforms provided by them at high costs in the first few paychecks. The shoes you have to buy from them only get a 30 day warranty. After that if they have a hole, ripped sole, or paint on them, you have to buy another pair of them. The shirts keep stains and smells on them after you use them a long time, even after laundering them. The safety glasses that you have to wear at all times in the bays fog up, get dirty, and are easily scratched up. After this they reduce visibility in under lit places, such as the "lower bay" or under car hoods in hard to reach places with low light. This is an easy way to get burnt this way.
Having to work with the threats of being fired or get hours cut, they tell us to rush work or cut corners. It seemed daily after awhile, if management feel it is not going fast enough. Offers of advancement or increased pay, in lieu of working long hours, without breaks or off the clock to complete working on cars or other tasks seems to be a daily reminder of how you are just a
means to an end by upper management and higher.
