Just need to vent
20 year career with a major retailer. Had solid career momentum. Living decently well. Never have any issues at the job. I believe I was a good manager who treated people fairly and always went to bat for them when they deserved more. Also, just had my best year, performance wise, ever.
Back in December, as I was getting a receipt validated by security for a drink I purchased, he noticed someone possibly about to walk out with product without paying. I start moving to the side of the exit to make myself visible and just convince the guy to not bother. Not here to be a hero or get someone arrested. Just trying to deter. Have my drink in my hand.
The shoplifter, quite unexpectedly, charges at me. I’m able to turn around quickly enough and brace myself before finally separating. Security grabs the guy and I, in a moment of instinct, grab the security wrap on the item. The shoplifter pushes into me again and punches me in the face. I don’t let go of the product but I just keep saying “just drop it and leave” hoping to end the chaos. Shoplifter lets go, runs back into the store, grabs more product and tries to run out with it. I just get on the phone with 911 as security struggles with the guy. He leaves without product while I’m still on phone.
Today, I get fired because “as a leader” I “acted recklessly”. I got charged, punched in the face and fired. I’m in at At Will state, so my career is gone and now I need to find something else quickly so I can continue to pay the mortgage and rest of the bills a normal family has.
I know people say corporations don’t care about their employees, but I’m just incredibly devastated. I was a damn good employee and it’s all gone because some jerkoff charged at me and corporate refuses to see any nuance in the event.
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Sorry op, but after 20 years you should have known better. I feel like I’m victim blaming here, but it’s kinda like someone intentionally jumping into a tiger cage and getting bitten or eaten. Should they have been able to get into the cage? No, but it’s hard to feel sympathy when they should have known better.
You put yourself and a security guard in danger, and it could have been a lot worse. It’s a lot cheaper to heal some lost product than a bullet hole.
Unsafe work environment lawsuit.
Delete this post & get a lawyer.
Shoplifters and the general public being potentially violent is a normal condition of working retail. Nothing of what occurred in OP’s story qualifies as an unsafe work environment.
Sounds like OP wasn’t working at the time of the incident
Not the issue. They’re a representative of the company on and off the clock. You can’t put your hands on someone shoplifting. The company has insurance for theft and an acceptable amount of shrink every quarter. OP made a bad mistake.
Can you get a refund on your law degree?
Lawsuit. You did right and deserve to be heard out in court.
No lawyer will take this lawsuit against the store. They would just pull out the employee manual that says “do not confront shoplifters”. As a manager, he definitely knew that, probably even taught new employees.
Just get a new job, or get an MBA. Experienced managers are always in short supply.
Absolutely. They should just apply around. An MBA would help, but they wouldn’t even need one to land a decent gig at most places.
Your employer has policies for dealing with shrink/theft. They assuredly don’t include confronting the shoplifter. It sucks because you were just trying to act in the best interest of your store. It sucks to lose your job, it sucks to not be given a second chance based on your history. I’m guessing there is probably liability/reputation concerns that is keeping corporate from just giving you a warning. Its not that they don’t care about you, actually it is because they don’t care about you, the dollar value of the risk of lawsuit/bad press became higher than what it costs to replace you.
Take that to the labour board if you don’t qualify for unemployment.
Lawyer time. At will, maybe. But you’ve been assaulted on the job, are now suffering from severe anxiety (right???), and got fired on top of it? They’ll eat your boss for breakfast and get a nice severance package out of it.
Dude admitted that he put himself in the way. This case will be dropped quickly.
hey’ll eat your boss for breakfast and get a nice severance package out of it.
I’d be shocked if they didn’t act outside company policy simply by moving to “deter” them. the company’s liability lawyers are never going to let whatever lawyer OP can afford to hire near OP’s boss.
Surveillance footage
What about it?
OP’s own statement is that they moved to deter the theft. Had he not moved to do so, it’s probable he’d never have been attacked.
It’s certainly likely that had he elected instead to walk away- that is to follow policy*- he almost certainly would never have been attacked.
It’s very, very, unlikely that the shoplifter’s attack wasn’t precipitated by OP’s action of placing himself in such a place.
Now imagine the shoplifter was armed, carrying a pistol, and elected instead to draw and put a couple rounds into OP- and then, because the shoplifter is already fucked if they get caught, pops a couple into the security/LP staff; and then emptied the rest of the mag in the store.
The store would have to pay out for medical bills, lawsuits, over stopping the theft of something that probably costs less than $100, and is covered by insurance anyhow
(*there’s almost zero chance a retailer doesn’t have these policies. Even mom and pop shops know better,)
As much as he may have a case so long as he didn’t act against store policy and actually attempted to he probably has a case, even in an at-will state.
The problem is that it will likely be difficult to get an attorney to represent him without an actual retainer because these cases usually draw out for a long, long time and are difficult to fight. Unless there’s a legitimate case for a class action, then the chances are slim that anyone can afford to fight the case, even if they ultimately could win because no attorney is going to devote years to this for a ‘maybe’.
The only route there may be a hope of winning here is for him to apply for unemployment and if he doesn’t get it, to appeal himself. He may get that as small of a win as that is.
At will is a bullshit shield used to deflect legitimate labor issues. You need to talk to a lawyer like now.
While I agree with the sentiment, I don’t know that a lawyer is going to help.
At will states need to repeal that legislation, but until they do, they are at will states.
Or maybe I am seamlessly substituting “at will” for “right to work” and OP is not in a “right to work” state.
At-Will doesn’t apply here. He acted against company policy and escalated a simple shrink issue into a violent incident.
It wasn’t even the deterrence. That may have been a slap on the wrist, but grabbing onto the product and grappling with the thief was absolutely a termination event.
OP was fired with cause.
What else can I say.
You right.
this smells like they needed to cut staff, and are just taking every opportunity to do so. if they can fire you for cause, no unemployment
Yep, lose the guy with 20 years of raises and get someone new they can pay less. Easy decision. It’s not like retail is hard to learn.
Do america not have labour law to stop these? This is incredibly frustrating that company can just let go of employees without facing any trouble.
At-Will = your employer can fire you at any time for any reason. It means no protections for the worker except for unemployement.
For any reason that isn’t specifically a protected class*
Although in practice that just means if they want to fire you for discriminatory reasons, they just don’t give a reason.
The protection is bogus and that is the point. They didnt fire you for being in a wheelchair, they fired you for failing to deliver required materials to required personnel on time. Nevermind that it was only accessible through stairs.
This happens far more often than someone is protected.
There’s a very small number of reasons your prevented from citing when firing someone, and preventing theft, being attacked or anything described here aren’t on the list.
A major right wing talking point for decades has been that labor protections are bad for workers, and so we should get rid of any we have and roll them back as far as possible.
At-will, as mentioned, means that an employer can terminate an employee for good, bad, or no cause at their sole discretion without warning. The common argument is that this is fair, because the employee can quit on similar terms, and it means employers will feel more willing to hire, which is good for workers.
In many states no, they are called “at-will states”, where the employee can leave or the company fire you for no reason at all. It’s phrased that way to make it seem better than the evil unions making you stop working to strike to fight for your rights.
Short answer is maybe. Long answer is it depends on which state you live in. So called At Will states effectively have no labor laws (well, there’s things like minimum wage, wage theft protections, worker safety, etc. but nothing around employment). In an At Will state you can be fired without notice and without any reason. In theory this is balanced by being able to quit at any time and without giving notice, but people aren’t exactly clamoring for the right to quit jobs without notice.
Yeah, it feels like all disadvantage because people quit when they REALLY need to, majority will only quit after having a plan on what’s coming next.
Just for clarity, before at will, you could still quit at any time without notice. At-will only takes from workers, even though it’s phrased as giving something to them.
At-will just got rid of employers need to have cause to fire someone.
They violated company policy. probably.
The item- in fact all of the loss caused by shoplifting- is far less than it’s worth putting employees in that position. That shoplifter could have had a gun, or a carton knife or screwdriver or some other kind of weapon, and sent OP into the hospital, racking up the medical bills. there is a reason most retailers policy is “Don’t [do exactly what OP did]”
And that’s assuming the guy attacks an employee. Imagine the expense if a patron gets knifed with a rusty, AIDS-infected shank. or shot.
for most retailers, the only people that are supposed to engage (and, yes, that includes positioning yourself as a “deterence”) are Loss Prevention teams. and even then, they’re probably just going to let it go rather than risk a confrontation with shoppers near by. They’re going to call the cops and let them take the liability.
I worked (briefly) as an unarmed security guard many years ago. It was company policy to never, never, ever touch a person unless we felt our life was in danger. We were there to document only. Security is just a less reliable camera with a mouth.
I’m a manager for contract security, and yeah, the mantra for unarmed guards is “Document and Report”. But also, the rule of the day is constructive cowardice.
even the guards equiped with firearms… that firearm is mostly there because their position is deemed to be that hazardous, if that makes sense.
Frankly I’ve not met someone who’s worked in retail in the last 15 years who’s said they had a different policy. Even a cart full of shit is cheaper to pay for than the potential lawsuits from an employee getting hurt from trying to intervene.
Beyond that though, please don’t put your life at risk for your employers merchandise. It is not yours. Your store carries insurance for a reason. Your life is not worth any of that shit.
Beyond that though, please don’t put your life at risk for your employers merchandise. It is not yours. Your store carries insurance for a reason. Your life is not worth any of that shit.
absolutely. Especially because, it’s not (written) company policy… they can and absolutely will try to say it’s your fault and weasel out of the expenses.
Well, without knowing, your explanation (at least to me) is not a “why this happened so it’s more understandable” but a description of the problem. Whatever the “policy” of the business, a “heat of the moment” action or one slip-up should never be allowed to lead to a cancellation in my decidedly German union member mind. Especially not after years of employment.
This could have lead to some citation or training or something, but not a cancellation.
If businesses lack those.laws, companies are never required to really train their ppl, because they can just hire and fire, expecting the knowledge they want to already be there.
Ish on the deter by being there. I can’t speak for all companies but the major one I work for would have you act as just a visible deterance by just standing there. The grabbing the cable and stuff would be what would be “to far”
Deterrence happens before somebody decides to do something.
It certainly doesn’t happen as the dude is walking out with a case of whatever it was. Moving to block somebody’s path is generally considered an escalation; and that’s exactly how the shoplifter saw the action.
“maintaining a presence” to “deter criminal activity” only works if they’ve not already decided to conduct that criminal activity.
I understand how you feel, but reading your story, I think when you were grabbing the product and telling him to “just drop it an leave” is what ended your career.
It sucks, you got attacked, but you don’t need to trade your personal safety for some store product.
Just based on this story here, where you are giving a very one sided view of the situation, you intentionally put yourself at risk and kept escalating. I hate that a criminal put you in a situation where you ended up getting fired, but there was more than one mistake here.
Company doesn’t want to pay for your hospital bill if you get seriously injured.
When I worked at Kmart years ago I was just a layaway employee. Since I was kind of fat and and of average height, the security guy asked me to stand-in while he dealt with this huge dude, maybe 6’3", as some kind of intimidation tactic while he asked him questions. My job was apparently to block the security office door to prevent the guy from leaving. Security guy starts asking about warrants and the guy is like “Fuck this” and rapidly approaches me at the door. Towering over me. This job paid minimum wage and I had zero training to deal with Brute Squads. I just let him go past me while the security guy desperately chased after him, asking him to stop repeatedly. Security guy talked a lot of shit about me after that. Couldn’t give less of a fuck. Not my job to get knocked out by giant dudes who got caught trying to steal a pair of Basic Edition sweat pants.
It’s a bad situation OP and I’m sorry you lost your job. I may have done the same thing if I were in your situation. I hope that you recover quickly. Wrong place, wrong time.
This is one of the many reasons why you should just call the cops and otherwise not get involved unless they’re immediately dangerous to people, a.) The companies have insurance against this stuff, and they usually have policies against would be “heroes” getting involved, and b.) They will fire you, you could get sued, you could wind up with charges yourself. You as a manager should have had an understanding of these things, but you didn’t and now you are facing the consequences of your actions, or the actions you felt forced to take.
Nobody should care that much about their faceless corporation, especially not in retail, why? Because they absolutely do not give a fuck about you, they will fire or lay you off for any silly reason, often just to make or save a few more bucks.
Everyone should just learn how to do your job and go home peacefully, and enjoy your time, or do something more meaningful with your time. You sound like you’re a nice meaningful person, maybe spend some time volunteering with the homeless or other needy groups, those people need the help, not some faceless greedy corporation.
Also get out of front line retail, it’s a shit show at every level, as a manager there are plenty of other fields you can move to if you have the ability, also getting into something like Project Management doesn’t take much, and the Project Management Professional certification is fairly easy to get, albeit somewhat pricey.
Good luck with your next move in life, hope it’s something that brings you happiness.
The insurance generally doesn’t kick in unless its 100k plus. It is “planned” for that a certain amount of theft and such will happen,
As for getting sued, meh, merchant rights protect doing reasonable things. Issue comes up when someone “thinks” someone stole and does shit without thinking. Generally All the stores don’t want to have any type of liability with anyone getting hurt so no touching and/or heavy interacting is in policy
You as a manager should have had an understanding of these things, but you didn’t and now you are facing the consequences of your actions, or the actions you felt forced to take.
Not everyone can do cost benefit analysis while in a panicked struggle with someone.
OP admitted that they at least mildly engaged with the thief, had OP not gone even that far there probably wouldn’t have been a physical confrontation, also OP’s version of events could be biased as well, I’m not accusing OP, I’m just open to the possibility.
So with that said, sure people panic in tense situations, but if they know the policies in place, especially a manager with 20 years on the job, they would probably know that they shouldn’t engage if the policies forbid it, or at least I’d hope they would, managers are supposed to be some of the arbiters of the rules in the workplace.
The problem in these situations is usually the worker’s ego and sense of outrage at the crime, and obviously also the shithead or desperate criminal committing said crime, people have to overcome their ego and outrage and simply not put themselves in harms way, push folks to safety in the back areas, lock yourself in, and call the cops and corporate who ever you’re supposed to call in such situations.
I’m also not talking out of my ass, I’m going off accounts of what my 26 year old daughter has done as an assistant manager at Walgreens in similar circumstances, thankfully she no longer works at Walgreens, as it’s a shit company that does not give AF about their people.
Well, time to shoplift from their stores and shout “come near and you will lose your job” at any personel affronting you. Take as much as you like and don’t pay a cent.
That is your severance package.
