Starting your first job as a teenager requires adjustment and quick learning of a variety of new skills, so it can get stressful and frustrating that you can’t do it properly from the start. But it teaches you independence and responsibility as well as financial literacy and social skills.
Some learn quicker than others, but a coworker that Reddit user violetshockwave had was very slow. But not only that, he was annoying too and would call his mom to defend him if anyone would criticize him. From what was told, it is surprising that he wasn’t fired earlier and when they were planning on doing that, the teen quit, which made the rest of the employees feel relieved.
More info: Reddit
Grocery store hires a 16-year-old as a cashier, but nobody expected him to be so bad at it or having to deal with his mom
Image credits: Shann (not the actual photo)
The original story was posted in 2012 and it didn’t receive much attention, but not too long ago, Reddit user Sesshoboru reposted the story with all of its updates in the subreddit Best of Redditor Updates and people found it pretty intriguing.
The grocery store where the Original Poster (OP) worked was pretty small and it was a popular place for teenagers to start their first jobs as opposed to going to work at McDonald’s. Generally, the staff was peaceful but the stillness was disturbed when a 16-year-old boy called Ray in the story came to work there.
His dad was a regular customer at the grocery store and asked the manager if his son could get interviewed for a job as a cashier. The manager had never met Ray before and his dad seemed like a decent person, so the teenager was hired.
The story took place more than 10 years ago and the author of the post was working at a grocery store that hired teenagers looking for a job
Image credits: Sesshoboru
Most of the time it was a calm job until 16-year-old Ray came to work with them
Image credits: Sesshoboru
But Ray couldn’t keep up with the pace that was considered normal in that store and the lines at his register were always the longest despite him working on the express lane, where theoretically people should get out of the store more quickly as they are not buying a lot.
Not only was he slow with customers, but he was also sometimes just clueless and lacked judgment. Once he called the OP to ask what he should do when he dropped two pennies in his register. The OP was working alone with two lines and was pretty annoyed that Ray would call her for this and would hold up his own line for two pennies.
He called again later and asked about the lost pennies again because he was unsure if the OP was joking about just leaving them there before. When the OP gave him a sarcastic response, he just hung up.
Image credits: Sesshoboru
Ray was pretty slow at his job, was a burden to the author of the story and could be mean and disrespectful towards his colleagues
Image credits: Sesshoboru
There were people who came to defend Ray because this was his first job and you can’t expect him to know these things, and it is understandable that he would worry about losing money, even if it’s two pennies.
The OP was Ray’s supervisor, so she could have been more professional and understandable despite having a big workload, because in retail, everyone is always busy, so if they gave in to their frustrations, it would be impossible to have friendly colleague relationships.
Once the woman told off Ray for talking down to the lady who bagged the items and his mom found out
Image credits: Sesshoboru
She waited for the woman in the parking lot just to tell her to stop mistreating her child, to which Ray's colleague snapped back
Image credits: Sesshoboru
However, what made the OP even angrier was when she overheard Ray belittling their only bagger, an older Indian woman who didn’t really speak English, as Ray was irritated that she didn’t come when he asked her to bag the items he scanned.
The rules for the bagger were that if she was busy with something else, the cashier would bag the items themselves, because she couldn’t help several cashiers at once. Plus, he was working in the express lane, so the priority would be to help the other cashiers.
To make sure this didn’t happen again, the OP disciplined Ray and warned him that if he disrespected his colleagues again, she would be involving the manager.
Image credits: Polina Tankilevitch (not the actual photo)
After this incident, the woman didn't see Ray for some time as he took time off because of an injury, but when she did, he came back with a note
Image credits: Sesshoboru
Image credits: Anete Lusina (not the actual photo)
Being told off is never pleasant and you want to vent about it to someone, even if you’re not right. The person Ray vented to was his mom and she actually waited for OP to finish work and met her in the parking lot, which is a bit creepy considering how many women are afraid to go to their car at night after work because of men stalking them.
Ray’s mom was upset about how the OP was talking to her son because she had no real hierarchical authority over him despite working longer in the store. The OP was not working anymore, so she allowed herself to match the mom’s energy and snap back.
Image credits: Sesshoboru
The note wasn't from the doctor but was his mom saying that Ray couldn't stand all the time because of his injured knee, so he would need more breaks
Image credits: Sesshoboru
This was also the moment when she decided that Ray needed to be written up as initially, the OP was thinking of just letting it go. When she talked to the manager about the incident and how Ray got his mom to defend him, the OP found out that her grandmother also had the displeasure of meeting Mommy.
Nothing was done about it and the OP had a feeling it wouldn’t be done, so she was already thinking about how to approach the matter with the owner of the store.
Ray was sent back home so his mom came to settle things, demanding that the store accommodate her son
Image credits: Sesshoboru
Image credits: Mikhail Nilov (not the actual photo)
The conversation had to be delayed because Ray busted his knee and couldn’t come to work. When he did, he brought his mom’s note that he couldn’t stand all day so he would need more breaks to go and sit down.
This is not how you handle medical issues in the adult world and in the workplace. A mom’s note isn’t a valid document that exempts you from doing your job. So the manager suggested that Ray take more time off and get better enough to be able to work his 6 hours on his feet with the 15 minute break the law guarantees.
The manager didn't think that making an injured teenager work was a good idea, so the mom also had to go home empty-handed
Image credits: Sesshoboru
The next time the store workers saw Ray was when he came with a letter for the manager
Image credits: Sesshoboru
The mom’s note was truly absurd. While you can believe that a 16-year-old might think it’s valid as long as he is a minor, it is even more absurd to think that the mom who wrote the note was sure that her son’s colleagues would accept it. She even came to the store to insist that her son was being discriminated against for being injured.
People in the comments were pretty mad at this point. If it was an AITA post, they would say that everyone sucks here.
First of all, non-American readers were appalled at the cruelty that cashiers in the US have to suffer through because somehow having a chair to sit on makes you less productive. Also, a 15-minute break when you work 6 hours seems too short, especially when you have to stand all the time. They were also confused why the mom wanted her child to work while injured.
The letter thanked the store for the job opportunity, but Ray was upset that his efforts to be the best weren't enough as he was constantly mistreated by coworkers
Image credits: cottonbro studio (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Sesshoboru
It was practically a resignation letter unless Ray got a raise, more vacation days and a promotion
Image credits: Sesshoboru
Well, the reason behind it was that Ray hadn’t injured his knee at all. Actually, he was already working at his new workplace and was trying to juggle two jobs without telling the grocery store manager about it.
His former colleagues and manager found out about it when he had already quit. But the teenager couldn’t even quit without some sort of a spectacle.
The demands weren't taken seriously and everyone suspected from the way it was written that it was the mom who wrote it
Image credits: Sesshoboru
He came in to work and again brought a note, but this time it was tucked in an envelope, a typed-out letter to the manager. You can find the scan of the original letter here and here. Knowing the teenager’s writing style, his colleagues immediately realized that it was his mom who wrote it.
The letter highlighted what a wonderful employee he was, but his colleagues didn’t appreciate it and he was always treated with disrespect, especially by the OP and the bagger. So he was quitting, unless his working conditions were improved, his pay raised and he got a second paid vacation.
Nobody took the demands seriously and Ray was scheduled to come in to be fired, but he quit of his own will a few days before the meeting. He went on to work at rue21, which is a clothing store, and OP didn’t have much hope that he was better at his job there.
A few days after Ray quit, the store workers found out that he already had a new job and had started it on the day he injured his knee, which was a suspicious coincidence
Image credits: Sesshoboru
The attitude the teenager had and his mom being so involved was a true nightmare, but having teenagers as employees comes with its own issues. Veterinary Business Advisors point out that teenagers still are under their parents’ control and they “may have parents who hover over them and this can have a negative impact on the workplace.”
Also, teenagers don’t have much experience, so “This means you’ll need to expend more resources training and/or supervising a teenaged worker and be patient as the learning curve takes place. You will likely need to explain tasks in more detail and answer more questions.”
Employers need to understand that teenagers not only lack working experience but life experience in general so “may need guidance in how to handle pressure and/or frustration at work, and they may struggle to accept feedback if it’s the first time for them in a workplace setting.”
But training a teenager requires patience as it might be their first job and they have no idea what are company policies that are common in various companies. “Policies that just feel natural to you, as an employer, may not make sense to them at all.”
The woman who wrote the story was glad she got rid of the burden and was surprised he managed to get another job
Image credits: Sesshoboru
It could truly be that Ray was hopeless and he thought he was coming to hang out and be paid for it. But it is also possible that he just needed more time to adjust and be trained more thoroughly.
The bigger problem the OP had was that Ray would complain about his work to his mom and either ask her to defend him, or she did that with her own initiative. What do you think about Ray’s work ethic? Do you think the store expected too much from him or was he being a brat? Let us know your thoughts on this story in the comments.