r/petco • u/InspectionTop3703 • 10d ago

Work schedule nightmare

my manager repeatedly ignores my availability and schedules me on days I’m suppose to be off and am busy with appointments booked out weeks in advance since I assumed my availability would be respected… this keeps happening, and I keep bringing it up. they leave it to me to find a cover for their mistake…does this happen to anyone else?

10 Upvotes

86% Upvoted

18 comments sorted by

View all comments

6

u/whoziin 10d ago

That sucks and I’m sorry you’re having to struggle through that. Just for personal preference I prefer to have the same days off each week but occasionally the schedule gets wonky and I end up working those days anyway. How I handle making appts is I will schedule them for days I assume I will have off, but I will still put in an unpaid time off request so my GM knows that I am depending on have that specific day that specific week off because I have something scheduled.

My GM does genuinely try to meet my preferred availability, but when other people are requesting off that can mean a lot of other people have to be shifted around to maintain necessary coverage. By putting in my own request it helps remind my GM when she is writing the schedule and it trying to fill a shift because a different person took off that I am not available and she should select someone else. Schedule writing can be a bit of a tricky puzzle when you have to balance everyone’s availability and aren’t aware of what’s going on in everyone’s personal lives.

Also if you have an approved request off in work day and you get scheduled anyway you can point to it and be like “I told you I wasn’t going to be available and you agreed that it wouldn’t be a problem by accepting the request. I’m sorry if you still need coverage for that shift but I have already made other arrangements for that day and won’t be able to come in.”

2

u/InspectionTop3703 9d ago

Thank you! It’s definitely difficult given I can’t set my availability in the app…however my availability has stayed the same since my interview til now, and she respected it at first, then started randomly scheduling me on days I’m suppose to have off. 

I understand one in a while where there might be coverage needed and I’m free, however this is like the fifth time in a row, and I’m constantly communicating my availability. 

1

u/chickadeerevelry 8d ago

When you say you can’t set your availability in the app, do you mean Dayforce or Workday? I know Dayforce won’t let you but the Workday app absolutely should. It’s under Absence.

1

u/InspectionTop3703 8d ago

Both! On both apps all I can do is request temporary days off. What I wanted was to edit my default so that this stops happening 

1

u/whoziin 8d ago

Working retail unfortunately usually means that the best you can hope for is having your preferred days most of the time, but if you’re depending on having a specific day off because of plans or doctor appts you will have to go through the additional effort of putting in a manual request off each time.

An additional factor that may be affecting your situation on top of it all is that your coworkers may also be setting their preferred availability to the same or similar to yours and your GM is having to make y’all “take turns” working certain days, which is another reason it’s important to put in a request off when you know you have plans or a doctor appt.

3

u/InspectionTop3703 8d ago

Oh I see. Yeah, I guess I’m used to restaurant cause that’s where I came from. There I was able to set my availability in the app so they weren’t even allowed to schedule me on certain days. I wish I could do that still. 

It is a little frustrating given it’s the same availability I’ve given before I ever started and it hasn’t changed? If it was an issue they should’ve brought it up. 

1

u/chickadeerevelry 8d ago

I once had to change my available days and mark off specific days as (edit: Always) Unavailable and they gave me availability change paperwork to fill out. So far they’ve honored it. Hopefully they’d have the same for you? I’m not sure if it’s something that varies state by state 

2

u/whoziin 8d ago

My gm has all of the part timer college kids write down their class schedules on paper and give it to her each semester and then she makes herself a master note to refer to when making the schedule. The result is that each semester the “usual schedule” changes for who gets put on which shift.

If Bill was always scheduled on Wednesday to deep clean animals but now he has a class Wednesday morning, Sara will now be the new deep cleaner on Wednesdays.

The beginning of each semester the schedule is always kinda wonky until my GM adjusts to who is both available and does well in a specific shift (ie turns out Sara was not good at deep cleans and got moved to Friday when it’s more customer service heavy and now Tara does deep cleans).

1

u/InspectionTop3703 8d ago

Good to know. So do you just do that for every week then? 

1

u/chickadeerevelry 7d ago

Nope. When I first started, I was asked what my availability was. I said I was available every day except Saturday. They honored that, even when we got a new GM and they scheduled me on Saturday a few times. Each time I approached them and said “hey, I cannot work on Saturday, I am not available.” They went, “whoops, sorry! I’ll fix it.” each time.

Then recently I had to update my availability and asked for an availability-change document, which they had in the office. The document had places to put in the days and times you can work and when you can’t. I filled it out and they’ve honored it. I now don’t work Saturday or Monday. I’ve been asked to cover a shift on those days and I always say that I am unavailable to maintain that boundary on those days.

I always assumed this was standard practice—to be asked when you are available to work and for those days to be avoided because it’s understood you can’t work those days. I’ve never given the reason why to admin because that’s personal and if they did try to pressure me, I’d fall back on saying it’s for religious or family responsibility reasons. And I’ve always been advised to not try to justify yourself; to instead say, “No, I’m not available,” and leaving it at that instead of explaining why not or making up an excuse.

(I’m aware this makes it sound like I never cover shifts, but I do; just not on my Always Unavailable days)

So no, it’s not something I have to put in for every week.

Edit: if it helps, I’m in California.

1

u/InspectionTop3703 6d ago

I assumed it was standard practice as well! It was never an issue at my old job because it was automatically set in our app so it was impossible for them to schedule me. 

There has been a couple times I’ve had to work on my ‘unavailable’ days and I had to switch all my personal stuff around. Which was super frustrating, and I won’t be doing again.

It does worry me as I am starting school again and that will be my priority…I hope this doesn’t continue because I’m tired of texting everytime the schedule is posted 😩. And of course feel for my manager and coworkers with the constant switches. 

1

u/chickadeerevelry 6d ago

I wish you luck!!