Union says retail employees missing out through unpaid work meetings

WELLINGTON: More shop workers are stepping forward to complain in what is believed to be a ‘‘widespread’’ problem of bigname retailers failing to pay for work meetings, First Union says.

First Union spokeswoman Tali Williams told Morning Report yesterday the union was receiving messages and reports from retail workers who had not realised until now that they were entitled to be paid.

Ms Williams said considering the number of messages and reports, the issue appeared to be widespread but some employers did not deal with the issue even when it was brought to their attention.

‘‘In some situations they have raised it, and even we’ve raised it at various points over the years to say ‘well this doesn’t seem right to us and you should be paying these people’, and the response from companies has been similar to what the Briscoes employee spoke about earlier,’’ she said.

‘‘The response has been ‘no, this is the right thing to do, you’ve got to come in, you’ve got to do these sessions, otherwise you’re going to be behind on work and that’s going to affect your performance’.’’

‘‘A lot of retail workers are on minimum wage and so then they’re missing out on roughly $800 a year by attending these free meetings every morning.’’

A retail employee who worked for Rebel Sport said she was not paid to do the evening cashup.

‘‘I noticed that I wasn’t getting paid for that final 15 minutes of work, and when I brought this up with the management team they told me that it was because Rebel Sport cashes in less tills, so the cash at the end of the day takes less time and because it tends to take 1015 minutes they don’t have to pay us.’’

Another retail worker who was formerly employed by Briscoes said the staff were required to go to work 15 minutes early for unpaid daily meetings — as Smiths City workers do.

The former Briscoes employee, who did not wish to be named, said she went to the meetings every shift for the four years she was at the company but never questioned them because she did not know any better.

Briscoes managing director Rod Duke, whose company owns both the Briscoes and Rebel Sports brands, said it was mindful of its obligations as an employer.

‘‘It may have been many years ago that was the case — I don’t know whether it was or was not,’’ Mr Duke said.

‘‘But I can tell you for the last good number of years, and probably an extended period, people have, in fact, been paid for the Monday meetings or the meetings which occur from time to time 15 minutes early.’’

He said he had checked with every regional manager today and all staff were paid for meetings. — RNZ