Supermarket Worker Hit over the Head with a cardboard box

Supermarket Worker Hit over the Head with a cardboard box

My Story

I was working at New World Supermarket at my home town of Greymouth for a period during the 1990s. I was on a scheme where the government subsidized my wages. My hourly rate was $7 an hour. My job was as a produce assistant which involved restocking shelves, rotating the fruit, cutting up vegetables, and other tasks which are required to serve the customers.

My time at New World was not a happy one. My colleagues in the produce department took bullying to a whole new level.

My job was to close up the produce department. I would finish up and stand back and admire my hard work as I finished up, but when I came into work the following morning, the produce manager whose name was Stephen Fennell, said, “You did or didn’t do this, blah, blah, blah,”

At first I accepted this as the learning process, but this went on for weeks, then months. Colleagues in other departments noticed and said, “They are not happy with Bob no matter what he does.”

Fennell, referred to me as “bloody idiot,” and this was not just an isolated incident, it was just about every day. He would say, in general conversation, “You’re a bloody idiot.”

Sarah was the co manager, she was a nitpicker, just like Fennel, and nasty to go with it. She nitpicked at every single thing I did. One day I came in and started work 15 minutes early to try and catch up with work and she said, “You shouldn’t come in early, it adds to your time.”

Yet, when one of my colleagues went away early she signed her out at her normal time for her and Sarah would price up some vegetables at a cheaper price for her own shopping.

I once found a couple of $50 notes among the vegetables and said to Sarah, “Look what I found,” She snatched the money out of my hand and went up to the office and told them she found some cash. It is not known if the $50 was reunited with the owner or if Sarah got it.

A customer asked me a question and I went up to answer her when Sarah butted in and answered it before I had the chance to open my mouth. The customer thought she was rude and said, “He was going to tell me himself.”

If you think this is all bad then keep reading.

During my time at New World I was suffering from a pinched nerve but continued working. One day I said to Sarah, “I have a sore back,” and she responded, “Bullshit.”

One job I did sometimes was to sit down and take the loose skin off the onions and while I was doing this, Stephen Fennell came up behind me and whacked me over the head with a cardboard box for no other reason than to provide some entertainment for our colleagues. Sarah and Tara were both laughing and Sarah said to me, “What’s the matter you look stressed out.”

I laid a complaint to the police for assault and was told it was not serious enough.

I was basically expected to be seen and not heard from. Whenever I responded to something which was said by a colleague the other person said, “I was not talking to you.”

One day I said to Mason from the butchery “Good morning,” and he responded, “F***” off.

That is a summary of how some of my colleagues thought of me.

Sarah used to come into work on Saturday morning still worse from wear from a night out and still intoxicated. I once was working away there when she drove the pick up vehicle into the produce department and swerved at the last moment to avoid hitting me. I actually told John (The shop owner) that they come into work on Saturday intoxicated. I believed he talked to them but as usual they would have an explanation for everything.

Of course, “what would Bob know, he is intellectually challenged,” or so they try to make out.

Another time a person who was trespassed from the store walked in and I said to Jamie, who was the assistant to Fennell after Sarah left, “He is not supposed to be here.”

Jamie said, “Don’t worry about it.”

When John asked about it on Monday, Jamie said, “He wasn’t the guy,” trying to make out I had mistaken him for someone else. But then he changed his story and said, “I don’t know, Bob was the one who saw him.”