Wesfarmers Coles Integrity Watch
by suzie Tuesday, Jun 25 2013, 9:54am
international / prose / post

Following revelations of the sordid and heartless exploitation of Bangladeshi textile workers by Wesfarmers Coles, aired on the ABC Four Corners program on Monday night, it has come to our notice via Bangladeshi, Indian and other Coles staff that staff are verbally abused on a regular basis by the Store manager of the Eastgate Bondi Junction Store. He has even engaged in this grossly improper practice, we are advised, in front of customers! All Coles staff should be made aware that they are not required to tolerate verbal abuse from ANYONE, customers, other staff but especially management. Very clear protocols and industrial laws exist in AUSTRALIA which must be adhered to and they do not include tolerating verbal abuse!

We have also been informed of a very un-Australian but characteristic mean spirited action initiated by the same offending Coles Store but on this occasion by the night manager who advised the meat section to discontinue selling lamb off-cuts, which have been traditionally taken from left-over shoulder cuts. Though these cuts are rough, less well off shoppers have been able to stew or curry these pieces into a satisfying, nutritious meal, however, under advice from the Coles Bondi Junction night manager, Coles’ meat section replaced (store wide) these edible off-cuts with almost pure lamb fat discards and solid shoulder bones, which frankly a dog would have trouble eating. This is just another example of the mean-spirited and heartless attitude that leads to the exploitation of people in undeveloped nations like Bangladesh.

It is clear that the top down centralist approach favoured by American Corporations is not working for Wesfarmers Coles. A very pronounced disconnect from upper to middle and lower management now exists which is negatively impacting the viability of the entire supermarket chain -- we would mention that Woolworths continues to sell edible lamb shoulder off-cuts.

We have also been informed that Coles’ policy of cutting back staff hours and then squeezing rostered floor staff to make greater and greater efforts to compensate for the cut-back hours is coming at a quality control cost; staff now do not have ample time to adequately perform stock rotations -- checking for ‘use-by’ or ‘best before’ dates and discarding date exceeded stock and cycling expiring stock to the front. The demands of local managers to extract the last bead of sweat from workers has resulted in numerous returns from customers who are appalled that their purchases may not be safe to consume. We would also mention that exploited floor staff are then blamed for this management created problem and in some cases have been sacked so local managers do not appear to be at fault or the real cause of the problem.

While our dedicated Coles complaints website is under construction, we shall endeavour to keep everyone informed of every improper practice that comes to our attention.

In the meantime do not fail to give Coles management a piece of your mind when encountering any problem whatsoever; thanks to recent exposures, Wesfarmers Coles is now a known exploitative and very sordid organisation which does not deserve your custom or support.