Archived Fitting Room is insane

[laineyluxx]

I work in a super high volume store, we are never not busy. We always have a line of at least 5 people every morning waiting at the doors before we open.

Our fitting room is insane. I've been both softlines/hardlines for the past year but lately they've been super short staffed at the fitting room (I can see why everyone's been leaving now) so they moved me back there permanently. We have one opener and one closer. Their rule is we must come completely clean of reshop at the end of our shift. This is such a stupid rule considering how they have us run the fitting room. It is only me doing reshop. I am responsible for answering the phones which ring every 2 mins, getting the reshop from guest service (our cart back there gets full every 20 mins) and all the clothes that everyone tries on at the fitting room If I just leave the fitting room for 2 minutes I will come back and the rooms will be FULL off clothing laying on the floor. 70% of the time I'm not back there, I'm running around the store doing reshop, and looking for items around the store for guest on the phone (because when I try to transfer nobody ever takes the calls so I have to do it). The rooms are always full of clothing and tags. Always. Since I'm basically never back there the guest get to do whatever they want, steal whatever they want, be however messy they want in there, and they sure do take advantage of it.
How can the LODS expect me to come clean at the end of each of shift like this?
Not to mention they also want me zoning men's and sleep/hosiery/activewear when I close cause we only have 2-3 softlines closers. I constantly tell the lods we need one person just doing reshop and someone staying at FR. They never care. Especially our Stl, he sucks. I seriously want to quit but I need the money.
How do the LODS at your store run the fitting room and what are their expectations there?

If you read through my long rant, thanks!!

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

Welcome to end to end.
End to End team PILOT

 

[Badjedidude]

Most fitting rooms I've seen are a barely contained mess.

Nobody put me in charge, but they definitely could use some love.

 

[jenna]

Our fitting rooms have been better since End to End, but our Softlines team is staffed really well (barring call-offs, of course.)

 

[Yetive]

FRO can not leave the fitting room. First and last hour of the day, they can push reshop if it is slow enough, but otherwise they stay put. And their breaks/lunches are covered. If nobody is getting calls, have the LOD get them. Your store I'd not doing what they are supposed to be doing with the FR.

 

[sprinklesontop]

Their rule is we must come completely clean of reshop at the end of our shift. This is such a stupid rule considering how they have us run the fitting room. It is only me doing reshop. I am responsible for answering the phones which ring every 2 mins, getting the reshop from guest service (our cart back there gets full every 20 mins) and all the clothes that everyone tries on at the fitting room If I just leave the fitting room for 2 minutes I will come back and the rooms will be FULL off clothing laying on the floor. 70% of the time I'm not back there, I'm running around the store doing reshop, and looking for items around the store for guest on the phone (because when I try to transfer nobody ever takes the calls so I have to do it). The rooms are always full of clothing and tags. Always. Since I'm basically never back there the guest get to do whatever they want, steal whatever they want, be however messy they want in there, and they sure do take advantage of it.

So.... here's how we've been successful: The FR Team Member's biggest priority is the Fitting Room! Period. Yes, our FR TM does the sorting and answers phones. On occasion, she will step away within "arms-reach" to do reshop/go-backs.

BUT...... we give our FR TM the power to "walkie" the A&A TMs to come "collect" their reshop/go-backs in the area that they are working in: "Hey, Jane... you're go-backs are getting full in the FR, can you come get them, please?" And Jane, in turn, happily replies with, "Sure, I'll be right there !".

Also..... we give our FR TM the power to quickly, QUICKLY divert any phone calls to the necessary parties: "Hey Sally..... there's an Infant HL call on 2280." Period. No questions asked. YOU don't have time to figure out exactly what nipple pump, nipple cream, nipple anything the Guest wants, but Sally does ! You're the "operator".... pass the call on as quickly as possible.

Then.... Our FR TM doesn't get the re-wrap dumped on them. The A&A TMs do their own at the end of each shift.
In addition..... whenever GS calls out that our (returns) cart is getting full...... any of the A&A TMs will get it on their next break/lunch and bring it to you so you don't leave the FR.

Now..... if all of that is taken off your hands: You can truly focus on the FR !! We ask our FR TM to walk EVERY guest to their room, make small talk about their merchandise, and then politely ask them to bring the merch out with them. It cuts WAAAAAAY down on shortage, trust me !!!!!!! The FR TMs were slightly uncomfortable w/ this initially.... but the benefit is huge. Also, on the "service" side of the things ..... if your FR Guest needs a sparkling pink tule Cat & Jack skirt in a size 12, YOU "walkie" your A&A pal in Girls: "Hey Sue, do you mind bring a 'sparkling.....size 12' to our Guest in the FR?" And Sue, would be "happy to do that !!!"

Sorry for the L O N G explanation....... but it works !!!!! It's a big change, hopefully your Leadership will consider some of the changes...... and give it time. We stumbled a bit until everyone became familiar with it.

Good luck, Laineyluxx !!!

 

[NKG]

I work in a super high volume store, we are never not busy. We always have a line of at least 5 people every morning waiting at the doors before we open.

Our fitting room is insane. I've been both softlines/hardlines for the past year but lately they've been super short staffed at the fitting room (I can see why everyone's been leaving now) so they moved me back there permanently. We have one opener and one closer. Their rule is we must come completely clean of reshop at the end of our shift. This is such a stupid rule considering how they have us run the fitting room. It is only me doing reshop. I am responsible for answering the phones which ring every 2 mins, getting the reshop from guest service (our cart back there gets full every 20 mins) and all the clothes that everyone tries on at the fitting room If I just leave the fitting room for 2 minutes I will come back and the rooms will be FULL off clothing laying on the floor. 70% of the time I'm not back there, I'm running around the store doing reshop, and looking for items around the store for guest on the phone (because when I try to transfer nobody ever takes the calls so I have to do it). The rooms are always full of clothing and tags. Always. Since I'm basically never back there the guest get to do whatever they want, steal whatever they want, be however messy they want in there, and they sure do take advantage of it.
How can the LODS expect me to come clean at the end of each of shift like this?
Not to mention they also want me zoning men's and sleep/hosiery/activewear when I close cause we only have 2-3 softlines closers. I constantly tell the lods we need one person just doing reshop and someone staying at FR. They never care. Especially our Stl, he sucks. I seriously want to quit but I need the money.
How do the LODS at your store run the fitting room and what are their expectations there?

If you read through my long rant, thanks!!

Your AP must not care about the new directive place where the fitting room operator can ONLY be at the fitting room. Ours is only allowed to work reshop at the fitting room and stay within greeting range. If they need reshop from GS, they have to get a SL TM get it or have someone at the fitting room. Lunches must be covered as well.

 

[HRZone]

Our fitting room doesn't sort anymore has made her job a lot easier. Most of them complain of being bored unless there are a lot of guest.

Like others have said your leadership is doing it wrong.

 

[RightArm]

So.... here's how we've been successful: The FR Team Member's biggest priority is the Fitting Room! Period. Yes, our FR TM does the sorting and answers phones. On occasion, she will step away within "arms-reach" to do reshop/go-backs.

BUT...... we give our FR TM the power to "walkie" the A&A TMs to come "collect" their reshop/go-backs in the area that they are working in: "Hey, Jane... you're go-backs are getting full in the FR, can you come get them, please?" And Jane, in turn, happily replies with, "Sure, I'll be right there !".

Also..... we give our FR TM the power to quickly, QUICKLY divert any phone calls to the necessary parties: "Hey Sally..... there's an Infant HL call on 2280." Period. No questions asked. YOU don't have time to figure out exactly what nipple pump, nipple cream, nipple anything the Guest wants, but Sally does ! You're the "operator".... pass the call on as quickly as possible.

Then.... Our FR TM doesn't get the re-wrap dumped on them. The A&A TMs do their own at the end of each shift.
In addition..... whenever GS calls out that our (returns) cart is getting full...... any of the A&A TMs will get it on their next break/lunch and bring it to you so you don't leave the FR.

Now..... if all of that is taken off your hands: You can truly focus on the FR !! We ask our FR TM to walk EVERY guest to their room, make small talk about their merchandise, and then politely ask them to bring the merch out with them. It cuts WAAAAAAY down on shortage, trust me !!!!!!! The FR TMs were slightly uncomfortable w/ this initially.... but the benefit is huge. Also, on the "service" side of the things ..... if your FR Guest needs a sparkling pink tule Cat & Jack skirt in a size 12, YOU "walkie" your A&A pal in Girls: "Hey Sue, do you mind bring a 'sparkling.....size 12' to our Guest in the FR?" And Sue, would be "happy to do that !!!"

Sorry for the L O N G explanation....... but it works !!!!! It's a big change, hopefully your Leadership will consider some of the changes...... and give it time. We stumbled a bit until everyone became familiar with it.

Good luck, Laineyluxx !!!

This is great but only works if you are well staffed and have a Sally in Infant Hardlines/Softlines and a Sue in girls. We are so short staffed at this point we are lucky if we have just ONE team member doing go backs day side. The Op's conversation makes me think that the Op may be in this same situation but even worse because her leadership doesn't care. The only thing keeping our fitting room from seriously tanking right now IS our leadership and their willingness to roll up their sleeves and jump in and help when it becomes an issue. If it were not for our leadership at this point I probably would quit due to the stress and expectations on such a SMALL group of people. We were also doing fine when we were well staffed. If any of you loses about 4 TMs in your dayside scheduling you'll feel it too. Hopefully when/if it happens to you you will have leadership that cares.

 

[laineyluxx]

Your AP must not care about the new directive place where the fitting room operator can ONLY be at the fitting room. Ours is only allowed to work reshop at the fitting room and stay within greeting range. If they need reshop from GS, they have to get a SL TM get it or have someone at the fitting room. Lunches must be covered as well.

Our AP doesn't care. I find it crazy how they allow nobody to stay back there during my lunch/breaks. You what happens when not a single team member is at the fitting room for 30+ minutes? I come back and each fitting room is loaded with clothing on the floor, a bunch of tags under the seats and on top of the mirror. Whenever I ask if someone could stay back there during my lunch to avoid this, their response is "we don't have enough people, and they need to work on their zones" omg drives me CRAZY. I feel like my target must be the only one this idiotic.

 

[SquishySquishy]

Super high volume eh?

 

[Bosch]

Our AP doesn't care. I find it crazy how they allow nobody to stay back there during my lunch/breaks. You what happens when not a single team member is at the fitting room for 30+ minutes? I come back and each fitting room is loaded with clothing on the floor, a bunch of tags under the seats and on top of the mirror. Whenever I ask if someone could stay back there during my lunch to avoid this, their response is "we don't have enough people, and they need to work on their zones" omg drives me CRAZY. I feel like my target must be the only one this idiotic.

I feel you.. We didn't have one in hardlines today Saturday before Labor day and we had not one team member for hardlines from 10am to 3:30p. Not a call out, just no one scheduled.

 

[Doglover89]

Our store...is lucky if they have a fitting room person. They are usually needed to push truck, reshop, etc. At night they also zone RTW. We're pretty high volume too. I can't imagine having enough hands on deck to allow someone to just stay in the fitting room.

 

[R2d2]

Reshop? Zone? When? In my store you"ll never see that... the Fitting room is allways full with carts to sort and tons of returns ... the softlines tms work the returns . Fitting room op : calls, sort, pick up clerance area and maybe other area near to the fr ...
They only work 4hrs a day so we don't have to cover their lunchs !

 

[Kartman]

A train wreck comes to mind.

 

[Tessa120]

Right now our process for the fitting room changes daily, there's the vision of how it works and then there's vision meeting reality. I've given up on any sense of order and simply ask every day what the goals for the day are, and do my best to meet the daily goals.

 

[Frontlanegirl]

I feel you.. We didn't have one in hardlines today Saturday before Labor day and we had not one team member for hardlines from 10am to 3:30p. Not a call out, just no one scheduled.

How is this serving the guests by not having someone on the sales floor?

 

[Frontlanegirl]

A train wreck comes to mind.

I've seen several areas of softlines that have not been zoned in over a week.

 

[HRZone]

Our store...is lucky if they have a fitting room person. They are usually needed to push truck, reshop, etc. At night they also zone RTW. We're pretty high volume too. I can't imagine having enough hands on deck to allow someone to just stay in the fitting room.

We're a low volume store and our fitting room stays at fitting room. Considering the focus on guest service and the amount of theft that happens at the fitting room

If you don't have someone at fitting room at all times you are definitely not operating in best practice.

 

[Doglover89]

If you don't have someone at fitting room at all times you are definitely not operating in best practice.

Yeah, I know its not best practice. But what do you do on a day like this for example: 3 tms are scheduled for a day shift. Two come in at 8 and one at 11 (a special needs tm). There is a truck to be pushed and someone needs to work price change. There is a lot of reshop hanging around the fitting room needing to be sorted and then of course put away. One tm worked truck (and did not finish). The second worked price change nearly all day and covered phones for the HRTM's breaks. The special needs tm worked on a bit of already-sorted reshop. When myself and another closing tm arrived at 3pm, the second tm only just got done pc and moved over to start working on the fitting room. I don't know what else could have been done differently.

 

[sprinklesontop]

Yeah, I know its not best practice. But what do you do on a day like this for example: 3 tms are scheduled for a day shift. Two come in at 8 and one at 11 (a special needs tm). There is a truck to be pushed and someone needs to work price change. There is a lot of reshop hanging around the fitting room needing to be sorted and then of course put away. One tm worked truck (and did not finish). The second worked price change nearly all day and covered phones for the HRTM's breaks. The special needs tm worked on a bit of already-sorted reshop. When myself and another closing tm arrived at 3pm, the second tm only just got done pc and moved over to start working on the fitting room. I don't know what else could have been done differently.

Any idea how many hours A&A is "supposed" to have on any given week? Is there a possibility that ALL of the hours aren't being used towards A&A? Maybe that's where the problem lies. Not sure of the volume of your store, but we average about 270- 290 per week..... based on what the company dictates for the workload. We use every BIT of those hours because I partner w/ the STL.... we make edits to the (generated) schedule to be certain we are "staffed" according to the workload.
If you don't have enough A&A TMs to cover all the shifts allocated; that's another issue as well. We have a few crossed-trained cashiers and Beauty TMs who pick up hours in A&A.
Most days, we feel good about our productivity. The departments look "good", not great. It's not perfect, trust me...... especially PC..... still kicking our a$$.

 

[HRZone]

Any idea how many hours A&A is "supposed" to have on any given week? Is there a possibility that ALL of the hours aren't being used towards A&A?

That's what I suspect is happening at their store. We are required to over schedule for call outs in AA.

You also are not allowed to underpost in fitting room to pad softlines now.

 

[Doglover89]

Not sure of the volume of your store, but we average about 270- 290 per week..... based on what the company dictates for the workload. We use every BIT of those hours because I partner w/ the STL.... we make edits to the (generated) schedule to be certain we are "staffed" according to the workload.
If you don't have enough A&A TMs to cover all the shifts allocated; that's another issue as well. We have a few crossed-trained cashiers and Beauty TMs who pick up hours in A&A.

We are A volume. We're understaffed right now, but I believe we're using more than 290 hours. My TLs/ETL are not involved with the schedule at all. It is generated and no changes are made (according to HR). The only people allowed to look at it whatsoever are the ETL-HR and the STL. We have a couple people we're using temporarily to fill in the gaps, but my TLs don't want to cross train anyone. They don't even like that we have to have these extra tms helping out for the time being.

 

[Ahem]

So many things said here seem mad unrealistic to me.

Waking every guest to their room isn't even plausible in my store. You'll be walking over and then the phone rings and 6 people come in and say "can I just go in? Do I need a number??" So you can't make them wait so you can walk and chit chat them.

Then if you go get different sizes for one guest, who walks the few that came in while you were gone? Then you get back and the phone's ringing, then guests come out and some come in all at once... When do you fix the hangers, sort the gs cart, fold stuff? Then on a busy holiday shift the phone is ringing back to back with "what are your hours today calls lol. Then someone wants to know if another store has the size in stock that you don't have... And more guests come. And on and on and on and on. My store was toying with this thing where they scheduled so 2 people were FR during busier hours (they labeled the second person GE because they were supposed to do the guest facing tasks) but the TLs kept stealing them to work on the floor. It could've been helpful though

Your fr has to always be slow for one person to do all of this and keep up with it. I'd love to keep the guests feeling special and attended to, but they can't buy things if we're letting unsorted carts build up. There were times this summer where we had carts in the double digits in the backroom waiting to be sorted lol. No one could buy that stuff... But the guests felt special so yay.

 

[Tessa120]

So many things said here seem mad unrealistic to me.

Waking every guest to their room isn't even plausible in my store. You'll be walking over and then the phone rings and 6 people come in and say "can I just go in? Do I need a number??" So you can't make them wait so you can walk and chit chat them.

Then if you go get different sizes for one guest, who walks the few that came in while you were gone? Then you get back and the phone's ringing, then guests come out and some come in all at once... When do you fix the hangers, sort the gs cart, fold stuff? Then on a busy holiday shift the phone is ringing back to back with "what are your hours today calls lol. Then someone wants to know if another store has the size in stock that you don't have... And more guests come. And on and on and on and on. My store was toying with this thing where they scheduled so 2 people were FR during busier hours (they labeled the second person GE because they were supposed to do the guest facing tasks) but the TLs kept stealing them to work on the floor. It could've been helpful though

Your fr has to always be slow for one person to do all of this and keep up with it. I'd love to keep the guests feeling special and attended to, but they can't buy things if we're letting unsorted carts build up. There were times this summer where we had carts in the double digits in the backroom waiting to be sorted lol. No one could buy that stuff... But the guests felt special so yay.

You are so right in so many ways. It's a balancing act. It really is. You can go full tilt guests, and the place looks like crap with half the popular items sitting at the fitting room. You can go full tilt product placement and the guests feel ignored. Or you can go halfway with all tasks.

I've found that guests really respond well to small talk. If you can keep a conversation going while your hands are busy, the guest feels like you are both attentive and you see them as a person, while your stuff gets sorted, folded and hung up.

With the phone, treat it like you are a receptionist. Hold is a wonderful feature when used properly.