Having the 'Rite' Name, Doesn't Make it Right
April 18, 2009. By Gordon Gibb
Camp Hill, PA: Rite Aid is a powerful force in the business world, a Fortune 500 company with total sales of $24.3 billion in fiscal 2008. But according to employees with claims of unpaid Rite Aid overtime,Rite Aid is not a happy place to work.
And allegedly cheap, too. A class action lawsuit is currently underway, filed by disgruntled employees who feel the company stiffed them out of overtime. The poster girl, if you will, is reported to be Shirley Craig of Brownsville, Georgia. Craig filed a lawsuit in December alleging Rite Aid and Eckerd (a drug store chain acquired by Rite-Aid) improperly classified assistant managers as being exempt from overtime, even though Craig contends that the assistant manager position requires little skill and primary duties are said to exclude managerial responsibilities for a store, or department.
In other words, if an assistant manager is in reality a glorified stock boy or cashier, then the type of work is arguably not management fare and the standard rate of 1.5 times their normal rate for hours worked beyond 40 hours in a week would be justified.
Craig campaigned to have a class action registered, representing some 250 assistant store managers similarly treated. A class action lawsuit is currently underway.
Rite Aid, based in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, denies it wrongfully classified assistant store managers as exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act in an effort to avoid paying overtime wages to which the plaintiffs suggest they were entitled.
The chain is lobbying to have the case dismissed. In a response to Craig's original action, Rite Aid asserts that Craig worked for its Eckerd subsidiary and, as a salaried employee was not entitled to overtime pay.
However, in defense of the plaintiff's position a number of class action lawsuits representing disgruntled employees of Rite Aid, as well as other retailers argue that assistant store managers and other employees performing similar work don't qualify under the 'executive exemption' clause under federal and state law. This is because, it is argued, the primary duties of those employees fall outside of any degree of managerial capacity.
In other words, you may have been given the title of assistant manager. But if you are denied the opportunity to perform the work your title suggests, then you have a strong case for an overtime claim. It’s not so much the title you are given, but the work you do.
In theory, an employer could make everyone an assistant manager—even the stockboy and thereby get around the requirements for the paying of any overtime, to anyone at all.
Meantime, Rite Aid is alleged to have problems elsewhere on the labor front. An attempt to unionize on the part of employees has reportedly been stonewalled by the company at every turn. And "…payroll is so tight," writes one Rite Aid employee from Torrington, Connecticut.
"If one person calls [in] sick, no one can even cover it because we can't allow overtime, so I am stuck working more and more hours for free and getting less and less accomplished in the process. And [we are] blamed for sales being so far down, when [Rite Aid] wiped out half of the products we used to carry that people want to buy, and raised the prices so high no one wants to shop there! It's getting quite ridiculous, the impossibilities that are expected of us."
Even though the company earned billions in 2008, their capitalization is reportedly slipping. Is that the reason for the alleged withholding of overtime? Employees feel they were improperly classified in an attempt to save the employer money. They may have been given the management moniker, but were not afforded the power that goes with the title.
Hence these employees feel they have a valid unpaid overtime claim.
You could, too.
If you have suffered losses in this case, please send your complaint to a lawyer who will review your possible [Rite-Aid overtime Lawsuit] at no cost or obligation.
Click on title above for a free case evaluation;
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It's true! They are greedy bastards! I was an assistant manager. In my job description I was to work 50 hours a week, instead I worked between 60 to 70 hours a week performing cashier tasks a large majority of the time. They treat their managers like slaves so they can avoid paying their hourly cashiers overtime! I was even told I could'nt go to jury duty! Also I was never compensated for my time and travel when I had to testify against shop lifters! It's a horrible company to work for.
ReplyDeleteI usually worked 11 hours a shift and most of that time was spent putting merchandise away from truck deliveries. We would receive 2 trucks a week with 12-16 pallets of merchandise on each truck. I was a glorified stock boy/cashier with an assistant manager's name tag. I worked the 3rd shift and usually spent my time facing the store (straightening merchandise on shelves) with no shift differential pay. Rite aid is a horrible company to work for. I wouldn't reccomend working there to my worst enemy!
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone out there know the status of the lawsuit against these greedy devils? They owe me a helluva lot of money! I want my money!
ReplyDeleteDoes Rite Aid pay their employee's well, No they don't. However, If you are an Assistant manager like i am, and aren't doing any management duties, it is by your lack of skill or motivation. I do every bit as much, if not more than my store manager does. I am the one that makes the sched. I am the one that does interviews, I am the one that makes up the daily work-list, I am the one that disciplines/re-trains the employees. A supervisor is the one who does invoices/credits. If you are not doing any of these things. Get out of my company, because it is people like you that are making our stock go below $1
ReplyDeleteOOH! boo hoo. How many shares do you own? Don't you know when you're being taken advantage of. I bet your D.M. promised you your own store years ago and your still believing the B.S. I did all the things you did an then some. Wake up!
ReplyDeleteI use to work for rite aid for 9 years and one day they suspended me and for no reason so after three weeks i just left and now they are the ones who are worried about their jobs who is laughing now ha ha .
ReplyDeleteRite Aid fired me after 2 years when I was hurt on the job so they would not have to deal with my short term disability my doctor ordered me out on.They gave me the option to come back to work disabled and do heavy lifting or be fired. I was given a strength test at the beginning of my employment to determine what capabilities I had as far as lifting in the warehouse. They constantly made me lift double the weight and told me if I didn't they would open the door for me to walk out. They said they knew it was a rough economy and that all of us would have no job if it wasn't for Rite Aid. Although I am very happy that warehouse manager was fired a month later, I am home resting from the herniated discs in my neck and the pinched nerves. Don't let this company use you for those low wages, you will end up hurt for life as I am. Hey, heard Rite Aid did not pay their employees again this week??????
ReplyDeleteI worked for Rite Aid as an assistant manager, and YES - I DID do all the things a manager did because they were so damn lazy they didnt want to do them - and I didnt get paid nearly as much as they did! She even made us stay all friggin night long to get ready for inventory so HER butt wouldnt be on the line, then blamed ME for not doing things! I stayed in the store overnight for floor stripping/wax, and she put me on the schedule to cover second shift that same day. I was constantly promised 'my own store' and transferred to other stores regularly to 'fix' them too - it was like being punished for doing a good job. I finally got laid off, and am part of this lawsuit because it was just not fair to be treated like that.
ReplyDeletei WAS A MANAGER FOR FITE AID. i DID ALL THE SCHEDULING WORK LISTS AND TRAINING, BUT BECAUSE OF PAYROLL RESTRICTIONS I WAS OPENING 3 DAYS A WEEK WITH ONE CASHIER AND DOING ALL THE VENDOR CHECK IN'S AS WELL AS RINGING ON THE REGISTER AND THROWING LOAD AND CUSTOMER SERVICE ON THE FLOOR. I WAS WORKING 12 HOUR DAYS AND MAKING $56,000 A YEAR. MY ASSISTANT WAS A NEWLY MADE MANAGER FROM LOSS PREVENTION WHO DID'T DO ANYTHING. THEY HIRED HIM AND TOLD ME IF HE WASN'T WORKING OUT I SHOULD WRITE HIM UP. WHO HAD THE TIME TO TRAIN HIM ? IF THINGS DID'NT GET DONE THEY ASKED ME WHY? I SAID NO PAYROLL NO SEASONED ASSISTANT AND YOU STILL WANT THE LOAD THROWN IN 24 HRS, THE STORE STRAIGHTENED OUTDATES PULLED PULL SHEETS DONE PRICE CHANGES DONE AND MAKE SURE YOU MAN THE HAND DIPPED ICE CREAM DEPARTMENT. THESE PEOPLE ARE INSANE!
ReplyDeleteI worked for Rite Aid for 7 years. After awhile I became very unhappy with the company. I remember going to a meeting where we were told that Rite Aid is a family oriented company. Well, I as well as others that I know didn't see it as such. You work 10 and sometimes double shifts doing stock, facing, cashiering, floors, trash and running back and forth taking care of customers and cashiers. Then you get repremanded because things aren't done according to their schedules as is you are 10 people. It seems the managers are happy if you work your but off so that they can get their bonuses and the DMs are happy also so that they can get their bonuses. But who does most of the work in order for them to get paid the big bucks and reap the bonuses? The assistant managers, shift supervisers and the cashiers. Its like being monkeys in a zoo getting paid peanuts and bananas!
ReplyDeleteI worked for 10years at Rite aid and did all the jobs of a cashier, supervisor, stock person, ice cream dip person, planograms, order the entire store, pull outdates and do it all alone while the store manager and assist. disappear somewhere in the store. Management like to pit people against each other so that everyone is so busy trying to be better than everyone else, with petty insults, and constant bullying they dont see management sittin around not doing anything laughing at them. My store manager and asst manager will tell an associate "don't call me for stupid questions", pretty soon everyone is so scared to even ask a simple question even if its a customer asking for a manager, management instills a level of intimidation and even fear of losing your job, as an associate your constantly stressed out and eventually everyone quits. Management even goes so far to train their new hires-associates to tell the older associates what to do while they read magazines at the register. They assign all tasks, and i mean like 20 impossible tasks to do in 1 day-to senior associates who earn top pay in the hope they'll just quit so they can hire all minimum wage workers. They even put extra pressure on their associates who have been there for 5 years, because at the 6th year in california an associate gets top pay $14.10 which is what they like to pay their new asst. managers, so naturally their is resentment between management who get paid so little and a senior associate.Management will talk badly about their associates right in front of them to each other attacking their personal life, but no names, there are no boundaries when it comes to "workplace bullying". And whats worse is when bring these situations up to HR no matter how wrong a manager is and completely against Rite Aid and State policy they side with the manager, why?? to avoid a lawsuit, the manager is supposed to be the representative of corp. in the store, so they can't look bad! As an associate you are nothing- they treat you with no respect, no recognition of your hard work nothing and supposedly thats one of their core values-RESPECT!
ReplyDeleteWhen are we getting our MONEY?????????? I want what they owe me!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteTHIS IS SO TURE THERE IS A DM NAMED ROB OR ROBERT FROM MY AREA PICO RIVERA AND HE SAID THAT ALL THE TIME RITE AID IS BAD
ReplyDeleteI have not been paid for any travel time (Manager forgets there keys at home and tells me to go get them) or we need more wellness card go to this store!!!! this is a dumb place to work for and they treat their asscoate like crap !!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteDO YOU KNOW WHY RITE-AID SUCKS?
ReplyDeleteIt sucks because of the dictatorship imposed inside that corporation.....they are a bunch of ungrateful dogs, I worked there for 5 years and all I experience was humiliation, hatred, harassment, bullying, corruption, etc.
During my working period there, I had 5 Bosses who where a bunch of BASTARDS while playing the role of managers, these are the following:
BASTARD #1
Mr. Hany Farah (current loss prevention manager at New Jersey's rite aid stores and former store manager at store #1542).
BASTARD #2
Mr. Mark Polanco from Carlstad-New Jersey (former supervisor at store #3337)
BASTARD #3
Mr. Paul Petrowlka (HR Manager of New Jersey stores)
BASTARD #4
Mr. Jorge L. Guevara-Garcia (current supervisor at store #3337 in Hoboken-New Jersey, used to have an affair with one of his coworkers back at store #1542 a couple of years ago in order to be promoted as an assistant manager).
BASTARD #5.
Mr. Brent Perdue
(HR Manager at New Jersey's stores)
These 5 men besides being a bunch of BASTARD, they are also FUCKERS, Fuckers in the sense that they don't thank their employees, making life miserable for them, etc.
This is why RITE-AID sucks!
Plagues like these people are the cancer of our society inside the workplace world.
One more thing, 3 words I have for Rite Aid and these 5 men:
FUCK YOU!!!
I HOPE I CAN SHIT OVER YOUR MOMMIES CUNTS!!!
BASTARDS, I HATE YOU ALL!!1
Thanks to these guys I lost my job!!! They played dirty on me making belief they were going to help me with my case of harassment I suffered from two supervisors.
^^^^^^^^^ NEPTUNE NJ
DeleteTHAT SUCKS BRO..IUM SORRY
Deleteif you come out of rite aids and fall into an unfiled hidden pot hole and the manegers standing their having an smoke break, see you help you up and take info and tell you the cooperate office will call and they dont, you leave and go to an emergancy room, have and treat injuries, take pictures of injuries and the pot holes hidden by most parked cars.. do you have an fair case, that will pay for therpy, life long adding to injuries you just had surgery for pain and suffering, them knowing ivejust recooperated to only be reinjuried by their neglence of repairing these hidden holes by customers that pull up to the door and usaully covers them, but on this ocasssion i happen to walk right down into one that i not knew was there. do i have an fair case to be awarded,saw through fairly?
ReplyDeletei have been at RITEAID a little over 5 months, a new store manager HOWARD was hired,after a month of him working,the ENTIRE staff realized he had no idea what he was doing,and it had also been brought to light by him babbling on the job that he and PAUL KRAMER. the DM . had been outside ''personal'' friends AND THEY GREW UP TOGETHER!! and that he never even worked in a RITE AID and got hired by paul outside of the company!!,wich is how he got the job.over time me and about 5 other store employees (2 who quite,2 who still work there,and one who transfered),noticed that the store manager continuously used abusive language toward staff,uttering words such as, ''your trash'' , ''your an idiot''..usually he would make comments towards other workers and look at me like i was going to agree with his nasty comments. ive noticed that almost all of his comments are aimed toward the black people in my store.i myself am white , about a month ago he came into the back stock room and began screaming at me yelling curse word after curse word directed toward me until i abrubtly stopped him in his tracks and said ''do not ever in your life curse at me or talk degrading towrds me ever again and also do not call the associates trash or garbage and look at me like im going to agree with you because you are flat out disrespectful and completely unprofessional''. ... the store managers jaw dropped and he said ''say no more it wont happen again'' . however one month before this,he had been telling me how much he needed me at work and how he needed me to work extra hours and i explained to him that i had another job.he then told me that he would give me extra hours if i left my other job..so i did...i left my other job to commit to riteaid.i have 2 sons.after i asked him to stop discriminating..the next day i went from 35 hours a week to 9 hours A WEEK!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleterite aid is a ridiculous company to work for.in fact the worst place i've ever worked at.they had me in a store smack dab in the ghetto neighborhood of mount oliver in pittsburgh pa. the pay was trash the clientele was trash and the work hours were insane, and shift coverage what is that.i was a glorified clerk who did more than the manager there and at the time when he and the dm just up and quit i applied for the gm position.i was interviewed and for 2 weeks or more ran the store solo and how was i thanked i was let go why was i let go i violated policy. what policy did i violate? oh yes i asked everyone from hr to the temp dm they put in there never got an answer.
ReplyDeleterite has never been an equal opportunity employer. I worked for them for over 2 years and was dismissed by HR.from what they came was some sort of harassment. after over two years of service to the company and making their store safe for consumers again increasing their sales. suing them will be a pleasure...MPT
ReplyDeleteriteaid is so going down hill! they brought eckerd chain and proceded slowly to get rid of all the eckerd dms managers etc!!! and those people where the best of the best!!a very poorly run company and so much shady things going on that i could write a book on coruption just from the years ive worked there!!!!shame for shame for the abuse we took the endless hard work we did and the extremely long days we put in without a bit of thanks or decent pay!!!then when those !@#$*&^% where done with using us...they found a convient way to let us go!!!!!!idiots
ReplyDeleteRite Aid is working to get rid of all pharmacist who are 45 and over. They want to hire new grads who will work for 10 thousand dollars less and have so much student debt (120 to 150 k) that they will be less likely to participate fully in the 401k plan so much less 401k match for RAD to pay out. They do this by cutting on your tech hours so much that you can't meet your required metrics and look for the slightest thing to document you out of the company. They don't do this to all older long time pharmacists because it would be too obvious for age discrimination. But each district has their quota, usually 1 per district per year. The targeted pharmacists are chosen not by the pharmacy district manager, but by an HR computer generated metric algorithm. I know of several pharmacy district manager who have resigned so as not to participate in this unethical ploy.
ReplyDeleteRite Aid corporation will "cut costs" at the cost of their "employees well being." If you are a perspective employee do not ever consider Rite Aid as an employer! I was hired as a part time employee and promoted into a supervisor role. Conveniently, Rite Aid corporate office "forgot" to change my status from part time to full time. This resulted in me "not" receiving holiday pay for a year. I threatened to complain to the labor board and they cut me a check for my missed holiday pay.
ReplyDeleteMore importantly, Rite Aid was non-compliant with the "Affordable Care Act" since they never offered me health care benefits for 2016. If this happened to you, I recommend filing a 211 form with the IRS, which is a tax whistle blower form. If enough people file this form for 2016 they could potentially be fined 90,000.00 for each employee they did this to. I myself, spoke to 4 employees who had similar or the same story. Print the form and file it!
Rite Aid will always make their employees liable for their own improprieties. They do not care about their employees safety, stacking pallets so high they look like they will topple over. Some days while unloading trucks, the pallets would not come off the truck it was stacked so high. If this is happening in your store contact OSHA. I was assaulted by shoplifters twice and Rite Aid Management made it look as if I was in the wrong for doing exactly what they asked me to do. Please for your own physical well being and mental well being do not become involved with this company.
Rite Aid upper management puts their supervisors under extreme duress in order to avoid customer complaints. They literally "take your better judgment" away and replace it with "their greasy" business practices. A coupon is a legal contract between the manufacture, customer and retailer. Rite Aid's upper management encouraged me to approve any coupon so they could avoid a complaint, regardless if it was fraudulent. For "you shoppers" out there, Rite Aid also encourages "shelf stripping" from their coupon customers, leaving no product for other customers. These practices are not conducive to a healthy working environment. The only reason Rite Aid is a fortune 500 company is because they cut costs everywhere they can. The amount of fines Rite Aid pays for breaking laws is astonishing. They have broken HIPAA laws, environmental laws, labor laws, OSHA laws, and a multitude of other laws.
Before Trump was elected for office, Rite aid was in negations with the FTC to merge with Walgreens. I was curious about Trump's stock portfolio so I goggled it. Trump has a large portion of stock in Rite Aid. It's no surprise that shortly after Trump was elected, "Walgreens basically bailed Rite Aid" out by purchasing a large portion of Rite Aid stores. Greasy business practices, political involvement, breaking the laws, and treating their employees like slaves. Do not ever become involved with Rite Aid!
They are the kings of slavery. The kings and queens sits in their high throne and have their aides whipping the slaves at the bottom while they look on with pleasure.
ReplyDeleteHere at the Ridgecrest store they hired a girl,Susan, after she had been sleeping with one of the supervisors. Now lot of favoritism going on.
ReplyDelete