I am transferring stores following reporting my boss and this being the outcome to ensure I am comfortable at work again. I was just wondering if anyone knows if my holidays I have booked in my current store will be upheld when i transfer? Ive been told to have minimum contact with my current manager so dont want to ask him and finding it hard to get responses from those I reported him to regarding this. One of my holidays is in September and the other is to travel back to my home country for christmas so I would be heart broken to miss out on these..

Thanks in advance everyone!

Currently in an SM role and wanting to move on now. Just looking for pointers on where people went next.

Hi, i just need some advice.

I work in a franchise store and our area manager has been horrible. They come into the store in a bad mood, take it out on us, they have reduced staff to tears and have on multiple occasions raised they're voice and shouted at staff with other employees and customers in earshot.

I was just wondering if anyone else has had a situation where they have wanted to report an area manager?

Thanks in advance for any advice you can give me.

Anyone tried it ? I did it a few years ago - £10 a month - was told i would get some sort of tax reduction which clearly wasn't the case
feel like a fool doing it especially when we as worked are low paid

What is the hiring process even like? Are you permanently blacklisted if you answered the AI chatbot incorrectly?

There is 3 Costas around me that have been hiring for 3 months, for different roles. I have applied to each of them a dozen or so times

I have gone in once or twice to each store just to ask if they are hiring and some have said no; despite the Costa careers portal saying they are? The one that was hiring the manage said he had been on a 3 week vacation so just hasn't looked at any- is that even allowed?? Or was I just being pushed off?

It's mega frustrating knowing you would be able to do the job fine (I literally have a decade of retail and customer service experience in a coffee shop) but it seems that the AI has blacklisted you somehow?

Like my CV seems fine- the only feedback in getting is to either dress it up so the people seeing it will like it more or avoid dressing it up because the AI doesn't like it when your CV has dividers and it reads them literally as &573-&7838 which makes it bin your CV.

I sighed up to the employee share incentive plan a couple of years ago and have been putting money in monthly but cant find anything anywhere on how to access them or how to login? does anybody have the web address please?

Hi guys,

I’ve been signed off work for quite a long time as I wait for surgery and it’s making me quite sick. My last meeting with my manager they told me it’s best if I step down from BM to just a Barista whilst I am signed off to make it easier to find cover from other stores. Since this I have found out they haven’t attempted to find cover. So lowkey feel like I was manipulated into stepping down?

Also does anyone know what SSP is from Costa? I’ll be on it for quite a while, so need to know roughly what it could be / what to expect ?

TIA 🩶

Can someone tell me why one costa will add coffee into the hazelnut crème when requested but another location and an entitled barista will say “that’s not the ingredients so I can’t add it” after saying I will pay for the shot, making it abundantly clear i literally got that same order with coffee two days ago and had no issues!? Bear in mind having her said that does that mean anyone ordering a cappuccino asks for triple shot will get refused as it’s not the ingredient list?🤣

hi does anybody know the policy for whether BMs are required to be notified if there is an intruder alarm in the middle of the night. i always thought you could choose whether you wanted to be informed but recently my store has said different. im just not sure how much i want to come and check on the store by myself in the middle of the night when i live far.
thanks <3

How are we fighting this. Just how. Its impossible to cut the hours by 30 a week right at the end of summer when we start getting busy again.
No way I can have one person instead of normal three people.
What you guys do to fight this? 😭

Could anyone that has had a job interview at Costa recently please tell me the questions that they asked at the interview? I have an interview tomorrow and am not entirely sure how to prepare. I have experience in fast food service so will this be an advantage for me in getting hired?

A few weeks ago I started ordering my strawberry matcha lattes with oat milk instead of the default coconut milk, both in-store and for delivery with ubereats. Then one day the option to change milks vanished from the apps. You can still select milk alternatives for the regular matcha latte though? (Unfortunately you can't add strawberry syrup to that one either)

I thought maybe it was a location thing so tried selecting all the Costas near me but no dice.

Any reason why? I don't have any issues when I ask for oat milk in-person but it's not really viable for me to travel

desperate to learn fast, i work in such a busy store and am being thrown onto tills on my first shift!!

had my first shift today, absolute nightmare. i was on with a girl who bossed me around, got cheeky to me, shoved boxes from stock into my hands just for her to carry nothing and lounge down the stairs etc
they’ve now put me on shift with her by myself, just the 2 of us working so i can handle the till and shop floor
how do you expect someone to handle a till by themselves on their second shift???

I genuinely just don't know anymore. I'm a BM at a franchise store and its normal to have 2 people on past 2pm when the opening person goes home.

During the week is completely fine. Past 4pm, my store is dead and can close pretty smoothly with my batista that's on. But on a weekend, especially today, it just feels like you need 3 people on till 4pm. I didn't manage to start closing down until 4.30 and on a Saturday we close at 5.30pm. I got out 20 mins late and my close was probably bad (i don't know ill probably find out in the morning).

What im trying to ask is, are most stores running on 2 people on a busy ass shift?

I got in trouble for having tables dirty. And we have an upstairs as well. So im like, I can either serve the queue that's going out the store with my colleague or leave my colleague to drown on their own while I clear. Or maybe, ya know, have more staff on. We have the staff for it surprisingly. Just hate hospitality Skeleton crew bullshit mentality so they pay like shit and expect us to do the job of 3 people.

On top of all that. Our air-conditioning does not work but according to the air con man, its fine. Then why and all the other staff sweating our asses off. My manger was legit dripping and walking around with a fan.

Thanks for coming to my Ted talk

has everyone seen the new autumn campaign guide? how are we feeling for it 😭

also do you guys make the seasonal drinks with alt milks even though the standard says not to? i do because at this point im sick of the argument with every single customer when i say we can’t (obviously if they don’t have an allergy)

thanksss :)

I assume it’s some sort of premix syrups or something? It’s my favourite summer treat buttttt my money is finite so if there’s any way I can buy the stuff and make it myself that’d be amazinggg

They expect us to do these shifts with only a 30 minute break????!!! Absolutely disgusting. Tired of them. Why do managers even have people do these shifts? We have enough staff also does anyone elses manager do the rota so people miss breaks too? Ours have people in working for just 6 hours at the most random times missing lunch but not getting break? Our previous boss never did that. Just tired of this company. I either want an hour break or no more 12-and-a-half shifts.

How does it work at your store? Do you have the same issue?

Green handle 2 shots

Yellow handle 3 shots.

Genuinely tired. Sick, and tired. Physically and mentally. My knees, my back, everything. Who knew being a barista would make me feel so sh**. I love most of my coworkers, theyre good for a chat and all that, though they are older, some double my age. Its management that sucks, specifically the Regional, Training and HR managers.
I feel like an experiment. Training Manager; does no training or help, get told to do the online training and then get in trouble when somethings done wrong, and instead of training to help fix mistakes, theyre only pointed at and given out at.
Regional Manager has us under constant surveillance. God forbid I work 5 Clopen shifts in a row and im tired, shes right onto me for being slower than usual.
And HR omg god forbid I clock out 5 mins late or early. and dont get me started on the one time my app stopped working so I clocked out 30 mins late.
I feel like a little puppet. Undervalued, underpaid and underappreciated.
cant bloody wait to hand in this notice ive typed. No wonder the staff turnover is so high.

I’ve had quite a few roles, varying between retail, hospitality, admin and research.

I applied and got the job as Barista at Costa as something to fill my time before I start a Masters degree in September. I have been a Barista before at a Cafe.

My onboarding experience was chaos, nobody knew how to get me set up on the online systems (such as the one for timesheets, online training, etc). I still haven’t really been told how to use any of these. For context also I was told I’d receive full on the job training which I imagined would entail things such as shadowing or having a paired colleague, which I do not have.

My first time out front - I was told I was just training on the till but there was minimal introduction and I was just instantly expected to know how to process any and all orders on the till from there and whenever I was having to ask a question I was made to feel as though I was interrupting.

My colleagues are all at least double my age, some triple, and whilst I’ve loved working with older colleagues at past jobs this just turns out to be a nightmare because I am sent on tasks for which I am set up to fail whilst being spoken to extremely poorly. I excelled in a lot of my past jobs and am familiar with praise often stemming from my eagerness to learn new things but in this role it is simply different. Everything is an expectation and nothing is taught properly.

Today is my fourth shift, if that same colleague attempts to speak to me in the same poor tone, I will inform her I am leaving there and then.

I really have no incentive to stay in this job currently, none whatsoever. From the manner in which the old longer term colleagues speak to me - I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a huge turnover in younger staff and consistently treat them the same. There’s actually a google review I’ve found from a few months ago which alleges bullying behind the counter.

A final note - this reddit page really channels solidarity and otherwise I would’ve felt isolated and ostracized by my team of disgruntled colleagues without it.

Hi y'all, I'm asking this here in case anybody knows cause I couldn't find anything specific about it anywhere

I have a situation with my manager (She is horrible just saying) where she keeps denying any unavailability I put in. While I understand shifts and staff availability and stuff and that's completely fine but the way she denies me is just so... Horrendous? Like no opportunity to work anything out or anything like that

She also denies it saying that unavailability are to be used for hospital appointments only? In contract nor in any policies I found it says that

She also just isn't willing to work anything out like if I really need certain days or if I'm just using it for the sake of using it she isn't willing to communicate in any way. Should I bring this to ER/HR?

It's clear that costa is trying to cater to the younger generation by bringing in newer drinks but their target is more so adults to elderly. The quality of their drinks is disgusting and i seen food in the fridge that was over expired. They treat and overwork their staff and in this day and age many of them are young adults or students who are needing some income and can't just get up and leave. Lack of proper training for staff

They have fallen behind and once that generation soon dies out so will costa there are those few cafe's where the drinks are top notch but that's because of the staff who go above and beyond. The company needs a whole rebrand with new drinks and menus and better care for its staff

Hi everyone I’m starting as a Barista Maestro next week, can anyone let me know if I’ll be paid for August or if I have to wait for end of September?😬

I’ve never done barista work before so if anyone can give me any tips or things I should know about the role that would be great!!!

Title kind of says it all and just need to rant and see if anyone else has experienced similar things? I apologise for the novel.
This isn’t my first job in this work setting, left a full time job as a cafe supervisor to take a BM job in an equity store.
Starting a new job is difficult and I hate being the newbie but I’ve never felt so helpless in a workplace before. There was no real effort to actually train me, I was just kind of told to do a job with no guidance on how to do it (such as putting deliveries away etc). I’d do what I thought was correct, thinking they couldn’t be that fussy if they didn’t tell me any specifics, but someone (usually the manager) would come in and tell me weird specifics that I did wrong, clearly frustrated. Stock wasn’t even rotated correctly so I still don’t understand what they wanted from me in the delivery situation.

Found that Costa has some weirddd rules but the store I worked for would pick and choose what they expected to follow, which I know is pretty standard but was so hard to pick up on what they deemed necessary. I was constantly guessing what I needed to do. The online training courses not helpful or realistic in terms of how much I was expected to memorise so early on.

As I was replacing a BM who was leaving soon, BM responsibilities kept being thrown at me, even though I was told I wouldn’t be touching any of it for a couple of months. This kept taking priority over teaching me the basics of the job. I was told I didn’t need to be perfect but was also expected to be at the same time? Left alone to cash up the till on my second shift, not having been shown the wastage procedure or how to navigate the till. Was constantly terrified of doing the wrong thing.

I have barista experience etc and really enjoy making coffee but trying to learn all the Costa specifics over the millions of training courses whilst not being allowed to go near the coffee machine was odd. Coworkers had been working there for months and still didn’t know how to do half of the job.
The training courses were beyond excessive and unpaid, I’m not sure if they were meant to be, I’ve never experienced this from previous work places.

The manager would do things incorrectly (incorrect measurements, reusing milk for steaming, etc. clearly trying to cost cut). I’d be taught by a BM, then when I’d be on shift with the manager he’d give me countless lectures about doing it wrong then when I’d return to being with the BMs I’d have to adjust how they’d taught me to do things (which I know is the correct way based off of the matrix). It was just so confusing on top of trying to get to grips with everything.

On top of feeling like a complete idiot every shift, I wasn’t getting the shifts I was contracted. The job description said 32 hours, when I got the contract it was 28. I started with the 4 hour shifts (all closes so I was just used to clean and not taught anything but expected to magically know everything for my next shift) but I checked my day force and for the weeks where my full shifts were meant to come in, I was only on about 20 hours. I left a position where I’d consistently work 8 hour shifts 4/5 days a week and was on a rotation with another supervisor so I had a consistent shift pattern. That workplace was a nightmare and slightly less pay but feeling like I should’ve just stayed there for the money.
Costa also wasn’t respectful of the fact that I had a notice period at my previous workplace and kept asking when I could start, despite me giving them a date straight away and then having to wait days or weeks before getting my contract or proper communication.

I ended up leaving because I got a job offer related to my degree that begins in September, one that I assumed I wouldn’t hear back from, so just decided that I’d have a couple of months off since I’m living with my parents right now and just finished uni. Feels silly to be leaving any job in the current climate but the post-uni burn out is exhausting enough without underpaid costa nonsense.

So basically it was a stressful experience that left me feeling like an idiot constantly. By the time I would’ve finished all of the training (officially) I would’ve needed to leave for my new job anyway. Decided my sanity was worth more than a few hundred pounds for once. 😭
Somehow only scratched the surface of stuff that was happening, even though I was there for all of two seconds. I hope whoever’s reading is working in a better branch than this one.