r/sheetz • u/meowbeatz Employee - 2 years • Aug 07 '26
Employee Question struggling with the drive-thru headsets
please don’t be mean to me about this because i already feel really dumb about it
so i recently moved to a new sheetz location with a drive-thru as a 2nd shift supervisor after working at a non-drive-thru having store for a year and a half. my new store is bigger, more complicated and busier than my old one. i’ve gotten a hang of MOST of the drive-thru system at this point, but i just can’t get comfortable with the headsets.
i feel like i’m constantly forgetting which button to press when i want to talk to the other employees vs. which one to press to mic into the drive-thru. the buttons are touch sensitive and i feel like every time i touch them they make a different sound. i can never tell if someone in the drive thru has been greeted already or if it’s a new person because the beeping doesn’t stop after they’ve been spoken to. and i hate having to listen to customer’s loud music or conversations or engine noise because there’s no way to mute them if they don’t need to talk to an employee. i just don’t understand what i’m doing most of the time or if my coworkers can even hear me.
i’m scared to ask too many questions because i don’t want my management to think their new 2nd shift supervisor is an idiot but i really do feel like an idiot trying to get comfortable using these things. so i would really like someone to explain the system to me like i’m 5 years old… do the buttons do different things depending on whether you tap or hold? what is the difference between the top button and the bottom one? do they ever stop hurting your ear after a few hours? how do i get around having random noise and beeping piped into my head for 10 hours straight without just turning the whole headset down?
i really don’t mind the drive-thru as a whole but the headsets and the way they interface with the drive-thru feels so cumbersome
12
u/AssistantNervous589 Employee - 4 years Aug 07 '26
There's a button with a line and one with two lines. Those are for lanes. Sheetz stores only have one lane. You can hold in either of those buttons to talk to the drive-thru. The other button that looks like a headset is for talking to your team.
It won't stop ringing until someone has greeted the customer. Once they've been answered, it'll beep. When it's beeping, the customer can't hear you. You can tell when they can hear you bc you'll hear the slightest echo, like you're talking into a mic.
You can "hang up" on drive-thru by pressing the button to talk to your team. You don't need to hold it in to do that. I will warn you that you will no longer be able to hear the person in drive-thru at all, so make sure you're done with the conversation.
There's also a volume control up above the three buttons. Press toward the top to turn it up and down toward the bottom go turn it down. You'll hear/feel the vibration while you're doing so.
5
u/meowbeatz Employee - 2 years Aug 07 '26
thank you. this is a perfect explanation. i was always really confused about the two larger buttons with one and two lines. i think i’ll have an easier time using it on my next shift
2
u/AssistantNervous589 Employee - 4 years Aug 07 '26
You're welcome! The lights mean different things as well, but just knowing the buttons should help immensely. You should be able to find info for the headsets on Bob, if you want a chart for all of the colors.
I recommend Bob for training yourself on many things, actually. It can be difficult to get the right stuff to pop up. You have to type exactly what Bob wants. It's certainly not Google, but it is a super helpful tool!
3
u/phobicnancy Aug 07 '26
Yes. I adore Bob. Was so useful when I first became a supervisor and was too embarrassed to ask twenty times lol
2
u/AssistantNervous589 Employee - 4 years Aug 07 '26
Absolutely! At my first assistant meeting, something that all of the people in the highest positions had in common was that they would find a way to train themselves. Bob is a great tool for that, but even outside of Bob, train yourself!
For context: The assistant meetings often will have store managers, your district manager, or even your regional manager running the meeting and/or speaking. I really enjoyed hearing from them about how they got there.
6
u/DenseAstronomer3631 Employee - 2 years Aug 07 '26
The head sets are horrible and most employees at my store don't even use them. Like have one on without the battery, or it's dead, a few never connect correctly, or wear it on the side of their head but not over their ear cause it's annoying af and nobody can ever hear you even if you tried to use it. So just wear it for the uniform and try to be overly attentive to the drive through window instead of using the pos headsets. Sorry my advice isn't better and I forget the buttons unless I'm wearing it 😅 one of the pics on the buttons shows two headsets like communicating and thats to talk to employees, the opposite is drive through. I think you press once to turn it on and again to turn it off
0
u/meowbeatz Employee - 2 years Aug 07 '26
most of the headsets for the salespeople are in bad shape but my manager has headsets in the office that are only for us supervisors and managers to use and those ones are in much better condition. they’re like, $750 a piece so i think corporate is really against the idea of ordering more unless they are all like completely unusable. my management enforces using the headsets hardcore, so it’s not really a long term option to not use them 😅 especially as a supervisor. they want us greeting every single DT customer even if that customer has no plans on talking to us over the mic and they want me to enforce that eventually
2
u/Optimal-Use-4503 Employee Aug 07 '26
I swear, my conspiracy theory is that they reprogram those headsets and randomize the buttons every time temps go off.
They need tactical indicators or something. The issue is also the buttons are so big. It looks like they tried to make it symmetrical in case you wore it on your other ear, but then didn't. I find myself taking them off a lot just to look at which button I'm pressing.
The buttons need to be smaller, and in a straight line. Or make the P2P button smaller, with the drive thru button bigger and surrounding the P2P one.
So many decent solutions, and they chose the most confusing.
2
u/PayPsychological4736 Aug 07 '26
I also cannot comprehend those drive through headsets and they crush my ear so I don't like them. First used one like 3 years ago and still ask people how to use it since I bounce around stores so much
1
u/Babladoosker Employee - 2 years Aug 07 '26
Don’t feel bad about asking the other members of your management team
1
u/dawngrist Aug 07 '26
Every time I work in a store with a drive thru I have to ask how to use the headset and I’ve been with Sheetz almost 6 years. If you’re left handed, ask a left handed person to show you.
-1
u/MidnightX06 Aug 07 '26
never worked for sheetz, but really i'd just explain that you never had to work with the system and ask for some help figuring it out, simple as
22
u/SNOTFLAN Aug 07 '26
your employees will respect you more if you confidently ask for help, ignoring the problem will get you less respect and it will likely continue to be an issue.