What is a typical working day like at Caffè Nero?

Food and drinks are heavily discounted and coffee's made on shift were free.

Often not given much time to clean up after a closing shift, which means atying back after hours without pay most of time. though this may veyr depending on the locatoin you choose.

None that I can think of

30 mins break on 12 hours shift, no food staff, constantly understaffed, you've to close the entire store in 30 mins, if it takes you more than that, you don't get any payment.

Free drinks on shift which is great

Hard work and not enough hours

Good co workers Decent discount

Low pay Morning shift hours don't give you enough time to complete opening tasks

Good team work through shift

Not appreciated enough with everything

Flexible working hours, Decent shift times

Early hours to start work which sometimes did not work with transport

staff discount on food and free drinks on shift

only a 20 min break

The pros to working at Caffè Nero are as follows: - No experience is required and the interviews for the most part aren't that challenging. - You get contracted hours instead of a 0 hour contract. - Depending on the store, you get good Barista-training. - Free drinks whilst on-shift and good staff-discount was a substantial bonus. - Progression is easy and often encouraged BUT this is a double edged-sword, pay-rises are MINIMAL considering the added responsibility,

I could write a book about the cons of working here but I will try and summarise them into points with short examples, At the bottom I will talk about my personal horror-story experience of working here. - Career progression in terms of promotions are constantly pushed upon you, despite the pay-rise being almost negligible after tax. As the hierarchy goes; a 'Barista' makes minimum-wage. A rung above that, a 'Shift-leader' makes ~20-23p more than minimum-wage however you are now responsible for cashing up, closing and opening the store, filling in all legal paperwork, processing deliveries and orders, and more. Above this, again is 'Maestro' which has NO PAY RISE, I was moved to this role being told that I would have one by my manager, and I'm not responsible for training staff and the overall quality of coffee from the store. Assistant manager gets a similar pay-rise and paid breaks, with ever-increasing responsibilities. - Breaks are unpaid unless you are Assistant manager or above. - Perhaps not specific to all stores, but you will find yourself constantly being asked and pressured to do things outside of your job role. - The standards set by Nero's governing bodies are impossible to uphold, especially in busier city-centre stores. For example, we were given 30 minutes to close down an entire Cafe, including but not limited to: Cleaning the entire coffee machine in handles, having every piece of crockery and utensils cleaned and washed, having all items restocked for the next day, having outside furniture and heavy bollards moved into the store, the toilets cleaned, paperwork filled in, and more. And you aren't allowed to start before the store is closed. This is just one of many similar parts of the job where the regulations do not reflect the reality of the work. - This goes for most franchises and hospitality work, but customers can be downright disgusting in terms of their respect for you as a human being. At the end of my tenure, my favourite customer experiences were ones where minimal interaction outside of them telling me their order occurred. - Professionalism is at an all time low, specifically for Leeds based stores. I have experienced breaches of my contract, breaches of data-privacy, Not being compensated correctly for the hours I worked, being harassed by managers outside of working hours, and more that I will get into in the next section. My personal experience is as follows; Some teams working at Nero can be good, you will find like-minded individuals. However, there is a horrible work-culture that exists here. Which could be specific to the Leeds area. ALOT is expected of you for what you are payed to do, but each store and it's training is designed to make you feel like you were at a one-off Nero that is a special tight-knit team that you should be willing to make sacrifices for in terms of work-life balance. That and the drama is otherworldly; a new manager was assigned to my store, I later learned from a different store manager that other managers and the area-manager made this decision as they knew it would be overwhelming for them and that the added pressure would cause them to slip up and get fired, or quit. These shady, legally grey-area activities were constantly happening in the background, and it's always those at the bottom of the company ladder that suffer the consequences My every move in the city was monitored by someone from the 11+ stores, and would have prying questions asked about my private life by my colleagues who had been told 'down-the-grape-vine''. It felt almost like a surveillance state cult-type situation. Someone from outside the company even shared details of my job applications when I was searching for a new job with my at-the-time manager and assistant manager which made my work-life even more miserable. If you value your privacy, mental well-being, and even at times safety, I suggest looking elsewhere, it isn't worth it, there are other less demanding no-experience jobs that pay better. This is my own personal experience and may not happen at ALL Caffe Neros, this being said, this should be taken as evidence that it CAN happen when it definitely shouldn't. My advice to anyone looking to work here is to only take the job if you must. And only apply for the 'Barista' role, you get paid minimum wage but your responsibilities are closest to matching how much you are compensated for. Read your contract through-and-through, make sure you are WELL aware of your responsibilities, as you will definitely be asked to do something beyond them. Decline shift-leader promotion at all cost. And stick it out for 1 year so you can have a valid entry on your CV, then leave. Good luck.

- free coffee - some nice customers (good for networking)

- Very short breaks (20) sometimes interrupted; 1 employee left to serve alone. - only 2 people working per shift - No employee toilets, customer toilets only. - Pay doesn't match the stress. - Management receives more rewards from the company than the employees that are actually working hard and putting up with horrible customers. - Managers refuse to clean the toilets. (dont lead by example) - Management can sometimes be homophobic to others or sexist. - The company just cares about the money and not the employees. - Not worth growing in the company. 15p difference for a big role change.

free drinks on your shift.

no free meals, shift patterns irregular, busyness of shops, customer service is not for the weak, customers can be hard to handle sometimes