Woolworths worker shares sad 'realisation' after customer abuse

As public sentiment towards the supermarket giants sours amid ongoing accusations of price gouging, frontline workers continue to hit back at the "abuse" they face from customers.

One fed up Woolworths employee is urging customers to remember she is not just the uniform she wears but also a "person too" despite the rising cost of living making life difficult for shoppers.

She shared an encounter on Monday in which she said a "rude" customer spoke to her "like a dog" and left her with the heartbreaking "realisation" that "people do not actually see me as a human being when I'm standing behind a register".

After a miscommunication about a product return, the worker claims she copped verbal "abuse" from the shopper in her Brisbane store despite apologising and providing them with a solution. Once the customer left she had to momentarily gather herself but was offered no grace by other customers who saw the incident unfold.

"I bopped down behind the register, put my head in my hands and took a little bit to catch my breath," she said in an emotional video posted online. "When I stood back up there was a lady who was in the opposite line who had watched me be abused the entire time and she said, 'Are you going to open a register?'"

"You've just watched me get spoken to like a dog but yes, I'll do your basket of groceries... I'm a f**king person too," she lamented.

Supermarket workers share horror stories

After sharing a video online, which has since been taken down, a large number of supermarket workers chimed in with their own similar experiences, with one woman admitting that working in a supermarket was the "worst experience of my life".

"Woolworths was probably the worst job I ever had," another shared, while a third said "retail workers are treated like garbage".

"Welcome to retail!" another woman wrote. "I resigned from Woolworths after 11 years, not just from abusive people but total lack of support from management!"

Woolworths told Yahoo it continues to review its "health and safety controls to ensure we're doing everything we can to keep our team and customers safe in our stores". Yahoo understands that counselling services are also made available for team members all year round.

Union accuses Woolworths of prioritising 'sale' over safety

Price gouging accusations and the subsequent ACCC investigation has helped fuel a "substantial increase" in hostility to supermarket workers and the Retail and Fast Food Workers Union (RAFFWU) claim supermarkets aren't actually doing everything they can to mitigate the issue, even accusing them of doing the opposite.

"Woolworths are doing abhorrently little to either stop or hold those responsible for the antisocial behaviour," Union Secretary Josh Cullinan told Yahoo News. "These employers categorically refuse to implement systems to guarantee the safety because it might cost them a single sale."

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The union has called for supermarkets to include a safety clause into Enterprise Agreements — a document which outlines wages and workplace conditions for workers — but they allege this has been dismissed.

"That's the core problem, if we saw them step up and start shutting it down, I have no doubt that what will happen is that these instances of abuse will massively diminish," he said.

Most disturbingly, the union claims workers who have previously spoken out publicly on social media – like the incident in Brisbane – have faced negative repercussions, with staff members losing shifts or being pulled into meetings to receive informal warnings due to alleged social media policy breaches.

The young worker who posted the latest video declined to share further comment, admitting to Yahoo that her candid clip "breaks social media policy" at Woolworths — but despite the upsetting incident said "I like my job a lot".

A spokesperson for Woolworths noted to Yahoo that social media clauses are common in many employment contracts in various industries but declined to comment any further.

Woolworths increases store security measures

There has been "increasing prevalence" of antisocial behaviour toward staff since Covid-19 when workers were thrust into the frontline according to the RAFFWU and Woolworths agrees it is a "worrying trend".

"We continue reviewing our health and safety controls to ensure we're doing everything we can to keep our team and customers safe in our stores, and this remains our absolute priority," a Woolworths spokesperson said. "We use technology such as team safety cameras and VR Training modules to both support and prepare our team members for instances where they may feel unsafe."

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