River Island is a cult-like company with bullies at all levels. - Sales Advisor River Island Employee Review

Without doubt, the biggest negative to working here as a sales advisor is the managers. Floor managers and above do whatever they want, whenever they want, and will discipline sales advisors and level 2s for doing the same. They will break “rules” but if somebody lower than them does the same, they will be spoken to about it. The level of absolute hypocrisy and corruption in the management culture is something to marvel at. In the course of their power trips, higher managers also talk down to staff regularly any time they don’t like something, with some talking to people with a complete lack of respect every single day. This includes people in their thirties or older talking to under-18s like dirt on their shoe. It’s a disgrace, and nothing is done about it due to my next point. Several of my colleagues have raised complaints with management about other managers (including complaints to and about the store manager), which were completely ignored because the higher managers are all personal friends and won’t see each other disciplined. The store manager makes them all untouchable and able to abuse the staff to their liking, and head office staff who visit do not care. The store manager’s utter lack of humanity and respect for anybody has been the reason cited for everybody I know of leaving whilst I worked there, which is over half of the store in less than two years. It’s a big part of why I left. Interactions with regional and head office staff are another negative point for this company. Area managers are complicit in the abuse of sales staff and do similar things to the store managers and floor managers in the stores they visit. The whole company has a culture of bullying and disrespect. As for actual head office, they exist only in London and have very little contact with anybody except daily messages on a teams channel which is extremely cult-like. I imagine they’re aiming to be motivational, but these people (who have never set foot on the sales side of a cash desk) simply post a message about sales targets, customer conversion, and E-receipts (more on that in the next paragraph) and have absolutely no perspective on what impacts sales (it’s not the fault of the sales staff when profits are less than 10% up on last last year). In the day-to-day, you can expect to be absolutely anywhere in the store. Whether you are contracted to the till, the shop floor, or ops, management does not care and will put you wherever they want. Often they put people in certain places to benefit themselves, and change the lunch times of staff (sometimes other managers) so that they can have lunch with their friends, which is despicable. Stores are CONSTANTLY understaffed. And I mean barebones at all hours. One person across several areas is common and creates unnecessary customer complaints and stress for staff. Not to mention that head office constantly remind stores to staff properly, but then will not give them enough hours to do so, even saying that they won’t give hours to cover ANNUAL LEAVE. That means that every time there is a holiday, that person is not replaced at all and the rest of the staff have to pick up their jobs. If you’re on the till that day, managers would have you focus on getting email addresses from customers so that they can get an e-receipt. However, the actual motive for this is to sign them up for marketing emails. Some staff/stores do this without asking, which is illegal. Towards the end of my time working there, the company really ramped up efforts to get e-receipts, requiring sales advisors to persuade (argue with) customers if they initially refused to give their email address by saying things like “you can’t lose an email receipt” or “we’re trying to go paperless!”. I cannot emphasise enough how much I hated this. If somebody does not want to provide their email, I don’t want to argue with them. So I didn’t. On a related note, the idea that the company is going paperless is absolutely laughable. Head office REQUIRES some things to be printed every single day, usually around ten pages at least. Not to mention that the company moved from Sharpies to paper and INK pricing guns in the last year. Not very environmentally friendly. This is an obvious ploy for email addresses and not close to the truth. A smaller note, the pay is above minimum wage but still nowhere near a living wage for anyone below store manager, and is definitely not worth the stress that the company and managers put you under. Lastly, I know of at least one way this store breaks employment regulations. Under 18s in my store were made to work five hours without breaks, which is contrary to the four and a half hour law. As far as I know, this is still happening. In summary, River Island will give you “free” clothes four times a year, and you will be reasonably secure in your job. If, for some reason, you want to progress in the company, it’s possible. However, the magnitude of suffering you will endure by working here is not worth the so-called benefits. Understaffing, power-tripping corrupt managers, bullying, low pay, massive stress, excessive expectations, and the occasional illegal activity should drive you far away from this company. If you value being spoken to like a human being, not being overworked for little pay, and your dignity, steer clear of River Island. It is the purest example of a company which has no care for its staff OR customers, and does not deserve any of the labour of its staff