H&M reviews

There is a disconnect from management beyond the store level to that of the store level management and sales associates. Communication is handed down via conference calls and second hand name dropping rather than utilizing memorandums or written documents.. Training information is outdated as far as methods of training. The inventory tracking process is archaic, the POS systems are nearly 20 years old, there is no way for a salesperson on the selling floor to call other stores from the floor to check on product availability. Sale prices do not automatically ring up when an item is scanned at the register, leaving potential for loss or fraud. Also, the methods of preventing fraudulent refunds are too simplistic and don't really allow for true loss prevention, just holding up lines. The organization relies heavily on faxes and makes limited use of email. There is a great deal of paper driven activities within the stores rather than automated programs like Microsoft Excel or Access.. The margin for human error is tremendous and the resulting high shrink numbers are preventable with some carefully measured investments into the Operational infrastructure. H&M has great potential as a brand, but loses that behind the scenes and thus its integrity with its team, resulting in stressful situations,high turnover, and less retention of engage employees. The HR areas of progressive discipline are not clearly defined in many areas and subject to one person's interpretation rather than a specific, clearly detailed policy. Infractions that one could be held accountable for are vague, at best. Also performance reviews are not specific, consistently issued on time, and merit increases are not always above cost of living increases, there are none for 2009 for the company, but this information was not widely broadcast. While there is a process in place for promoting internal candidates, the process for ongoing career development and goals are not followed and there is little or no mentoring at the store level.

Your expected to work one full year with no company sick pay. Once you complete your first year, the company will give you 14 days sick pay. Your forced to use your annual leave on days the business is not operating, such as Christmas and New year's Day and you will not get this back. They claim to have a feedback culture, but this is a one way street. Management will pile feedback on customer service agents and will say that feedback for them is always welcome but if you do give feedback that is anything other than positive you will be called negative or sarcastic. Currently H&M are restructuring internally, but all this means is slashing teams and passing responsibilities to the lowest paid employees. Also please note that if you apply to work for H&M customer service, you will actually be handling the customer service for upto 4 different brands at a time, all of which expect you to change your entire being to fit what they want their image to be however you are paid as if you are working for H&M. Development opportunities will be promised, and speaking from experience, they won't be able to fulfill those promises. Office shifts for managers are social occasions and there is no concern for customer service agents trying to work quietly while they have their team days on the call centre floor, throw birthday parties and run around making videos and taking pictures of eachother. We have been promised for over a year they are bringing in competitive pay after intensifying the quality monitoring process, yet this has never happened and now when questions are asked about it, they will just inform you that they don't know about it. Your always told to "use resources" to help the customer, yet these resources are scattered and not updated. The communications team lack communication skills and as mentioned above, use work as a social event. Expect them to do what they see fit with your schedule, regardless of if you have a working agreement with them or not. For team days they will sit everyone around a table and give you a canvas and paints, telling you to paint something that makes you happy. In their opinion, this is efforts to improve the culture and customer service agents are fully expected to be grateful to be treated like children at nursery. So, while your working for upto 4 companies (at the moment, this could soon potentially increase to 7 - H&M, Monki, COS, Weekday, Arket, & Other Stories and Cheap Monday) your expected to get on board with whatever key words they pull out of a hat. This quarter it's all about elevation and empowerment. The only people being elevated and empowered are management and head office. Entry level are worked to death, underpaid and patronised along the way. Annual leave is also used a form of micromanagement, they promoted a new system that included same day requests while sacking the humans that used to monitor and manage the schedules. Soon after the launch of this system, they removed the ability for same day requests and told us they are helping us not burn out? So no same day requests, but then if you request annual leave in advance, it's really whatever mood the work force management team are in that is the decider on if you will have your request accepted or not. Back into the feedback culture, I once asked for an example of them gathering feedback from the customer service agents and they could not provide this, I was told it was "organic" - bizarre. How can there be a feedback culture, if they don't ask for feedback? Especially on so called trials, everything is a trial with HM management. This is just jargon they use until you lose the energy to try and discuss things. Once the energy is gone from the work force and people stop trying to give feedback "organically" they will call the trial a huge success. It's honestly madness.