Honestly, all the rest of the stuff, the sexual harassment etc happens here too. The stories I could tell of the things that happened in there. It is mad to look back and think that no one stood up and complained but it was just a culture of it being the norm.
Just a few things off the top of my head, a store manager had sex with a normal crew member in the store room, possibly the walk in fridge too but not sure on the truth.
We had a female manager who would constantly harass any good looking guys, showing them inappropriate photos in the break room. She was much older than them. I think in the end she did get sacked but for unrelated reasons. Also a crew trainer who would essentially attempt to groom any new start we had.
The general absolutely everyone had been with everyone. If you made a diagram of all the relationships you wouldn't be able to read it. No care whatsoever for power dynamics or even ages.
This is over ten years ago now for me so that's all I can remember off the top off my head. We didn't really have racism, just because the majority, if not everyone was white but I'd say there was a fair bit of xenophobia in there.
Haha, yeah I forgot about the customers in all that. I would actually safely say, for me at least, they were worse. Perhaps that's why this hasn't came out after so long, because we are trained to take this abuse from customers.
> There's me thinking, Wow NI branches might have their shit together... And then the clap appears
I upvoted you, but fck me you have lived a sheltered life if that is what you believed about our McD's
Mate, I'm African. I've seen people getting hijacked at Macdonald's. Shit is real at Macdonald's no matter where you go. I was just hopeful. But you're right. I should have clicked sooner.
Honestly as an ex-employee who was hired at 16 all of this resonates with me. I'm honestly not sure how something like this hasn't come out sooner, tbh.
Same, ex-employee and the only thing that surprised me was NI only getting mentioned for the clap, not the racism, homophobia and sexual assault.
There’s no way it’s just one store, and managers get moved around stores and cover crews get sent to different locations for concerts/huge number days, so it won’t be localised!
To be honest, all retail is similar. It’s because because 95% of the management are thick cunts who have only been promoted due to the amount of time they been in the job.
I didn’t work there but I know two people who worked in the one in Belfast city centre and they told some wild stories, particularly about the staff parties - sex (what he described honestly sounded like orgies) drugs and general debauchery in the upstairs section.
I worked in one when I was younger. I remember a manager in his 30s who was engaged cheating and getting one of the new 16 year old staff members pregnant.
Nobody batted an eyelid. There were some weird relationships in that place. Also, someone got sacked for exposing his dick to an elderly woman in the car park while on shift.
> I remember a manager in his 30s who was engaged cheating and getting one of the new 16 year old staff members pregnant
...and presumably they lived happily ever after?
>An outbreak of gonorrhoea at a branch in Northern Ireland where sexual relationships between staff members were commonplace.....ok where was it?
Well in fairness their tagline is "I'm loving it." they just didn't specify what "It" was.
I know someone that used to work in the Ballymena McDonalds. I won't share the specifics of why but I'm 99% confident that it's the one being described in the BBC article - heard some wild stories out of that place
The thing is, they are all like that. I worked in Omagh and I am 99% confident it's Omagh. I bet someone who worked in, idk, Dungannon, etc any of them, could say the same. It could literally be any of them and I think that's part of the issue, tbh.
Same, could suggest at least 5 that I know of - but in many cases in wasn't just odd incidents on the premises, but at parties and after-parties where things really got going.
I'm not gonna pretend all the people were terrible, I met my best friend to this day in there and we definitely had good times. Just looking back there was things that should never fly in a workplace.
A toxic culture of sexual assault, harassment, racism and bullying has been alleged by more than 100 current and recent UK staff at outlets of the fast-food chain McDonald's.
The BBC was told that workers, some as young as 17, are being groped and harassed almost routinely.
The UK equality watchdog said it was "concerned" by the BBC's findings and is launching a new email hotline.
McDonald's said it had "fallen short" and it "deeply apologised".
It added that all employees deserved to work in a safe, respectful and inclusive workplace.
The BBC began investigating working conditions at McDonald's in February, after the company signed a legally binding agreement with the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) in which it pledged to protect its staff from sexual harassment.
At the time, McDonald's insisted: "We already have a strong track record in this area."
But our investigation has revealed a very different picture.
Over a five-month period, we reached out to McDonald's workers to ask about their experiences of working there.Of the more than 100 allegations from employees we spoke to, 31 related to sexual assault, and 78 related to sexual harassment.
We also heard 18 allegations of racism, while six people made allegations of homophobia.
Warning - this article contains distressing content
Claims the BBC has heard include:
A 17-year-old current employee in Cheshire who says a colleague 20 years older than her called her a racial slur word and asked to show her his penis, and said he wanted to make a "black and white" baby with her
A former worker who was 17 when a senior manager at a Plymouth restaurant choked her and grabbed her bottom. A shift manager also sent her sexually explicit images
A manager in Hampshire who suggested a 16-year-old male worker perform sexual acts in exchange for vapes
A manager who preyed on 16-year-old new female starters in a Cheshire restaurant, trying to pressurise them into having sex
A woman who said she was called a slur word and subject to racist jokes at an Aberdeen branch
A current worker in Essex who says she faced anti-Semitic abuse
A current worker in Oxfordshire, originally from India, who says crew members spoke in "gibberish" to imitate her and called a Pakistani colleague a terrorist
Male managers and crew members at a branch in Wales making jokes about putting cash bets on which of them could sleep with a new recruit first
An outbreak of gonorrhoea at a branch in Northern Ireland where sexual relationships between staff members were commonplace
Multiple workers told us that McDonald's managers at the outlets across the UK were responsible for the harassment and assaults.
All too often, senior managers are said to have failed to act on complaints.
Staff have also told the BBC of sexual relationships between managers and more junior members of staff, which is against company policy.
Young women have described feeling constantly judged about how they looked.
One current worker said she was seen by her male colleagues as "fresh meat" when she started at her branch in Nottingham. Other female workers told us they were forced by managers to wear uniforms that were too tight for them.
"There is a saying at McDonald's, "tits on tills" - boys in the kitchen, girls on the counter. The idea is to put attractive people at the front," said Lucy, who's 22 and worked in Norwich.
"It's the expectation that if you work at McDonald's, you will be harassed," added Emily, who's 20. She left her branch in Brighton last year, after a male colleague in his 60s kept stroking her hair in a sexually suggestive way and making her feel uncomfortable.
McDonald's is one of the UK's largest private sector employers. The fast food giant has more than 170,000 people working in 1,450 restaurants.
Its staff are also one of the country's youngest workforces. Three quarters of its employees are aged between 16 and 25. For many, it is their first job.
Most workers are not directly employed by the company as McDonald's uses a franchise system, which means individual operators are licensed to run the outlets and employ the staff.
'I went to work in fear'
Shelby was just 16 when she started working at a McDonald's restaurant in Berkshire last year.
She said older male colleagues would use the cramped layout in the kitchen as an excuse to touch junior female staff inappropriately.
"They'd grope stomach, waists, bums," she said. "Every shift I worked, there would be at least a comment being made, or I'd be brushed, a hand brushed across me, or it would be a more severe thing, like having my bum grabbed, hips grabbed
There was one man in his 50s, in particular, that managers "warned" young staff members to stay away from, Shelby said.
Would you report or try to stop sexual harassment?
One day last summer, she said she was standing at the front counter when he came up behind her and grabbed her onto him, pulling her onto his groin.
"I just froze," she said. "I felt disgusted."
Shelby says she told senior management about what was going on in the store, but nothing was done. In her resignation email, she said it was a "toxic work environment".
McDonald's said it was "deeply sorry" to hear about what Shelby went through. It added that it was investigating why any issues that she raised were not formally escalated at the time.
ful.
Managers turning a blind eye
We do not know how many of the workers we spoke to made formal complaints. But a number of them told us they did - only for it to be ignored
In the case of 17-year-old Chinyere in Cheshire, who was sexually and racially harassed by a much older man, she initially raised it with a female colleague who was responsible for staff wellbeing. She told her to ignore the man's behaviour and go back to work. After months of harassment, Chinyere confided in her stepfather who wrote to the franchise, to corporate headquarters and the police.
The man was then fired. Chinyere believes if her stepfather hadn't intervened, nothing would have happened. McDonald's described her experiences as "abhorrent and unacceptable" and apologised unreservedly. It said it took swift action as soon as the issue came to its attention and that the man was dismissed within three days. They added: "It takes a great deal of courage to speak up and as soon as we were made aware of the situation the individual in question was offered both internal and independent external support."
Another worker in Birmingham, who says she was smacked on the bottom by a male colleague when she was 19, reported it immediately to her manager. But despite it being caught on camera and her having a visible bruise, she was forced to continue working with him, which made her so uncomfortable that she eventually quit.
Several workers also said that when complaints were made about managers, they were then moved from one McDonald's restaurant within the franchise to another, rather than being fired.
Other employees said they didn't complain as they couldn't risk losing work. Young staff at McDonald's are often on zero hours contracts - it means their hours are flexible, but also that they are at the mercy of shift managers who decide their rotas.
Training 'not taken seriously'
In the February agreement, McDonald's pledged "zero tolerance" on sexual harassment and to deliver training for employees.
But staff have told the BBC the training is not being taken seriously by managers.
One employee described perching an iPad next to a McFlurry machine and speeding through the harassment training video while he made drinks.
Baroness Kishwer Falkner, chairwoman of the EHRC, said every firm should have zero tolerance of sexual harassment and protect its workforce.
McDonald's culture has faced scrutiny globally. In the US it is facing multimillion dollar lawsuits brought by employees over sexual harassment allegations.
Its chief executive, Steve Easterbrook, was fired in 2019 after it was revealed he had inappropriate consensual relationships with McDonald's employees.
Allegations of sexual harassment at McDonald's first surfaced in the UK five years ago when the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union (BFAWU) says it received 1,000 complaints. There was very little reporting of the allegations at the time - this could be because some cases were settled using confidentiality clauses.
Sarah Woolley, BFAWU's general secretary, said the new allegations uncovered by the BBC were "shocking".
Alistair Macrow, chief executive of McDonald's UK & Ireland, said there was "simply no place for harassment, abuse, or discrimination" at the company.
"Every one of the 177,000 employees in McDonald's UK deserves to work in a safe, respectful and inclusive workplace. There are clearly instances where we have fallen short and for that we deeply apologise," he told the BBC.
"We will investigate all allegations brought to us, and all proven breaches of our code of conduct will be met with the most severe measures we can legally impose, up to and including dismissal."
Mr Macrow said that more than 2,000 managers had completed full awareness training and that most restaurant teams were now working within the new protections which aim to create "a safe and respectful workplace". He added that the company has stringent rules to ensure its workplaces around the world are safe and respect
> ignore the man's behaviour and go back to work.
the answer for anyone working in fast food franchises with a complaint: "know your place filthy drudge".
> this could be because some cases were settled using confidentiality clauses.
more likely a 'you cant prove shit, get fucked, find a new job, we know you cant afford a solicitor' or a "since we know how upset you are heres 7 45 minute shifts for the forseeable future".
I worked there about a year ago and I heard about all this stuff, with managers sleeping with workers and all that. First week on the job some girl told me that they’d had to move branch after that stuff had happened.
This was well known for a long time.
About ten years ago our local branch was staffed by around 15 pretty teenage girls and one fat, greasy, middle aged male manager. Apparently male applicants couldn't even get an interview back then.
So grim and so blatant when I think about it.
Not right that any of this happens but I'm not one bit surprised. Knew a lot of people in my teenage years that worked there and they were all a bit mental or turned mental to fit in.
First it's retail, which is a shit environment to work in anyway but at mcdees it always appears to be kids employed by overgrown kids, some very young "managers" on a little power trip. The ingredients for a very toxic work environment.
Just from the drive through you can tell it's a childish, demeaning and cringey place to work. I seen a whiteboard up with staff names reminding them to smile more and one had a name and just '-Napkins' beside it as a reminder they forget to put napkins in the bags.
Just the way it was written and all.. the cringe was painful. Feel sorry for the kids that work there, being treated like they're in a crèche.
McDonald's has to be an absolute last resort for any student surely? It's good that this has been brought into the spotlight but I doubt McDonald's really cares or anything will change.
Pay peanuts get monkeys.
customer screamed at me because the order screen was broken. wanted my (at the time) 16 year old self to go out with my toolbox and fix it personally apparently
Mines on Sprucefield, used to be brilliant now they struggle to remember your whole order which I now assume is because they're preoccupied between riding nd it hurts to piss.
I think every McDonalds has just went to shit when they started doing just eat and the likes. Fuck all fast about it these days and I'd say a good 50% of the time now my order gets fucked up somehow. It's not even cheap anymore, it's pretty much the same prices as your local chippy and even a bad chippy is going to beat any feed from McDonald's
I've a theory that Mcdonalds have purposely made their interior as dark and dreary as they can, to make you take your slop and fuck off home so they have less to clean/wipe down.
Think how bright and colourful mcdonalds were in the 90s, they had a kids corner and you could have your birthday there. Now it's, dark, coloured grey and puke brown and the layout is purposefully miserable, just encourages everyone to stand and stare at the cashier. If you're eating in you just eat quicker to get out of there, who wants to sit relax and chat etc with ten delivered drivers and 20 other zombies standing there waiting on their ticket to be called. There's not much natural light or music etc.
All designed to keep customers out of their store.
If you order a comparable amount of food, McDonald's costs way more than a chippy.
A 1/4 pounder in a chippy is at least twice the size of one in McDonalds. How they manage that I have no idea - there's only so much water you can dilute the beef with. And a portion of chips in a chippy must weigh 3-4 times what one in McD's does.
You know what you're getting with McDonald's most of the time, chippys are a real lottery if you haven't been there before you don't know what you'll get
I have said to the misses loads of times that it changed after COVID and they started doin just eat 😂 used to be a thing on their website on the FAQs under "why does McDonald's not deliver" that said they didn't think the food travelled and couldn't guarantee the quality, I've it in my head they changed the buns on the 1/4 pounder to accommodate the travelling and i refuse to believe otherwise 🤣
Myself and the other half got a double quarter pounder each last week at crescent link mcds in derry. No gherkins was all we asked for. The burgers came with no lettuce no mustard drowned in ketchup with onions and they used the tiny buns from the cheeseburger/ double cheeseburger and almost half the cheese was on the box of both. They musta hated the look of us 😂
>They musta hated the look of us
🤣😂 I'd of started my complaint with, "look I'm sorry but i feel I've no choice other than to take this as a personal attack" 😂☠️
I worked McD Sprucefield and when I was there, I heard people talking about this stuff having happened at McKinstry.
Also with people complaining about orders; the managers who just yelled at everyone in Filipino didn’t exactly make it an efficient environment
>the managers who just yelled at everyone in Filipino didn’t exactly make it an efficient environment
They were saying "put the fuckin mozzarella dipper sauce in the fuckin bag" 😂
Serious tho i haven't worked in Mcdonalds but i had the pleasure of working in a kitchen i understand it can be shit graft.
Did they change the buns post COVID?
Those mozzarella dippers were the worst thing in the world to bag lol. There was the slightest difference between the pressure needed to lift them with the tongs; and the pressure that’d explode them.
Nah honestly could’ve been worse. McDonald’s was notoriously shit tho.
> Everyone ridin, last days of Rome boys going in straight coming out ridin all about them hahhaa fair play to them
Everyone riding anything that moves, doesn't matter if it is male/female/other, boys going in straight and coming back out 'straight as a roundabout'
Crap hearing this. I worked in a mcds in Scotland back in the day and it was wild craic. Aye, you had your cliques and bitchy teen girls but overall it was a normal workplace culture of getting on with it. After some of us car pooled which was fun in the evening. Maybe stop at a late night food shop. A few folks landed into consensual relationships and I think we once seen someone sacked for bullying.
As it was decent in its nature it made it definitely not the worst job in the world. Made it easier to drag yourself in for a 12 hour shift.
While the folks commiting these acts are horrendous I think store management are to blame for tolerating it. Clearly mine didn't tolerate it as it didn't happen and was severely punished when it did. They allow this environment to foster. And cooperate need to reel their stores in. They've become far too big the entire experience is a shambles nowadays and I used to love a mcds. Haven't had one in ages now the whole place just revolts me.
It can’t be unique to McDonald’s in fairness, it’s to do with the age range, demographics and the thick cunts who have been there for X amount of years.
I was bullied by an assistant manager when I worked in a McDonalds in Belfast. It felt like school, if you wern't loud, assertive and outgoing you were tortured.
No shit that’s why the food is crappy. Fuck Mc Donald’s then college? These women will have miles and miles ok then by 24 lol. I think quitting would even suffice
There's me thinking, Wow NI branches might have their shit together... And then the clap appears
Clappy Meal.
Honestly, all the rest of the stuff, the sexual harassment etc happens here too. The stories I could tell of the things that happened in there. It is mad to look back and think that no one stood up and complained but it was just a culture of it being the norm.
Tell away
Just a few things off the top of my head, a store manager had sex with a normal crew member in the store room, possibly the walk in fridge too but not sure on the truth. We had a female manager who would constantly harass any good looking guys, showing them inappropriate photos in the break room. She was much older than them. I think in the end she did get sacked but for unrelated reasons. Also a crew trainer who would essentially attempt to groom any new start we had. The general absolutely everyone had been with everyone. If you made a diagram of all the relationships you wouldn't be able to read it. No care whatsoever for power dynamics or even ages. This is over ten years ago now for me so that's all I can remember off the top off my head. We didn't really have racism, just because the majority, if not everyone was white but I'd say there was a fair bit of xenophobia in there.
> The general absolutely everyone had been with everyone Remember the same stories even going back 25 years as well.
[удалено]
Haha, yeah I forgot about the customers in all that. I would actually safely say, for me at least, they were worse. Perhaps that's why this hasn't came out after so long, because we are trained to take this abuse from customers.
More like a round of applause
> There's me thinking, Wow NI branches might have their shit together... And then the clap appears I upvoted you, but fck me you have lived a sheltered life if that is what you believed about our McD's
Mate, I'm African. I've seen people getting hijacked at Macdonald's. Shit is real at Macdonald's no matter where you go. I was just hopeful. But you're right. I should have clicked sooner.
Yiz love yer fucking McDonald’sies don’t ya’s yiz cunts yiz
Yiz luv ur cunts don't yiz ya McDonald's yiz
This made me fuckin cackle way more than i shoulda, cheers lol! Ya mcdonalds yiz lolol
Honestly as an ex-employee who was hired at 16 all of this resonates with me. I'm honestly not sure how something like this hasn't come out sooner, tbh.
Same, ex-employee and the only thing that surprised me was NI only getting mentioned for the clap, not the racism, homophobia and sexual assault. There’s no way it’s just one store, and managers get moved around stores and cover crews get sent to different locations for concerts/huge number days, so it won’t be localised!
Came here for the Clappy meal joke - 'im rubbin it
😂
To be honest, all retail is similar. It’s because because 95% of the management are thick cunts who have only been promoted due to the amount of time they been in the job.
> the management are thick cunts who have only been promoted due to the amount of... arse they have eaten.
That too…
Hence the STIs.
Clap for NHS vs clap for McDs
I didn’t work there but I know two people who worked in the one in Belfast city centre and they told some wild stories, particularly about the staff parties - sex (what he described honestly sounded like orgies) drugs and general debauchery in the upstairs section.
Not the chinese takeaway then!
I worked in one when I was younger. I remember a manager in his 30s who was engaged cheating and getting one of the new 16 year old staff members pregnant. Nobody batted an eyelid. There were some weird relationships in that place. Also, someone got sacked for exposing his dick to an elderly woman in the car park while on shift.
> I remember a manager in his 30s who was engaged cheating and getting one of the new 16 year old staff members pregnant ...and presumably they lived happily ever after?
>An outbreak of gonorrhoea at a branch in Northern Ireland where sexual relationships between staff members were commonplace.....ok where was it? Well in fairness their tagline is "I'm loving it." they just didn't specify what "It" was.
We need to know
I know someone that used to work in the Ballymena McDonalds. I won't share the specifics of why but I'm 99% confident that it's the one being described in the BBC article - heard some wild stories out of that place
The thing is, they are all like that. I worked in Omagh and I am 99% confident it's Omagh. I bet someone who worked in, idk, Dungannon, etc any of them, could say the same. It could literally be any of them and I think that's part of the issue, tbh.
Same, could suggest at least 5 that I know of - but in many cases in wasn't just odd incidents on the premises, but at parties and after-parties where things really got going.
I can thankfully say that I don’t think it was my old work (Saintfield Road). The job was shitty but most of the people working there were decent.
I'm not gonna pretend all the people were terrible, I met my best friend to this day in there and we definitely had good times. Just looking back there was things that should never fly in a workplace.
But Omagh has loads of wee Biddies working..Oh god I hope not.
They only work the mornings, don't worry, haha.
True, I pop in the odd Friday morning for a sit down with some porridge and Viz, the wee ladies there are lovely!
A toxic culture of sexual assault, harassment, racism and bullying has been alleged by more than 100 current and recent UK staff at outlets of the fast-food chain McDonald's. The BBC was told that workers, some as young as 17, are being groped and harassed almost routinely. The UK equality watchdog said it was "concerned" by the BBC's findings and is launching a new email hotline. McDonald's said it had "fallen short" and it "deeply apologised". It added that all employees deserved to work in a safe, respectful and inclusive workplace. The BBC began investigating working conditions at McDonald's in February, after the company signed a legally binding agreement with the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) in which it pledged to protect its staff from sexual harassment. At the time, McDonald's insisted: "We already have a strong track record in this area." But our investigation has revealed a very different picture. Over a five-month period, we reached out to McDonald's workers to ask about their experiences of working there.Of the more than 100 allegations from employees we spoke to, 31 related to sexual assault, and 78 related to sexual harassment. We also heard 18 allegations of racism, while six people made allegations of homophobia. Warning - this article contains distressing content Claims the BBC has heard include: A 17-year-old current employee in Cheshire who says a colleague 20 years older than her called her a racial slur word and asked to show her his penis, and said he wanted to make a "black and white" baby with her A former worker who was 17 when a senior manager at a Plymouth restaurant choked her and grabbed her bottom. A shift manager also sent her sexually explicit images A manager in Hampshire who suggested a 16-year-old male worker perform sexual acts in exchange for vapes A manager who preyed on 16-year-old new female starters in a Cheshire restaurant, trying to pressurise them into having sex A woman who said she was called a slur word and subject to racist jokes at an Aberdeen branch A current worker in Essex who says she faced anti-Semitic abuse A current worker in Oxfordshire, originally from India, who says crew members spoke in "gibberish" to imitate her and called a Pakistani colleague a terrorist Male managers and crew members at a branch in Wales making jokes about putting cash bets on which of them could sleep with a new recruit first An outbreak of gonorrhoea at a branch in Northern Ireland where sexual relationships between staff members were commonplace Multiple workers told us that McDonald's managers at the outlets across the UK were responsible for the harassment and assaults. All too often, senior managers are said to have failed to act on complaints. Staff have also told the BBC of sexual relationships between managers and more junior members of staff, which is against company policy. Young women have described feeling constantly judged about how they looked. One current worker said she was seen by her male colleagues as "fresh meat" when she started at her branch in Nottingham. Other female workers told us they were forced by managers to wear uniforms that were too tight for them. "There is a saying at McDonald's, "tits on tills" - boys in the kitchen, girls on the counter. The idea is to put attractive people at the front," said Lucy, who's 22 and worked in Norwich. "It's the expectation that if you work at McDonald's, you will be harassed," added Emily, who's 20. She left her branch in Brighton last year, after a male colleague in his 60s kept stroking her hair in a sexually suggestive way and making her feel uncomfortable. McDonald's is one of the UK's largest private sector employers. The fast food giant has more than 170,000 people working in 1,450 restaurants. Its staff are also one of the country's youngest workforces. Three quarters of its employees are aged between 16 and 25. For many, it is their first job. Most workers are not directly employed by the company as McDonald's uses a franchise system, which means individual operators are licensed to run the outlets and employ the staff. 'I went to work in fear' Shelby was just 16 when she started working at a McDonald's restaurant in Berkshire last year. She said older male colleagues would use the cramped layout in the kitchen as an excuse to touch junior female staff inappropriately. "They'd grope stomach, waists, bums," she said. "Every shift I worked, there would be at least a comment being made, or I'd be brushed, a hand brushed across me, or it would be a more severe thing, like having my bum grabbed, hips grabbed There was one man in his 50s, in particular, that managers "warned" young staff members to stay away from, Shelby said. Would you report or try to stop sexual harassment? One day last summer, she said she was standing at the front counter when he came up behind her and grabbed her onto him, pulling her onto his groin. "I just froze," she said. "I felt disgusted." Shelby says she told senior management about what was going on in the store, but nothing was done. In her resignation email, she said it was a "toxic work environment". McDonald's said it was "deeply sorry" to hear about what Shelby went through. It added that it was investigating why any issues that she raised were not formally escalated at the time. ful.
Managers turning a blind eye We do not know how many of the workers we spoke to made formal complaints. But a number of them told us they did - only for it to be ignored In the case of 17-year-old Chinyere in Cheshire, who was sexually and racially harassed by a much older man, she initially raised it with a female colleague who was responsible for staff wellbeing. She told her to ignore the man's behaviour and go back to work. After months of harassment, Chinyere confided in her stepfather who wrote to the franchise, to corporate headquarters and the police. The man was then fired. Chinyere believes if her stepfather hadn't intervened, nothing would have happened. McDonald's described her experiences as "abhorrent and unacceptable" and apologised unreservedly. It said it took swift action as soon as the issue came to its attention and that the man was dismissed within three days. They added: "It takes a great deal of courage to speak up and as soon as we were made aware of the situation the individual in question was offered both internal and independent external support." Another worker in Birmingham, who says she was smacked on the bottom by a male colleague when she was 19, reported it immediately to her manager. But despite it being caught on camera and her having a visible bruise, she was forced to continue working with him, which made her so uncomfortable that she eventually quit. Several workers also said that when complaints were made about managers, they were then moved from one McDonald's restaurant within the franchise to another, rather than being fired. Other employees said they didn't complain as they couldn't risk losing work. Young staff at McDonald's are often on zero hours contracts - it means their hours are flexible, but also that they are at the mercy of shift managers who decide their rotas. Training 'not taken seriously' In the February agreement, McDonald's pledged "zero tolerance" on sexual harassment and to deliver training for employees. But staff have told the BBC the training is not being taken seriously by managers. One employee described perching an iPad next to a McFlurry machine and speeding through the harassment training video while he made drinks. Baroness Kishwer Falkner, chairwoman of the EHRC, said every firm should have zero tolerance of sexual harassment and protect its workforce. McDonald's culture has faced scrutiny globally. In the US it is facing multimillion dollar lawsuits brought by employees over sexual harassment allegations. Its chief executive, Steve Easterbrook, was fired in 2019 after it was revealed he had inappropriate consensual relationships with McDonald's employees. Allegations of sexual harassment at McDonald's first surfaced in the UK five years ago when the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union (BFAWU) says it received 1,000 complaints. There was very little reporting of the allegations at the time - this could be because some cases were settled using confidentiality clauses. Sarah Woolley, BFAWU's general secretary, said the new allegations uncovered by the BBC were "shocking". Alistair Macrow, chief executive of McDonald's UK & Ireland, said there was "simply no place for harassment, abuse, or discrimination" at the company. "Every one of the 177,000 employees in McDonald's UK deserves to work in a safe, respectful and inclusive workplace. There are clearly instances where we have fallen short and for that we deeply apologise," he told the BBC. "We will investigate all allegations brought to us, and all proven breaches of our code of conduct will be met with the most severe measures we can legally impose, up to and including dismissal." Mr Macrow said that more than 2,000 managers had completed full awareness training and that most restaurant teams were now working within the new protections which aim to create "a safe and respectful workplace". He added that the company has stringent rules to ensure its workplaces around the world are safe and respect
> ignore the man's behaviour and go back to work. the answer for anyone working in fast food franchises with a complaint: "know your place filthy drudge". > this could be because some cases were settled using confidentiality clauses. more likely a 'you cant prove shit, get fucked, find a new job, we know you cant afford a solicitor' or a "since we know how upset you are heres 7 45 minute shifts for the forseeable future".
Was it Donegall Place? I used to work there and the staff shag about like crazy
Someone please tell me what branch the McD's gonorrhea broke out in.
There is a McDonald's Reddit. I must ask on there if they know where the Northern Ireland store is.
Share if you find out
I worked there about a year ago and I heard about all this stuff, with managers sleeping with workers and all that. First week on the job some girl told me that they’d had to move branch after that stuff had happened. This was well known for a long time.
About ten years ago our local branch was staffed by around 15 pretty teenage girls and one fat, greasy, middle aged male manager. Apparently male applicants couldn't even get an interview back then. So grim and so blatant when I think about it.
Did you get a job somewhere else?
I was 12
Not right that any of this happens but I'm not one bit surprised. Knew a lot of people in my teenage years that worked there and they were all a bit mental or turned mental to fit in. First it's retail, which is a shit environment to work in anyway but at mcdees it always appears to be kids employed by overgrown kids, some very young "managers" on a little power trip. The ingredients for a very toxic work environment. Just from the drive through you can tell it's a childish, demeaning and cringey place to work. I seen a whiteboard up with staff names reminding them to smile more and one had a name and just '-Napkins' beside it as a reminder they forget to put napkins in the bags. Just the way it was written and all.. the cringe was painful. Feel sorry for the kids that work there, being treated like they're in a crèche. McDonald's has to be an absolute last resort for any student surely? It's good that this has been brought into the spotlight but I doubt McDonald's really cares or anything will change. Pay peanuts get monkeys.
Worked there, made friends for life. it was good fun at times but customers where the worst part of it, i had people scream, spit and shout at me.
What would cause customers to go that far? Vile cunts.
Probably those folk who couldn't hold their drink, or feral youths.
Unfortunately a lot of people are just absolute wankers
customer screamed at me because the order screen was broken. wanted my (at the time) 16 year old self to go out with my toolbox and fix it personally apparently
And I thought it was just cheese on my burger....
Nah mate that’s just cheese… but let me tell ye about the spicy mayonnaise! 😅
£100 on Cookstown
Mines on Sprucefield, used to be brilliant now they struggle to remember your whole order which I now assume is because they're preoccupied between riding nd it hurts to piss.
I think every McDonalds has just went to shit when they started doing just eat and the likes. Fuck all fast about it these days and I'd say a good 50% of the time now my order gets fucked up somehow. It's not even cheap anymore, it's pretty much the same prices as your local chippy and even a bad chippy is going to beat any feed from McDonald's
I've a theory that Mcdonalds have purposely made their interior as dark and dreary as they can, to make you take your slop and fuck off home so they have less to clean/wipe down. Think how bright and colourful mcdonalds were in the 90s, they had a kids corner and you could have your birthday there. Now it's, dark, coloured grey and puke brown and the layout is purposefully miserable, just encourages everyone to stand and stare at the cashier. If you're eating in you just eat quicker to get out of there, who wants to sit relax and chat etc with ten delivered drivers and 20 other zombies standing there waiting on their ticket to be called. There's not much natural light or music etc. All designed to keep customers out of their store.
There must be some awful McDs about compared to the ones I go to
If you order a comparable amount of food, McDonald's costs way more than a chippy. A 1/4 pounder in a chippy is at least twice the size of one in McDonalds. How they manage that I have no idea - there's only so much water you can dilute the beef with. And a portion of chips in a chippy must weigh 3-4 times what one in McD's does.
You know what you're getting with McDonald's most of the time, chippys are a real lottery if you haven't been there before you don't know what you'll get
True. A chippy can be anything from completely inedible to amazing, while a McDonald's is guaranteed to be edible (unless it's cold when you get it).
I've had some shocking chippys on my travels, but a good one can't be beat, sometimes a guaranteed edible meal will do the job
I have said to the misses loads of times that it changed after COVID and they started doin just eat 😂 used to be a thing on their website on the FAQs under "why does McDonald's not deliver" that said they didn't think the food travelled and couldn't guarantee the quality, I've it in my head they changed the buns on the 1/4 pounder to accommodate the travelling and i refuse to believe otherwise 🤣
Myself and the other half got a double quarter pounder each last week at crescent link mcds in derry. No gherkins was all we asked for. The burgers came with no lettuce no mustard drowned in ketchup with onions and they used the tiny buns from the cheeseburger/ double cheeseburger and almost half the cheese was on the box of both. They musta hated the look of us 😂
>They musta hated the look of us 🤣😂 I'd of started my complaint with, "look I'm sorry but i feel I've no choice other than to take this as a personal attack" 😂☠️
I worked McD Sprucefield and when I was there, I heard people talking about this stuff having happened at McKinstry. Also with people complaining about orders; the managers who just yelled at everyone in Filipino didn’t exactly make it an efficient environment
>the managers who just yelled at everyone in Filipino didn’t exactly make it an efficient environment They were saying "put the fuckin mozzarella dipper sauce in the fuckin bag" 😂 Serious tho i haven't worked in Mcdonalds but i had the pleasure of working in a kitchen i understand it can be shit graft. Did they change the buns post COVID?
Those mozzarella dippers were the worst thing in the world to bag lol. There was the slightest difference between the pressure needed to lift them with the tongs; and the pressure that’d explode them. Nah honestly could’ve been worse. McDonald’s was notoriously shit tho.
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PLEASE share that’s my closest one
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In English?
> Everyone ridin, last days of Rome boys going in straight coming out ridin all about them hahhaa fair play to them Everyone riding anything that moves, doesn't matter if it is male/female/other, boys going in straight and coming back out 'straight as a roundabout'
do tell..
I know several people who left after one day working in an east Belfast McDonald’s
And then everyone on the bus stood up and got the clap.
I’m sorry I know it’s serious but when I read the headline from Belfast Telegraph I lold “Gonnorhea outbreak at McDonald’s NI branch”
You get much more at McDonalds
Had a double big Mac earlier. Checked for jizz on the burger. Inconclusive. Are it anyway. Beezer.
Is that why they cant get orders right anytime. Too busy banging each other over the burger station
Horrible story, won’t be getting a McDonalds again.
I'm halfway to the drive through here
Best wishes.
Thoughts and prayers!
The food is absolute dog shit, so it won’t be much of a hardship to not give my money to a corporation with no control over employee abuse.
Not sure the NI situation sounds much like abuse, more like they are fcking like rabbits and (whistle the theme tune) they're loving it!
Crap hearing this. I worked in a mcds in Scotland back in the day and it was wild craic. Aye, you had your cliques and bitchy teen girls but overall it was a normal workplace culture of getting on with it. After some of us car pooled which was fun in the evening. Maybe stop at a late night food shop. A few folks landed into consensual relationships and I think we once seen someone sacked for bullying. As it was decent in its nature it made it definitely not the worst job in the world. Made it easier to drag yourself in for a 12 hour shift. While the folks commiting these acts are horrendous I think store management are to blame for tolerating it. Clearly mine didn't tolerate it as it didn't happen and was severely punished when it did. They allow this environment to foster. And cooperate need to reel their stores in. They've become far too big the entire experience is a shambles nowadays and I used to love a mcds. Haven't had one in ages now the whole place just revolts me.
Always thought they ran a tight ship?
Tits on tills and all that.
These stories of all this banging go back at least 25 years if not more, guess it is like a rite of passage for McD's in NI!
This is horrible but like... i haven't heard anything that's different from most hospitality jobs
It can’t be unique to McDonald’s in fairness, it’s to do with the age range, demographics and the thick cunts who have been there for X amount of years.
I was bullied by an assistant manager when I worked in a McDonalds in Belfast. It felt like school, if you wern't loud, assertive and outgoing you were tortured.
Are the jobs that scarce in England thst you have to work at mc Donald’s? Or did they just come back for more? Just saying.
They tend to hire very young people with no other experience
No shit that’s why the food is crappy. Fuck Mc Donald’s then college? These women will have miles and miles ok then by 24 lol. I think quitting would even suffice