Wal-Mart cutting about 7,000 back-office store jobs

[inanna]

Source: Associated Press

September 1, 2016

NEW YORK (AP) -- Wal-Mart is cutting about 7,000 back-office store jobs over the next few months as it centralizes its invoice and accounting departments, expanding a test it announced in June.

The nation's largest private employer said Thursday that the cuts will take place in all its namesake stores, confirming the move reported by The Wall Street Journal. The goal is to get workers out of the backrooms and onto the selling floors as Wal-Mart faces increasing competition from online leader Amazon.com.

Wal-Mart says it believes most of the displaced workers will find new jobs that involve direct contact with shoppers. That would include positions like working in the online pickup department or as pharmacy technicians. The company did not immediately respond to a query about worker wages.

Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart tested the program in 500 stores earlier this year, which it said would affect as many as 1,500 workers. Stores typically employ several hundred workers and the move affects about two or three people per store.

Read more: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/wal-mart-cutting-7-000-164542790.html

[Puppyjive]

1. Need more checkers

How about putting them to work at the checkout? We only have 2 stores to shop and Walmart has a long way to go to compete with the service at typical grocery chains. First of all, people do not want self check out most of the time when they havs a ton of groceries. Second, they never have enough check stands open, but they always have employees hovering around the checkouts. And finally, Walmart needs to step up the plate and provide better benefits for their employees and give back to the communities where they ran small businesses into the dirt. They are good at sucking money out of our communities and very lame about giving back.

[rurallib]

2. I go into a Walmart @ 1/month because they carry a couple products no one else does

and even in the middle of the day I end up standing in a line that usually takes 10 minutes.
I hate giving them any business and i hate having to wait in line as Wally saves a nickel because they are so fucking cheap.

But I will be damned if I ever go to that self checkout and give them an excuse to cut even more jobs. Even if I have to wait I want to be checked out by a human who gets a paycheck.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

6. Yeah, this seems to be a thing with them

Almost all the Walmarts have long lines. It is pretty bad when you have to wait in line to even use the self check out. That sucks. I hate that damn self check out machine too. It is always complaining about some mysterious "unexpected item in the bagging area".

[mpcamb]

3. "back-office positions" What does this mean?

Who are these people and what do they make per hour?

(What I'm driving at is who gets hurt in this.)

[tblue37]

5. People who had better-paid jobs will now end up working at the lowest pay level, I bet. nt

[KeepItReal]

4. Extra profits next quarter for more share buybacks!

...while their stores become crime centers due to understaffing.

How greedy can these mofos continue to be?