Lidl to implement Living Wage Foundation minimum pay rates

[elbows]

Too tired to look for a catch or express my thoughts on this right now but wanted to get this thread started anyway:

Lidl to pioneer recommended living wage - BBC News

Lidl has said it will become the first UK supermarket to implement the minimum wage as recommended by the Living Wage Foundation.

From October, Lidl UK employees will earn a minimum of £8.20 an hour across England, Scotland and Wales, and £9.35 an hour in London, the supermarket said.

The Foundation will announce a change in its recommended rates in November.

The rate is different from the National Living Wage as set out in the Budget.

Lidl said that if the Living Wage Foundation raised its recommended rate in its annual announcement in November, Lidl would adjust its minimum wage accordingly.

Currently, Lidl pays its staff a minimum of £7.30 an hour and £8.03 an hour inside London.

The Living Wage Foundation's current recommended minimal hourly rate is £7.85, and £9.15 inside London.

 

[Celyn]

Bloody foreign companies, coming over here and paying living wage.

 

[Hocus Eye.]

Good, I have shopped in Lidl and their stuff is good quality and cheap. I hear that they don't treat their staff very well but that is anecdotal. If they are creating publicity from improving staff wages, then good luck to them. I wish there was a branch near me but there isn't. I use them when travelling or camping.

 

[gimesumtruf]

It's very nice of them to pay their staff enough to live on, jolly decent, one could say almost human.

 

[Celyn]

Yeah, I think it's not great to work in. I recall somebody saying they had a bad habit of just 'phoning up and demanding that someone come in for a shift. I'd say quite a few staff at my nearest LIDL are students, so that sort of thing might or might not be ok, depending if they take "no" for an answer when person cannot do extra shift.

I don't know how LIDL compares to, say, Tesco or Sainsbury, or, for that matter, Poundland type of places. On the whole, committing to this slightly better wage is a Good Thing, though, I think.

 

[Celyn]

It's very nice of them to pay their staff enough to live on, jolly decent, one could say almost human.

Quite.

 

[quimcunx]

A friend was singing the praises of Aldi the other day saying they pay £10/hr in her area (not London) but this page doesn't uphold that claim. £7.25 to £7.40 for a stock assistant is lowest pay listed. Aldi Recruitment - Stores She also said some of her ex pupils have worked there and been happy and they treated them well. I didn't say anything as I couldn't remember whether someone had claimed it was Lidl or Aldi that did not treat staff well.

Anyway good on them for implementing a living wage, I suppose, seeing as plenty don't.

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Does this mean that those similar companies who bleat that they can't afford to pay are talking shite?

#boycottsainsbury's etc.

 

[weepiper]

Lidl work on a different basis to most other supermarkets - they have a lot less staff. Currently wondering if it's really worth sticking at my job that I really like for which I have 20 years' experience but earn a pound fifty an hour less for

 

[Whagwan]

This is from a while back but doesn't look like Lidl treat their workers that well:

Cheap - but not so cheerful? Helen Pidd investigates UK's 'worst' supermarket

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Lidl work on a different basis to most other supermarkets - they have a lot less staff. Currently wondering if it's really worth sticking at my job that I really like for which I have 20 years' experience but earn a pound fifty an hour less for

When I used to go to Aldi a lot the staff there would do the tills until the queue went down, then go stack shelves and mop the floors. None of this shite you get in Tesco, "Store cleaner to aisle 23" etc.

The staff seemed fairly happy, job adverts offered good wages, £35k for a manager (this in Walton-on-Thames) and it was a very pleasant place to shop. Our nearest Lidl/Aldi is quite a schlep away now, but an Aldi is opening 10 minutes away in November, can't wait!

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Lidl can only afford living wage because of their extortionate pricing, insist business leaders

Supermarket chain Lidl has come under fire from business leaders who say they can only afford to pay staff the living wage because they are obviously ripping off the consumer.

After Lidl said it would start paying their staff the minimum wage as recommended by the Living Wage Foundation, business groups said the move was clearly only possible because the consumer is being ripped off with sky-high prices.

Businessman Simon Williams told us, “No normal business can afford to pay its workers that sort of wage rate, not without the customer having to pay a lot more for their products – and do you really want that?”

“Where do you want all that extra money to go? Into the pockets of the shop-floor staff, or do you want it to stay in your pocket, as the consumer.”

“Because let me assure you, there is no third choice about where all the money goes when you walk into a business, it’s one of those two, and anyone who says different is definitely lying.”

The move has received a warm welcome from staff and customers alike, and Lidl has sought to explain their policy change.

A spokesperson for the supermarket chain told reporters, “Yeah, we thought about it, and we decided that when it comes to our employee’s wages and helping them stay above the poverty line, it’s probably best not to be pricks about it.”

“We can afford to pay this higher rate even with the meagre margins we make when we sell you tins of beans and our own-brand lager for tuppence a piece.”

“So I guess either our business model is orders of magnitude more efficient than those run by those other business leaders, or they’re just being arseholes about it.”

"Take your pick."

 

[unrepentant85]

Since Lidl and Aldi came about they have always been better payers than the other supermarkets.

After years working in the oil industry, which has now collapsed, tomorrow I start a new job in a supermarket and I will receive slightly more than that for a night shift job with one of the big 4.

 

[AnnaKarpik]

Aldi are paying 8.90 here, Herefordshire.

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

Lidl work on a different basis to most other supermarkets - they have a lot less staff. Currently wondering if it's really worth sticking at my job that I really like for which I have 20 years' experience but earn a pound fifty an hour less for

Well Sainsbury's/Tesco etc. probably have a lot fewer as well due to self-service tills

(except in my local one)

 

[brogdale]

Good.

Incidentally, I was recently in Munich and buying from Lidl German Pils ("Schloss" 'brand') in plastic bottles for €0.29 a pop (not including pfand). I mean, kinnel...it was really OK (5% and all) and all for 29cent a throw. Saw quite a few 'big-boned' chaps and I thought I'd probably end up quite a size if I lived full-time in the land of 29 cent beer.

 

[J Ed]

Good.

Incidentally, I was recently in Munich and buying German Pils ("Schloss" 'brand') in plastic bottles for €0.29 a pop (not including pfand). I mean, kinnel...it was really OK (5% and all) and all for 29cent a throw. Saw quite a few 'big-boned' chaps and I thought I'd probably end up quite a size if I lived full-time in the land of 29 cent beer.

*moves to Germany*

 

[KeeperofDragons]

Good for Lidl - now perhaps the likes of wetherspoons will shut thr fuck up but I won't be holding my breath

 

[brogdale]

Good for Lidl - now perhaps the likes of wetherspoons will shut thr fuck up but I won't be holding my breath

Unsurprisingly I think Lidl have been quite cute with this PR. Sure, they're 'going early' to catch the praise/wrong-foot the oppo, but they're really only bowing to the inevitable following Gideon's budget announcement. The (welcomed) take-home increase also might help to mask Lidl's rather parsimonious attitude towards unpaid staff breaks.

 

[Celyn]

Unsurprisingly I think Lidl have been quite cute with this PR. Sure, they're 'going early' to catch the praise/wrong-foot the oppo, but they're really only bowing to the inevitable following Gideon's budget announcement. The (welcomed) take-home increase also might help to mask Lidl's rather parsimonious attitude towards unpaid staff breaks.

Not sure but it seems to me that LIDL is going for a higher amount than the G. Osborne version, therefore good.

 

[brogdale]

Not sure but it seems to me that LIDL is going for a higher amount than the G. Osborne version, therefore good.

Yes, and this whole area is riddled with employer sharp=practice. I suppose Lidl not paying for employee breaks does show that, at least, some of their workers are employed on long-enough shifts to warrant a statutory break. I know that other supermarkets will manipulate ZHC shift patterns to eliminate that obligation.

For the sake of transparency I should reveal that the €0.29 Pils I referred to earlier was purchased from German Netto and not German Lidl. Apologies for any confusion this created.

 

[seventh bullet]

Fuck Lidl.

 

[NoXion]

I don't think I've ever been paid for my breaks. I'm lucky if I get paid holidays. So this notion that Lidl are cunts for not paying workers on their breaks is frankly bemusing. In my experience it's standard practice.

 

[Citizen66]

Yeah, not sure what that's about. Companies are obliged to give you breaks, but not pay for that time afaik. We don't get paid for them anyway.

 

[quimcunx]

I think it's standard that you work 7 (or 8) hours with an hour for lunch that is not paid. There may or may not be mid morning and afternoon short breaks.

The problem IIRC with fast food chains, for instance, is during quiet periods they would make you take a break but not pay you so you could turn up at 9 and at 10 it gets quiet so instead of just milling about you're told to take a break, back on at 11.45 or whenever summoned then at 3 it gets quiet so that counts as a break until it gets busy again at say 4pm and then if there is another lull you might get another break of 15 mins before being called back and so on. So you might be on the premises available for 8 hours but only get paid for 5. Not sure if that was put a stop to or not.

 

[Jon-of-arc]

Some guy from the British Retail Consortium said...

'there's not enough evidence for the living wage. The real way to lift people out of poverty is to increase productivity'.
Lidl to pay recommended living wage - BBC News

Defo not out of touch at all. As my mate said on FB, "Yeah, people doing MORE work for the same rate of pay will lift them out of poverty!".

 

[elbows]

Some guy from the British Retail Consortium said...



Defo not out of touch at all. As my mate said on FB, "Yeah, people doing MORE work for the same rate of pay will lift them out of poverty!".

Especially as one of the very few ideological concessions made at the height of the financial crisis was that the concept of trickle down is dead.

 

[brogdale]

Yeah, not sure what that's about. Companies are obliged to give you breaks, but not pay for that time afaik. We don't get paid for them anyway.

Probably more to do with me being out of touch with such labour market matters tbh. I'm of an age whereby I can remember actually being treated relatively decently by employers...maybe my expectations of employers are a 'throw-back' to those pre neo-lib days?

 

[Citizen66]

Probably more to do with me being out of touch with such labour market matters tbh. I'm of an age whereby I can remember actually being treated relatively decently by employers...maybe my expectations of employers are a 'throw-back' to those pre neo-lib days?

Even shops could be decent employers by today's standards at one point. Marks and Spencer's had a final salary pension scheme back in the bad old 70s (according to a colleague).

 

[brogdale]

Even shops could be decent employers by today's standards at one point. Marks and Spencer's had a final salary pension scheme back in the bad old 70s (according to a colleague).

Oh yeah, those dark (black & white, grainy film footage of strife) days of the 1970s. Thank goodness that fatch sorted that out.