Doddle is a complete and utter shambles in every possible way. Outside of the people working there nothing about this company can be described in a positive light.
The systems and equipment staff are given to work with rarely function and, more often than not, crash or break when we are trying to deal with customers. Although constantly informed of this, head office's response is always "This is when we have to be able to deliver the absolute best customer service possible", which is fairly easy to say when you aren't the one having to handle irate and confused customers.
Things are only exacerbated when the IT department actually try and fix an error or update the system to make it run more smoothly or efficiently.This usually leads to a follow up update to fix all the issues created by the previous one.
Anyone about an Assistant Manger's level seems to view the staff as an inexhaustible, all-purpose source of work who will do whatever is asked of them, regardless of whether it is there job to do so or not. Part-time employees on 9 or 10 hour contracts are being asked to make up rotas and create marketing plans. Employees are sometimes contacted at home to verify figures from that day, which they are somehow expected to remember off the top of their heads.
In store, Managers are condescending to staff; questioning their abilities and performance without actually attempting the tasks themselves. The "We're all in this together" spiel is bandied around a lot but this could not be further from the truth. If an error occurs when you are working due to one of the many system failures or impossible to follow or keep track of store policies, then you, and solely you, are to blame.
Head Office are worse still; full of friends and family with little to no experience in the positions they are in but given carte blanche to do whatever they feel like with their departments and are expected to be treated like royalty should they visit your store. There is no communication between departments and stores are often sent conflicting information due to a total lack of organisation. Yet, when any mistakes occur, it is, as always, the staffs fault.
Staff have often been promised that there is the opportunity to advance within the company, however, any who have offered their further services to the company have found that they received no improvement in salary, benefits or title but a simply a drastically increased workload. When managerial positions open within stores, staff are usually bypassed and, once more, friends or family of higher ups are employed to fill the role. To say this is incredibly demoralising would be an understatement.
In store policies and operations change on such a regular basis that errors are almost impossible to avoid, but the staff shoulder the blame once again for missing on a piece of information that's probably sitting in the middle of some labyrinthine fourteen message long email chain. Prices increase without explanation, only for staff to be told that the previous prices had always been promotional despite the fact that this was never mentioned before, neither to employees or, more importantly, customers. Many of whom have stopped using the service due to these constant and unexpected changes. This is often preferable to the customers who decide to take out their annoyance at this on you. Head office will reassure you it's fine though. Presumably for them.
If you are surprised that there is so much wrong with a company that you have probably never heard of, then you have the marketing department to thank for that. Staff are told that they should feel like the store they work in is there own and that they should try and out and implement ideas they think will increase brand awareness. This basically translates to head office telling you that they will provide, at most, the bare minimum of support. Staff who are hired as in store sales assistants are expected to go out leafleting and go door-to-door marketing the company to large businesses with information packs they have to create themselves. To start with, this makes the company look highly unprofessional and incredibly amateurish, especially when it likes to highly publicise its wealthy backers. Secondly, nowhere, from the application to the interview or the training process is this ever explained to staff that this is expected of them. Then again, an honest job application for Doddle probably wouldn't look quite as enticing as the vague and 'trendy' one they've put together and will see on job sites. The only accuracy to it is when they say they do things differently, however, what they mean by that is in a way that makes no sense and serves no purpose.
