A Great Idea, but the Execution Falls Short

I'll be honest, getting hired by this company was a breeze. I just gave them a call, scheduled an interview near the Zvenigorodskaya metro, and showed up on time. During the interview, they walked me through the process - they'd open a VTB or MTS bank card for me, and that was about it. After that, they took my passport, SNILS, and returned them. Then, I signed a bunch of safety protocols, got my ID photo taken, and received my badge with a little pamphlet.

Next, they called me with some shift options near my metro, and I chose the one closest to home. The next day, I went to work. (By the way, I didn't need to buy any uniforms, but I worked in clothing stores, so that's a plus.) No vaccinations or medical records required, either.

When I showed up for my shift, dressed in the code they'd told me about, things got interesting. They loaded me up with a ton of work I had no idea how to do, and they barely explained it. It was a wild ride.

After a few uncomfortable shifts, I wanted to quit because working in different stores and teams was stressful. But I was held back by the lack of a card to get paid - I had to call the manager and find out it'd take six shifts to get one. I gritted my teeth and kept working.

In the end, I quit, but two weeks later, I went back to work because sitting at home and not earning money was unbearable. That's when things took a turn for the worse.

Not only were there no shifts near my metro, but they offered me shifts in other parts of the city. I took a couple, despite myself. Eventually, I ended up in some really toxic teams with constant nitpicking, and they expected me to work just as hard as the experienced staff, no matter how little I knew. I barely made it through my shifts, and I was miserable. The only shifts left were ones where I'd be alone on the fitting room floor, running around the store all day, and the staff would either help or ignore me. I was getting really frustrated, especially with the administrators, who were pretty unhelpful, considering most of the staff were friendly young people.

One time, I worked at the Mega mall, and that was a nightmare.

The pay took forever to arrive, supposedly within two working days, but it'd take five days in reality. And to make matters worse, I had to call the city number for everything, which was a real hassle and cost me a lot of money. When I got my shift schedule via SMS, it was nice, but that was about it.

I only had one decent store with a decent administrator and salesperson - they were actually normal people. The rest was a struggle. Most stores wouldn't let you use your phone (not even to check the time), and you couldn't talk to your coworkers, either. You were always expected to be doing something, even if there was nothing to do. And to top it all off, the store staff might just decide to ruin your day for no reason. The concept is cool - you can work as many shifts as you want, whenever you want, and sleep in or start work at 1 pm or 2 pm - but the attitude is really bad, especially towards adults. You'd need a lot of stress tolerance to work here, but if you want to push your nerves to the limit and get out of your comfort zone, be my guest. Just don't expect to feel good about it afterwards.