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Working in a supermarket

StMartin72

I have difficulty with social interactions in my job at Morrisons.  I work on the Checkouts where an amount of interaction is required, ie eye contact, saying hi and so forth. I also have meltdowns dealing with the many irritations and frustrations created by customers and staff who don't really understand me.  I really struggle with these things and have been threatened with disciplinary action over the years. Any advice for me?

Parents

  • I worked in ASDA for almost 4 years and although I never worked on the checkouts I can just imagine how stressful I would have found it. I worked in the Homeshopping section and I would highly recommend it to anybody on the autistic spectrum. The routine was straight forward and consistent, and we spent 90% of our time just getting on with our work by ourselves. Of course there's always some interaction with customers but it never lasted more than 5 minutes.

    My mum and me once joked that i have a 'social interaction' meter, and that mine just fills up more quickly than most; and that's exactly what it is, isn't it? In homeshopping I only really interacted with my colleagues socially during break, and the rest of our interaction was based on the job we were doing at the time. That was always enough for me, and I hardly ever felt overwhelmed or frustrated (and when i did it was usually to do with a difficult customer, but you can never avoid them completely can you).

    The only drawback I found with Homeshopping was the early start as we had to be in by 6:00 am, but it meant I was finished by lunch time and i could take a nap after a stressfull shift.

    I agree with 'Normalish' that you shouldn't feel guilty about asking for help, and you especially shouldn't be made to feel guilty for asking for a transfer to any department with less social interaction; it's a perfectly legitimate request, no matter the reason. And it's not as if they can't hire a new checkout operator!

Reply

  • I worked in ASDA for almost 4 years and although I never worked on the checkouts I can just imagine how stressful I would have found it. I worked in the Homeshopping section and I would highly recommend it to anybody on the autistic spectrum. The routine was straight forward and consistent, and we spent 90% of our time just getting on with our work by ourselves. Of course there's always some interaction with customers but it never lasted more than 5 minutes.

    My mum and me once joked that i have a 'social interaction' meter, and that mine just fills up more quickly than most; and that's exactly what it is, isn't it? In homeshopping I only really interacted with my colleagues socially during break, and the rest of our interaction was based on the job we were doing at the time. That was always enough for me, and I hardly ever felt overwhelmed or frustrated (and when i did it was usually to do with a difficult customer, but you can never avoid them completely can you).

    The only drawback I found with Homeshopping was the early start as we had to be in by 6:00 am, but it meant I was finished by lunch time and i could take a nap after a stressfull shift.

    I agree with 'Normalish' that you shouldn't feel guilty about asking for help, and you especially shouldn't be made to feel guilty for asking for a transfer to any department with less social interaction; it's a perfectly legitimate request, no matter the reason. And it's not as if they can't hire a new checkout operator!

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