Melbourne restaurants: staff member forced to hand phone over to boss

Forced to hand over her phone to her boss to look at private group chats. Three unpaid “trial” shifts. A teen worker’s restaurant hell.

A popular restaurant in Melbourne’s northern suburbs has come under extraordinary fire from ex-staff, with claims ranging from wage to theft to being forced to serve rotting vegetables.

A 22-year-old woman from Melbourne’s north said she has “never recovered” from the experience of her first job at a well-known regional restaurant.

The woman, who did not want to be named for fear of identifying the restaurant, said she worked three unpaid trial shifts and was forced to hand over her phone to a boss who wanted to read her messages.

She is one of more than 30 former employees of the business who have described their experiences to Leader, which range from persistent sexual harassment, underpayment, being forced to serve rotting food and even being asked to repay JobKeeper payments.

Leader knows of at least one former staff member who has claimed more than $4000 in withheld wages from the business, and understands multiple staff are pursuing remuneration at FairWork.

“I knew nothing about how I could be treated, or my rights as an employee,” she said.

The former employee, now an architecture student, said she began working at the restaurant in June 2017.

She worked three unpaid trial shifts totalling approximately 15 hours, was given 24 hours to read and sign her contract, and then began to serve alcohol as a 17-year-old who didn’t have an RSA, she said.

But she said that the worst was yet to come.

Workers at the business had a private group chat, the messages of which have been seen by Leader, to discuss work-related matters.

The staff member was told to sit down by her boss and hand over her phone, she said, or was faced with legal action.

“She said, ‘We know you have a Facebook group chat and we want to see it.”

She said that she was told to continue setting up the restaurant while her boss took screenshots of the conversations, she said.

In a phone conversation, obtained by Leader, the manager can be heard interrogating the then-18 year-old for leaving a shift early, which she said was due to 20-minutes of consistent bullying.

In the 2018 conversation, the manager can be heard saying to her, “there was a lot of things that needed to be done like … washing utensils.”

“You are definitely affecting our business,” he tells her.

More to cone.