McDonald’s manager stood down for asking teenager uncomfortable questions in job interview

A QUEENSLAND teen was asked if she was “beautiful” and told not to cry during a nightmare interview with McDonald’s.

A QUEENSLAND teenager was asked if she thought she was “beautiful” by a McDonald’s store manager during a job interview that forced the fast food giant to stand down its employee.

The teen’s mum Rita Pryce took to Facebook on Monday with a lengthy post detailing her 16-year-old daughter’s experience with at the McDonald’s store in Cairns.

“(These) inappropriate questions left my daughter feeling sexually harassed and racially vilified,” she wrote.

Rita wrote: “‘Do you think you’re beautiful?’ was one of the many ridiculous questions an award-winning senior staff member of the ... McDonald’s asked.”

When Rita’s daughter responded, “Uhhh ... I guess ... yeah ...” the manager replied, “Well that’s what YOU make of it”.

Rita said her daughter got in the car after the interview and started to cry before detailing what else happened to her..

When the teen told the manager she was from Thursday Island in the Torres Strait, he asked her: “What’s two plus two?”

She replied: “Four?”

According to Rita, the manager then said: “Yep, it’s four in our country too!”

Rita also said the manager looked at her daughter’s paperwork and asked her, “16 and still no job?”

Rita Pryce was furious about how her daughter was treated.

When the manager asked her how she would describe herself, she said she was “bubbly”.

“Bubbly? Should I just stop you there and end this interview? Bubbly? Someone who is bubbly makes a lot of mistakes. Do you make a lot of mistakes?” he asked.

When Rita’s daughter started to cover her face and hold back tears he allegedly replied, “Are you gonna cry? You look like you’re gonna cry!”

Rita went back into the restaurant and left her number for the manager to call her, as he was still conducting interviews.

After waiting a day for the manager to call her back, Rita decided his lack of response meant she’d have to go back into the store.

“I asked for him and waited for 25 minutes in the store until someone came to recheck if I was okay. When he did finally come to speak to me, I told him I would make a complaint,” she wrote.

“I also asked how many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were employed at that store ... considering it was in a highly populated area of our mob. This of course, was something he could not and did not answer. I also told him and 2 staff members over the phone, how my daughter feels sick in the stomach every time we drive past a big yellow M now,” she added.

Eventually Rita was called by someone at McDonald’s who said they had changed their interviewing policies at the restaurant and were no longer doing solo interviews.

Rita told the McDonald’s spokeswoman she could no longer go to the branch for coffee, something she’d been doing for years.

“Now I have to drive all the way in to town, coz (sic) I don’t want to have to see his face as I keep picturing how upset my daughter was.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that,” the spokeswoman said.

“Oh, so he’s still there? ........ and you KNOW the reply!” Rita wrote.

The post clocked up more than 800 shares and 2500 likes on Facebook.

In a statement, McDonald’s said the incident had been investigated and the manager had since been stood down.

He had previously been placed on leave to allow the business to conduct a full investigation.