City Chic

I've been a long time customer of CC so I was excited to get a job there, but since working there I have become so disappointed in CC since. They expect you to memorise every little bit of info by the end of the first week and get frustrated if you ask questions, (nobody can be bothered taking the time to teach you the job) despite being available any day any time, I was only given 3 hours work a fortnight due to the work being kept for the manager and part timers. Because of the laziness of my manager In that 3 our shift I was made to clean the store take out the bins and size range the clothing so very little of my time was actually spent behind the counter (then they would complain that I wasn't making enough sales) While its nice to get a good discount on clothing, they expect you to keep up with the fashion and that means spending your pay check therefore you lose far more money than you make at this job. 65% off only applies for the week after you work so if you don't work the week prior - you don't get the discount, so as a fortnightly worker that meant I would have to visit on my own time to get the discount (Note: They really only want you to spend your money on the store you work at, not any surrounding stores which means if you live out of area your expected to travel to your own store) CC is more interested in making money off people than customer care, they encourage you to throw clothing in peoples faces (why else do you think they are so nice to you, they want your money). As an honest person I found it disgusting the amount of times the staff would lie to customers about the quality of the clothing (whether it would shrink in the washing machine, fray at the stitching, lose its colour etc). CC staff felt like a popularity contest in high school, if your not in the "click" of part timers than your only place there is to cover their lunch break. They signed me into their personal Superfund without my permission or even knowledge and told me it couldn't be changed  as it was part of the contract with CC to only be signed to their super and not your personal one. (There was no mention of a super-fund in the contract I signed with CC when I started employment) You dont get paid for any chores you do after your shift regardless of how long you stay behind to help, staff are very judgemental and often rude, they care only for themselves. Behind the scenes at CC is not the friendly smiling face you see when you shop there, maybe it was just my store I don't know, but I certainly am glad I quit that job! The only  enjoyable thing I liked about CC where the Customers!

City Chic reel you in with the promise of joining a family that is focused on making women feel good about themselves and providing A+ customer service. While this is true to some extent City Chic's only real focus is to make as much money as possible. 

A typical shift invovled unpacking stock, reading emails about how we are never making enough money, cleaning the store, putting stock away, rubbish runs and customer service. 

City Chic is very intense about the way they want you to interact with customers. Saying 'hi how are you' is not allowed. They have this weird policy called 'GAMES' where you have to hit each letter to close the sale. To be honest they really don't care what you do as long as you are making budget and beating last years figures. The area managers put a lot of pressure on the store managers as with most retail but they seem to cop a lot of the stress and pressure when the store doesn't do well. I was a casual for a while and then got promoted to part time, well I thought it was a promotion but I ended up getting the same amount of hours for less money which is why I had to leave. 

City Chic don't pay very well compared to a lot of other retailers which is understandable because they are the only plus size retailer in Australia so they would have a huge amount of people applying for jobs. There is also no staff allowance so if you are full time or part time or a manager you are expected to wear new stock all the time which comes out weekly but you can't actually afford it because the discount is so terrible and the wages are so low. You only get 40% off the clothing which seems like a lot but it really isn't when the average cost of a dress is $100, you're still paying at least 60 bucks for a dress and that's nearly every week to be wearing new stock. When I was a part timer I only got like $250 after tax for a 10 hour week. 

The customers are also brutual I had some terrible women that would steal and try to get refunds for things that they legally were not allowed to. 

The only good thing about this job was my manager and the other girls I worked with. The rest of the staff are amazing and you really do feel a sense of family but head office and the regional managers really do not care and are only focused on making money.

Where to even start.
Good -
Received between 9-13 hours per week, which was great with a second job.
Great management and co-workers are super friendly - they are rooting for you to do your best and willing to help you. 
40% off clothing on a regular basis. If 10K made in the week, you get 2 pieces for 65% off, which is super exciting when all the clothes are over $60.
Learning store standards

Bad -
Did not receive enough training to properly play GAMES.
Upper management extremely rude. Threats to fire you/reduce hours if budget/comps are not made. 
KPI's need to be over 1.7 and anything less will get you an intense chat with the manager, which is not always possible.
Money > Customer Service.
I felt as though I was overly pushy and at times felt as though I was harassing the customer, making them leave without anything.
Management from other stores extremely catty - don't bother shopping at any other store than your own as staff can make up lies to get you in trouble with your manager. 
Need to 'check in' every few hours so management know how your store is going. If not on track or above, rude emails/phone calls will follow. 'Check Ins' are excessive and should only be done 3 times a day (opening, lunch and close), not 5 times. 
Only worked there 3 months but was already thinking about when I could put my resume in. 
Spending more than 40 minutes with customers for them to just say 'oh i'll just get it all online' and have you put everything back. 


If ladies do not want to buy $600 worth of clothing, they will not. How are we as staff able to make them purchase this amount if they can not afford it? Even with AfterPay, ladies will not spend this much. What if we have little to no ladies in the store? Can't magically pull them out of a hat! We get blamed if we do not make budget for the day/week.

Don't get me wrong, I love the clothing, but they need to think about their staff and customers more than just money.
I had come home on more than one occasion upset by what other managers have said about me or how terrible my sales were for the day and letting the team down. 

Good luck!

The workplace culture was horrible. There was pressure to not take entitlements like short breaks or drink breaks, never explicit but always things like “you’ll notice no one else does” or even “unless she asks do not let her take a break”. I experienced punishment via rostering, I noticed that each time I refused a shift (even when refusing due to illness or pre disclosed limits) I would lose a rostered shift. While working I was told things like “management is watching on the CCTV and they will call if you slack off” this was despite the cameras clearly being stated as for security, not spying on staff. The team did not want to be friendly and we were actively and explicitly discouraged from speaking to each other socially, in many cases team members were pitted against each other as upper management was obsessed with blaming a person for any perceived delays. 

In terms of the work, it was difficult because management constantly moved the goal post. While doing a task they would suddenly appear and correct me saying that I was no longer doing the thing right and they now in fact had a new task for me to go and do and why hadn’t I already started it. There was no training and then many many instances of being blamed and experiencing others anger for being untrained. 

I have never experienced a workplace so toxic. If you interview here ask them their turn over, ask how long most people stay (it’s not more than a year), and then seriously think is every single person wrong? Or is CCX really the cesspool I’ve described (it is)

The ladies working at my store and other stores were fantastic, showed me the ropes, supportive and friendly. The customer's who come in whether they were new or a regular where good the majority of the time, sometimes some are standoffish but that comes the job. Training was good and I had all the tools I needed to succeed. Weekly games diary is irrelevant and not needed.
The area manager could be cold, distant and outright rude at times. I understand they are responsible for stores kpis, budgets, upkeep with store standards and micromanagement of their store managers, which btw is excessive and unnecessary, but that doesn't excuse how staff members are spoken too.
A typical day consists of knowing your sale targets, meeting your kpis, keeping the store clean, not too difficult, but you need to have customers in the store who are wanting to buy. No customers means no sales, a rant about not meeting kpis/$$ and a mind-numbing boring day. 
Hours are inconsistent, so don't expect anything permanent. They are OK with cutting shifts and reducing hours. They are also OK with cutting your shift in order to train someone else since wages are tight. They are OK with pressuring you to buying their lastest drops when you dont get many hours to begin with. If you choose to work here I'd advise to grab the continuity lines, and only some of the newer stuff, as it will go on sale and you will need to buy again.
Ultimately city chic are only concerned about $$ coming into the store, not whether the ladies who earn them those $$ are happy.

Pros
City Chic is very inclusive of everyone (young/old, non-binary etc). I've also had the pleasure of working with some great Sales Assistants, and some good store managers. And the staff discount is pretty good (when they're allowing it). You'll get 60% off your first item per week (only if you have worked that week), and 40% off after that.

Cons
The one thing I have noticed more than anything working for this company is the absurd amount of micromanagement. It's almost like they don't trust store managers to do their job - it's ridiculous. Store managers are constantly having to report to regionals every day and hour sometimes. Also, they're constantly watching you on the camera's instore. If they don't like something you're doing they'll call you and let you know. Say you were at the counter typing up your morning email (the morning email is for regionals to say what your target is and how you're going to achieve it), they'll call you and give you a verbal warning and tell you to stand at the front of the store.

Advice for management?
Be more confident in your store managers and allow them to do their job without extensive monitoring - you promoted them to store manager for a reason, they know what they're doing. 
Also, if you expect staff to buy and wear the latest fashion, KEEP the staff discount and don't change it/get rid of it just because of other factors such as the effects of COVID-19, or not meeting KPI's for only a week. It's really hard to keep up when you're charging us full price. You don't pay us enough so we can't exactly afford to be buying new clothes full price every week/fortnight.

Unfortunately, working at City Chic was an unpleasant experience for me. I was a Casual Retail Assistant and I was given a total 3 hours a week on average. It was never stated that the role would only require me to work 3 hours a week but that's what I got. As a result, I was getting paid roughly $40 a week after tax. With this in mind, I was required to buy their new stock to "advertise" the outfits every time we got new stock (even though an outfit costs roughly $150 WITH the staff discount). Whenever the ladies from head office would come in to see how our store was doing, we would get in trouble for not wearing their new (and expensive) items. I was constantly asked by my manager to stay back later than my shift (usually 1-2 hours) and I never got paid for the extra time and labor: just my usual $40 that week. Closing up shop took an hour as well so if you're rostered on until close, you're going to be staying back for an hour and not get paid for it. With that being said though, the things I enjoyed about working at City Chic were the lovely customers and the body positivity.

City Chic was always a great place for me to shop as a plus size woman. They made me feel confident and beautiful but behind that sales assistant is a pushy manager and an even more ridiculous regional.

We as employees must follow a procedure called GAMES. GAMES is pretty much a procedure that tries to get you (as a customer) to spend as much money as possible

We get emails at least every two hours updating us saying that we aren’t good enough and need to make more as a region.

We get calls from regionals saying why aren’t you making more money? Why is the store failing it must be your fault?

If you don’t make a certain amount of money a week the regionals will tell the manager to cut your shifts. If you don’t have a good relationship with your manager you will not get hours.

When you first get in it’s great! You get a minimum of 40% a week, you can win comps that the regionals throw & the work environment is great. But when it is low it is low.

Personally, I Wouldn’t recommend working here as sometimes it can be an unhappy environment with a ton of pressure.

Management holds you up to unrealistic targets of which you have no control over whether you can achieve them or not. 

Customer returns are taken off your KPIs even if you did not sell the product. 

Management send out regular emails ranking stores and staff members against each other. Including statements that your store is the lowest ranked in the country. 

No privacy from management or HR. Private details including contracts sent out to multiple recipients on numerous occasions. 

Minimum training and managers get irritated when asked questions. 

Contracts changed from casual to part time without my consent. When weekly pay was wrong was attacked for contacting payroll to query it. 

Whilst discount on clothes is good you are expected to wear the latest fashions all the time, usually dresses meaning you need to spend a lot to keep up.

Was never quite sure what my roster actually was as it was changed so regularly and would differ from the in store roster to the electronic roster.

I currently work for a nsw city chic store the management is s#!t .no hours  3 hours a week resulting in $77.00 if your up and kois are up you get more constant harassment about forcing customers to buy as much as possible  if someone returns something your stats get ruined and then you get in trouble upper  management  is wrose intimidation is where they thrive with a happy face and a caring smile they let you know that if you can't  perform your going to continue getting less hours to the point your not even on the roster anymore. And the other staff all want to throw you under the proverbial bus by creating lies or taking something out of context and lying about it to the RMs . If you have a problem  you are made feel like you are the problem and not the actual  problem you are made feel insignificant and  lower than dirt and that how you feel isn't important.

Working at City Chic: Company Overview and Reviews

City Chic

City Chic Ratings

Salary Satisfaction

Job Seeker Tools

Employer Tools

Browse

Stay Connected