No Extra Manpower or Wages but Expected to Do Regular Deep-cleaning
For those who aren’t aware, GAME is a major UK-based video game retailer. With the releases of the heavily anticipated Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and Doom Eternal, they are forcing their stores to stay open during the COVID-19 crisis. If that wasn’t already unreasonable, they are giving orders for regular deep-cleaning of the surfaces of the store, while somehow maintaining distance from others in times when they are busier than usual. It keeps on getting worse as we heard from employees that they were not given any additional manpower or wages to meet these outrageous demands.
One of the employees put it perfectly: “How we are meant to maintain cleaning standards and serve a greater volume of customers with no extra hours is something only possible in the imaginations of those in head office.”
These corporate moneymakers are probably sitting back in their multi-million dollar homes with zero knowledge of what it is like to work in these conditions. And guess what? No hand sanitizers provided. You need to buy and bring in those all for yourself (if you can even find one).
In an attempt to cut risks of spreading the virus, at least they allowed the stores to go cashless. With all transactions being done by card, less physical money has to be handled by the cashiers, which can be a very high-risk factor for contagion. Still, there is no excuse for forcing their stores to stay open.
Ironically, this comes days after New Horizons’ producer Hisashi Nogami said that he hoped the game will be used by the fans “as an escape” during such difficult times. Now, the game might be putting people at risk. Of course, he probably expected people to be sane and download the thing digitally.
Only excuse I can maybe see for going out to buy the game is that your internet is not working, and you need to buy the game to pass the time in isolation. If you got a good internet, and you went out to buy the game, shame on you. Seriously, I don’t care if you are a collector. You can wait or just suck it up and buy the online version. Don’t be selfish and put others at risk.
Source: Eurogamer