ONIVERSE reviews

Please take 3 minutes to read my review, people need to know. I don't know why I waited so long to do this. Before listing all the cons I would like to speak out about what happened to me and my colleague during the sales season at Bond Street store. My 2 phones and her phone and money were stolen. A guy entered the shop, went upstairs, entered the staff area and went straight to the kitchen. He got our staff and left. No one noticed because the store was busy. Leaving the fact that the police did a useless job and gave me no justice, the company did not pay me back for anything. All the stress and injustice I had to experience in my workplace. They blamed us because we did not lock our lockers (no one had lockers) and they said they do not have insurance for stolen objects. But the fact and the flagship store of London doesn't have a private code to access the staff area is fine, the fact that all of that happened under their watch is fine, it was just our fault and "they were sorry for what happened". The things stolen were worth around £1700, money the company earns in less than one hour. They just did not want to pay us back. This is how much they care about their employees. I have never felt so violated in my life. I did not sue them because they are a big company and I was just a 24-year-old girl working as a sales assistant. But I will never forget that. After that, they also asked me to do another event with the embroidery machine (I explain this later on) and I refused because they would not pay me to do that. All the other cons: very basic salary for the hours done and the stress they cause you on the shop floor if you don't sell. Very poor management from the Head Office, Intimissimi doesn't know what transparency means. They lie to the employees about bonuses and job promotions. I can make examples: I did events at the Bond Street store, King's Road Store and Tezenis Store, using the embroidery machine to customise customers' lingerie. They earned more money thanks to that, but I did the job for free. I was the embroidery specialist of the store but still a "sales assistant" in the contract. I have never been given anything for what I have done, on the contrary, their excuse was "You have to thank us because we allowed you to do the events". Another example: my colleague was also a sales assistant. She became the visual merchandiser of the store, never been paid for what she did in one year, they kept her "sales assistant" contract, because it was an "experiment" (that took almost one year). After we left, a colleague of ours became visual merchandiser because the role had been "officialised". She still has no contract, and now they are telling her to become a key-holder, just to cover up the mess. Another friend of mine is a key holder but also a visual merchandiser now. No contract changes. I could go on and on, on the way they exploit their staff and make you feel guilty when you speak up for your rights. They always hide the problems instead of trying to solve them with the team, and if they don't like you they make your life impossible until you leave. I have seen a lot of surreal things happening during my year there.

You are a literal slave once you sign your contract! DSM is expected to work 6 days a week always! You are told in interview it’s a lot of work but nothing outside the normal DSM role—somehow that translates to 12 hour in store work days plus sending emails 4 times a day everyday except Sunday. So at 10pm you are expected to have your phone ready and be communicating with stores...there is no way around it, you could be at a dinner, sick, sleeping you better have your phone or else your in trouble. You are in store 6 days 80% of the time, when someone says you work roughly 40 hours a normal DSM will take it as ok I will be working around 45-48 not 65 hours. It’s always brought back to the fact that you’re a salaried manager, there is no balance at all and it destroys your personal life if you’re able to even have one. You are staying in store to sell, you can complete your objectives and still you need to be there to sell the product and help the team. This is why you loose good store managers because you are in turn taking a way all leadership abilities and control from them and making the DSM the store manager so they leave. Quality people like to do their jobs not be micro managed. The company talks about being very female centric in the work place but have heard about brand mangers from calzedonia specifically questioning wether a candidate has a family because that will make it hard for them to work. How can you say you are a company with great work life balance and then have employees worked to death every week. They speak about the turnover and how it’s not like this in Europe etc but maybe they need to realize you’re in the US now and it’s different and the way you treat your employees and staff are all the reasons behind the turn over! The Europeans are the reason for the turn! HR is very nice but have zero control and can’t make any difference or do their job because it is always the Europeans way that prevails but then the US leaders are blamed when we have high turn and the employees feel abandoned and helpless. If you want to work for a company with great product but a dismal outlook for your life it is the company for you! If you are looking to do your job to the fullest and still be able to have a life outside of work—this isn’t the work place for you. Maybe if you are looking to become a DSM for your resume give it a try but don’t expect to be able to do this long term, it’s not physically possible.