Would you let your teen daughter take a job where she'd be by herself?

In My Humble Opinion
41

I personally know of a lady who owned a “quick store” in a good neighborhood, attached to her husbands business. Her store closed a few hours later than her husbands so her daughter would tend to the store BY HERSELF for those few hours (I think they closed at 9 during the summer) - she was smart and a good head on her shoulders.

She had one of those emergency alarm buttons installed and adopted the 2 person rule AFTER her daughter was assaulted. They had security cameras, but it didnt protect her daughter from being assaulted (not robbed, mind you). Lucky, there were police officers that would stop in from time to time and he happened to drop in that evening and arrested the man before something really really bad happened.

42

Coming at this from the other direction, if there’s ever a problem with ‘missing’ supplies or the register coming up wonky - there’s no one there to vouch for what your daughter is or isn’t doing.

Look, anyone working alone is, for practical purposes, managing the store. Unless they’re paying her a manager’s salary they shouldn’t be saddling her with a manager’s responsibilities. Part of learning one’s way in the workforce is learning what compensation is reasonable for one’s time and effort. Just because they’re paying her doesn’t mean it’s reasonable for them to ask her to do everything herself.

When to say “No” is an important lesson too.

43

I appreciate all the input. She hasn’t been called for an interview yet, so I’m going to tell her to count this one out and apply elsewhere.

I’d rather err on the side of caution than ignore my instincts and later regret it.

44

Another thing to be worried about (and this is one of the 800 reasons no one is allowed to work at my store by themselves), what if she were to cut herself (badly), or even slip on a wet spot and knock herself out on the corner of a table. Not that that wouldn’t happen with someone else around, but if she’s by herself there’s no one to call for help.
IMO it woulnd’t matter if she was a 28 year old man and had super ninja skills. Working all alone just isn’t a good idea. Ever.

Oh, another reason why there should always be another person around is so that someone can take care of the manager role if there’s an issue. When you work retail you get a lot of people that get mad for really odd reasons. If she’s by herself there’s she’s got no one to back her up. For example, when a customer comes in and wants a bowl of soup, but she doens’t want any of the broth or noodles, just a bowl of the chicken and she says no and the customer thows a fit, it’s nice to have a person that can walk over and ID themselves as a manager and also tell the person no.
oh and…
the “oh and’s” go on for a long time.
I assume the owner of that location doesn’t realize the manager is slipping out and leaving someone there all alone.

45

Pizza delivery is about a million times more dangerous than working in a store. I did it for a few years in college and I was shot at twice.

Also, none of the big chains will hire drivers unless they’re 18+.

46

That’s what I was going to say. Somebody misorders or miscounts, or flat out steals something, and the suspicion is going to fall on the teenager left alone there all the time. And not to say anything bad about the people involved, cause I obviously don’t know them. But thinking back about me personally, and most of my friends, lets just say it is probably a good thing we were never given sole responability for a register drawer.