Is Walgreens flexible?

[purpleorchid]

i just got hired for walgreens as a pharmacy tech but i havent had my first day yet. i was wondering how flexible walgreens is when you need a certain day off or you cant come in until a certain time due to an appointment. will they accommodate me if i tell them ahead of time that i cannot work a certain day? i told them that i am flexible with my schedule. i will most likely start out as a part timer. will i get sick days? vacations? how soon will i be able to? i'd like to take a trip to europe for two weeks in the future (as soon as this coming summer) and i wonder if they would allow me to. i dont expect a paid vacation unless i'm full time but i'd like to be able to take time off like twice a year to travel for a few days. can someone also breakdown what the benefits are between part time and full time techs? i live in san francisco, california.

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[ravingrabbid]

First off, welcome to SDN. Since you're from SF, I am assuming that you're working as a floater tech so,

Walgreens is not too lenient/flexible with requesting emergency days off, particularly if you've just started (as a floater anyway). If you have an appointment or whatever then let the scheduler know ASAP. They prefer that for vacations, you let them know, I dunno, five months ahead of time or something stupid like that.

Your sick days begin to accumulate right away, actually I think it's in terms of hours that you work. When I left, I think I only had three full sick days but whatever. Paid vacations start building up once you've worked for the company for at least twelve months - I don't think it matters whether or not you're full time or part-time (I started as a PT floater and then moved on to FT floating). So after a year, you get five days of paid vacation but you can still take a month off - you'll just get paid for only five days.

And if you weren't already informed, you have to join the union so that you can get insurance and stuff. Since you just started you'll probably be on probation for 30-60 days (I forget the actual time period) during which you can't get insurance anyway (it doesn't kick in until being employed for 90 days). The union will take your money after your probationary period is over, I think.

Last of all, the benefits of working PT vs FT: the only benefit is more time to yourself to get stuff done but since you stated that you're flexible, they may just schedule you FT (unless of course, you have a store). The sucky part about working PT is that as a floater, you have to work weekends.

Hope this helps