A young chef fired by her boss for using her phone for “four hours” during her shift says she should have been told to do more work.
Sophie Alcock, 20, claims that she went to work on July 6 and told her former boss at Toast, in Withington, Manchester that she may be “distracted” because she was receiving her degree results.
So furious about being fired after just two weeks, Sophie filmed herself informing cafe owner Matt, that she’s told everyone not to visit so that his business “suffers”.
The next day the history student heard a “rumour” from another employee that she was getting the sack because of her “attitude”, reports MailOnline.
To find out if the rumour was true she emailed Matt who replied to inform her she was “no longer required to work at Toast”.
The next day Sophie confronted Matt while secretly filming the moment he fired her, as he claimed she had been on the for “four hours”.
Sophie claims however she has evidence that she wasn’t on her phone for that long. She said: “I was on my phone for two hours and 50 minutes for the entire day and it was mostly before and after my shift.
“I was on it for about an hour, 10 to 15 minutes every so often and I took two breaks to go outside.
“If I was on my phone in the kitchen, there were no orders.”
She did admit to being on her phone a lot during work, saying it was only for “around an hour” throughout her nine-hour shift and also took two 10-minute breaks to eat and check to see if her results had been announced.
Admitting her shift had been “not perfect” and she “could have performed better”, Sophie says her exam results were “extenuating circumstances” and argues it could have been communicated better that her boss “wanted her to do more work”.
Sophie added: “If I’d done a not optimal day of work, he should have told me and not fired me out of the blue because of one day of work which was a really stressful day.”
In the recording, Sophie is heard threatening that “most of the people” she has served are friends of hers who will “no longer be coming to his business” – before adding that she “really hopes he suffers”.
Despite discovering that she’d achieved a first-class degree, Sophie said the moment was “overshadowed by being fired”.
Confirming that Sophie no longer works for them, Toast declined to outline “the reasons” – instead offering for her to get in contact with them if she would like to discuss it further and wishing her well for the future.
A spokesperson at Toast said: “Toast employed Sophie for two weeks over June/July and we are very sorry to hear that she is unhappy about her time working with us.
“We do not wish to breach the confidentiality of the employment relationship between Toast and Sophie by responding in detail to the reasons she is no longer employed by us.
“Over our six years as an independent high street café we have striven for a great atmosphere for customers and staff alike, but accept that this has not been Sophie’s experience.
“We have made contact to see if she would like to discuss her concerns further and we are taking on board her views and reviewing improvements we can make. Sophie is being paid for the hours she worked. We wish her well in the future.”
