crew member

shift leader

assistant manager

general manager

cleaning technician

Taco Time NW

Taco Time NW is an amazing first job. They have valuable paid training and helpful managers. The work environment is friendly, supportive, and customer-oriented. You get to select your available hours and request days off. I have never had any of my requested days off rejected. You can also view your paycheck stubs on an app called PayChex Flex. They pay you biweekly/every two weeks or so. Taco Time NW offers amazing benefits such as 50% discount on meals, paid 10 minute breaks, and has bonuses for referring other employees (STAR Referral Program) who get hired and perfect attendance. I highly recommend this place if you are looking for a place to begin and grow.
While Taco Time NW is a good place to work, there are a few cons. They will pay for 10 minute breaks, but don’t pay for 30 minute breaks. That doesn’t leave much time to go anywhere but Town & Country across the street. There is also low pay: minimum wage ($15.74). Before minimum wage increased in 2023, I received $14.49. There is also a lack of technology. You have to go in-person to see the paper-back schedule and fill out physical forms for requesting days off. You can not view the schedule or request days off online. The last con is there is not a formal tip jar and no option when customers pay to leave a tip. So, employees barely make any tips. The most I’ve gotten for one day is $5. Most of the time, I get nothing.

Right after you arrive, you stock the condiment bar, fill all of the ice bins, break down and take boxes to the garbage, and take out the trash so that you are prepared for rushes during the day. Throughout a shift, you ring out customers on the cash register, or take orders in the drive-thru, or make food on the line. I learned a lot about customer service; I learned things that I still carry with me today. A majority of those lessons were about how to treat people working with the public because I have first-hand experience of what it's like to be on the other end of it all. I learned about patience. I was taught how to be quick while still paying attention to detail. My coworkers were amazing. All of our personalities coincided incredibly well and the environment was positive and uplifting. The managers and owners were so nice and caring. Working for them was a pleasure. The most difficult part of the job was during rushes when, no matter whether you were working at the counter, on the line, or in the drive thru, there was a constant flow of customers and instincts and muscle memory had to kick in in order for everything to go smoothly. Overall, I would say that Taco Time is a wonderful place to work, especially if it is your first job or first time working in customer service.

What I Learned:
I learned so much through my co-workers and my other managers!. Starting with how others learn how to work, that helped me a lot when I moved into management as far as placing people in positions and how much I could rely on them to perform multiple tasks on one shift. Learning how others learn to work opened my eyes and helped me realize that not everyone can work at a pace that I can and I was able to understand them at their level which made them comfortable to come to me when they stumbled on some struggles and I could show them many different ways of doing one task to help them find what worked best for them!

Management:
I enjoyed being a manager, I appreciated and had new things to learn every day. I got to know how to run the floor and the insides of our company as to how things worked from the office  ( from ordering stock - paper work- to how to better handle situations.) I was able to look at our company from a different perspective and always thinking positively to help others and come up with ways around the restaurant to show how much we do appreciate everyone of our co-workers and each other in management.

Most Enjoyable:
Was seeing others achieve their goals in the company and watching them grow into strong workers!.

A typical work day consist of me showing up and counting into my Drive Thru til. Then after that in consist of me evaluating what needs to be done and whats going on. If they're are customers coming through then I must take there order, collect on that order had out food and as well as greet them and say thank you. When i start i must perform all the these functions at once. For instance I speaker, meaning i take the person currenty in the drive thru order. Then  I wait for them to pull up to the window, if someone else comes through I must also take there order while greeting the person who just order and as well as collect there money all at the same time. After customers stop showing up i must stock and assit where I'm need whither it be cleaing the disses in the back stocking my area or doing any form of prep. Throughout the day I mingle and make jokes with my co workers to keep the day a float and enjoy so it isn't so humdrum. The hardest part of job would be having to do so many things at one time that you can't do everything at once.

Decided to leave because I wasn't getting the training I needed even though it had been discussed several times with my manager there that I would be retrained on things since at the time of my hiring I was also hired with a few other people so I wasn't trained the best. Was constantly under a lot of pressure or else I would be snapped at for screwing up the simplest things. Was gaslit by a manager into trying to change my schedule back after I said I couldn't work late closings because they wanted to keep they amount of hours they were getting. Manager continuously brought her home life and marital drama to work and it effected everyone there negatively. I would say it was beneficial by exposing me to how a real job could be but at the same time I got a new (and better) job and it has way less of the stuff I had to deal with working here. Basically expect to be put under the pressure of a manager in a crew member position & be able to deal with personal drama there if you actually consider working here.

They claim to promote from within, but more often than not when a management position opens up, they do an outside hire.
The upper level management staff (district and above) only care about the bottom line and will micro-manage your store to death.
Labor goals are unrealistic, unreasonable, and unachievable, leaving everyone exhausted, miserable, and behind on work.
Constantly understaffed and under time crunches.
No support from District Manager and up, unless it's to tell us what we're doing wrong.
Reducing the amount of what goes in a taco (ie beef, cheese, etc) and raising the price.
Ideas of unionization met with threats of termination.
Random rotation schedules with 3on-2off-1on-1off and the like.
No vacation or insurance for part-time employees.
Little opportunity to go full-time.
401k with no matching donation, unless management.
Oh, and ants. Upper management refuses to deal with ant infestation.

My coworkers were great people and very respectful, I learned a lot there and am glad I had that experience. However, staffing was usually very light and at the beginning, I wasn't usually taught how to do things properly. I did some of the essential training in the dining room, on a laptop near customers, then thrown in the back to do things I didn't watch and just had to pick up. Then I'd get told how I wasn't doing things right or fast enough, instead of being shown how to improve properly. Then you get different managers that like different things and it gets so much more frustrating. Especially while closing, took me a month to get proper instructions so I could close on time. I did love the free food, 3x a week at corp. locations and a discount.  I took a lot of skills and now apply it to other parts of my life(stress management, multitasking, etc.) but I had some frustrations as well.

The food is really great and some of the people there are top notch. 
The pay is better than average.

That said...
There are WAY to many "leaders" compared to regular crew, which results in severely cut hours for regular crew members. There also is a severe discrepancy in how to perform tasks, no clear or consistent training in daily tasks, the result being an employee unsure on the correct way to perform said tasks. 
 
 Extremely "clique-ish". Gossip and office politics seem to matter more than a good work ethic and the desire to actually accomplish a successful shift or set up the next shift for success. Some basic but highly necessary shift tasks are shirked with the idea of "I don't want to do this so I'll drag my feet and the next shift can take care of it".

These points make for a very frustrating and overly stressful work environment, much more than it should be.

The companies higher ups and managers are great. A good local company. They accommodate your schedule and are fairly flexible. With that being said, it is a lot of work. You arrive 6/7am prior to the store opening at 10am to prep everything.. vegetables all hand cut, sauces, cooking chicken and beef ect. For me it felt like work before work. As if you were working at a sit down resturant, you'd be the prep cook, cook, and server. Everything is made fresh which is great, but again just a lot of work. They do pay a higher hourly wage vs other fast food, but that is because of the workload and no OT (rarely). Again other fast food pays less, but if you're willing to work OT you'll  make a lot more elsewhere. The Hourly pay times 38/40 hours isn't a liveable wage, OT would make it worth it but they purposely pay higher to avoided OT, which is understandable. It's a good company but you can make more money with equal work or less, or about the same with less work elsewhere. 

This company is run by truly nice people. They keep trying to promote me to manager, but I'm not about that extra responsibility, and they respect that I want to stay where I am.
I work between 36-39 hours a week, get a group rate for my health insurance, and the company pays most of that. I even get paid time off (but I've never used it).
Even as a regular, full-time employee, schedules can be flexible if I would like to work different times or days. 
The guests are amazing. All I have to do is smile and sincerely deal with their orders, and it makes their day. The happiness can be contagious. 
That being said, it does get a little stressful, sometimes. If we're short staffed, or have a lot of trainees on the crew, it stretches us thin and drags our order times. Not only upsetting some guests, but rushing everyone else. It all usually works out, but it's starting to feel more common thear last few months.
Overall, nice place to work, with nice people. And if you can handle stress well, it's a perfect place of employment.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Crew member 471 salaries reported	$19.11 per hour
Shift leader 127 salaries reported	$24.35 per hour
Assistant manager 56 salaries reported	$27.45 per hour
General manager 15 salaries reported	$33.17 per hour
Cleaning technician 7 salaries reported	$26.52 per hour

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