Burlington — Local services in Newark

It seems that no matter what Burlington I visit, there is always a line, and not just a normal line, a line that snakes and wraps around egregiously. This was my first time visiting this location(Newark, NJ), and it was just like any other Burlington, 2-3 registers open, the line as long as a football field. I literally waited on line for about an hour, how do I know this? I had to pay for parking, and I paid enough to park for an hour, by the time I got back to my car, I literally had 2 minutes before my time expired. There was I want to say 2 actual cashiers working, it was hard to tell because only one cashier had their light on, and that was register 13, I didn't get the young kids name, but he seemed to be the only one moving with any sense of urgency. There was a young lady on the first register, who didn't seem to want to be too bothered with anybody, she was literally berating the customers for not taking the clothes off the hangers, one of the customers didn't speak English, which only further frustrated the cashier, there was a male manager with glasses organizing hangers, yes literally organizing hangers, nevermind the length of the line, there was another female manager, she rang up I want to say 2 customers and then proceeded to call tech support about a few register issues, a legitimate reason, but given that there wasn't enough people to work the registers as is, it really didn't make much of a difference whether the registers she was calling in about were working or not. I went to the one on Morris Avenue in Union, NJ and low and behold it was the same thing. Lines were ridiculous, if I didn't really want to buy the candles I found for my wife I would've walked out like the 7 other people that walked out when they walked in and saw how long the line was. I went to the one in Elizabeth, NJ and the same thing. I worked at Burlington years ago, and it was bad, but never this bad, and when it was, the managers called all departments to come open up registers and help clear the line. What happened to that SOP(Standard Operating Principle)? You don't offer self checkout, which I can understand due to the rise in retail theft, I get it, but this is ridiculous. It's to a point where I avoid going into any Burlington now unless there is no other option, which is saddening because you carry nice things, but when you have to wait an hour or more to checkout after spending just as much time shopping, the ends don't...

Do not go to this location if you plan on doing a huge shopping haul and have many items to take to the fitting room. I approached the fitting room with about 20 items. I asked the fitting room associate what the limit was and where I could put my additional items I was not bring in at the time. I explained to her that I had other items that didn’t need to brought in like bath products but didn’t want anyone going though my cart because it was super busy. The associate gave me the green light to leave my cart along the wall just before the fitting room. About 20 minutes later The “Loss Prevention” associate appeared and shortly after a male police officer came banging on my fitting room door to tell me that the “Loss Prevention” associate said I was in there for a long time and wanted to know what was going on. I have never felt so violated in a fitting room in my entire life. I was taking in 6 items at a time and handing items back to the fitting room associate and placing items I wanted in the bottom half of the cart which was in visible site for all associates outside the fitting room, which can be corroborated through CCTV. This situation could have easily been avoided had this “Loss Prevention” associate spoke to the associates that were working the fitting rooms or even waited for me to walk out the fitting room and observe my behaviour. She appeared to have been doing her rounds and incorrectly assessed the situation. Nonetheless I was embarrassed and felt...

Having long waits to check-out seems to be a business standard at all your locations, I waited a little over a half hour to check-out, this was around 4:30pm. The end of the line was back by the fitting rooms almost to the back of the store.

This is a new location and you put in 10 registers yet was only operating 5, I spoke to management and was told that more people would be coming in yet only one additional register was opened. (I also asked management if they were hiring, they were not so I don't see this changing in the near future) They wrapped the line backwards so instead of moving in the direction of the doors to exit you ended up in the middle of the store and had to maneuver around the long check-out line to get to the front door.

Additionally the escalator going down into the lower level was broken. They closed the fitting rooms around 4:30pm.

And finally management blocked two Isles in the lower level with racks from another area to mop the floor, isn't that what an overnight shift is for? This was poor decision making.

Clearly you need more staff at your locations but corporates lack of addressing this shows us you don't care about the customer experience, profit over people. The customer will continue to patronize your stores for the reasonably priced items so there is no reason to care about the overall customer experience.

I will say that the staff was friendly, helpful and courteous so my three stars are for them...