I applied through a recruiter. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at City Holdings (Southampton, England) in Jan 2025
Interview
I was called by a recruiter who had seen my CV on a jobsite and asked if I was interested in this role, explained it was 90% wfh and was slightly more money than what I was on.
organised a teams call with the hiring manager who then told me its 99% travel to stores and not really WFH. Ok fine, no worries.
Went to oragnise a 2nd interview and told the recruitment team I could do any day apart from Friday, she then emails me offering me friday, ok, moved a few bits about and then replies that we cant do this friday anymore lets do next. Ok no worries, these things happen!
Got to the interview at the M&S store and spent half hour or so walking around spotting any issues in the store.
We then sat down and was asked my top 5 issues in the store and a few other questions.
I then had an oppertunity to ask any questions, so i asked more about the role and how M&S work in comparison to my current role.
He explained the role needed to be flexible as plenty of out of hour calls which I knew about so no problem. I then asked about hours (advertised at 40 hours) and he said that I would probably be working much more than 40 hours, with no overtime pay or time in leiu at all.
I thought for a family company a good work life balance would have been a priority but seems that I would have been working 50-60 maybe more hours for free.
2 days later had an email suggesting the role was not for me (guessing due to my questions about hours) However I would have declined the role anyway
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
top 5 issues in this store
How to deal with staff causing issues
It was quite a smooth process until they asked a red flag question. They seemed quite surprised when I told them I work 8 hours.It seems like they work more than 8 hours every day. It definitely a red flag for me.