Office Depot Employee Reviews

2.0

Solutions Advisor (Current Employee)

11.10.2022, Job Location: North Carolina

The job is easy most of the time, and most customers aren’t bad. This is a tech supervisor position, but you don’t actually do much tech work as it’s sent off to another company to remote in to the customer’s computer and do the work.

Expect to have to call their tech support almost every time you have them do work on a customer’s computer, as something will always go wrong with their connection or they just don’t finish the work for some reason. Part of your duties is also being in the print department, mainly as backup for when it gets busy over there, and eventually being able to run a full shift in that department because they don’t want to hire more staff.

The main part of your duties involves being cashier when needed, stocking shelves, helping customers find items or help with what type of printer or computer they should buy, and returning items where they belong. The worst part is being constantly badgered to get reward signups.

They want you to be pushy with it and act like it’s your fault for not getting lots of people to sign up even though it’s up to the customers to decide. They will also bug you about getting donations. If a self-serve printer or register is broken it will take them forever to get it fixed. Don't expect to make much working here, but you do get a surprising amount of PTO for full time workers (almost nothing for part timers though).

TLDR:
Mostly easy work, will be bugged about reward signups and donations, you’re expected to work many types of positions, low pay but good PTO for full time workers, and always understaffed.

1.0

Customer Service Specialist (Former Employee) - - September 16, 2022

16.9.2022, Job Location: Saint Louis, MO

A typical workday was stressful, filled with unreasonable expectations of upper-management/corporate management, and insane customer-service demands for absolutely no dignifying pay.

Depending on what position I was in determined what a "typical day" was.

A typical day as a cashier, I just did normal cashiering stuff, and I was told that this was the most important "first and last" point of contact with the customer.

A typical day on the sales floor was helping people find exactly what they were looking for, and if it wasn't in store, then you had to help them find it online.

A typical day in freight is running around like a chicken without a head trying to get everything done within a set time frame, with only two people, and still having to break away to help customers.

A typical day in the copy and print department is assisting people with laminating, printing, faxing, etc. The workload, in my opinion, was untenable at first until they overhauled their systems.

I learned the only thing that matters is money and that if you are not a full-time employee, you are absolutely expendable and you will be chewed up.

Middle-Management is variable and literally depends on the individual. Upper-management is laughable and puts insane expectations onto people, but I highly doubt any of those people in upper-management have ever actually had to do the work that their store employees do.

Workplace culture is abysmal. Very little room for advancement, no room for decent pay, and that the gender pay-gap is real.

Although "the hardest part of the job" is subjective, I would say objectively it is meeting the demands of people in the copy and print department, although at this point there is more of a coherent order to things, but still ridiculous with the amount of steps you must take to ensure that things can be completed.

If you mean physically demanding, then it would be lifting heavy items (like a chair), and carrying it up a ladder and putting it into top-stock.

If you mean the mentally hardest part of the job, it's knowing that you're not being compensated properly at all and that you have ridiculous standards to uphold within the company.

The most enjoyable part of working at Office Depot was literally the several co-workers and few managers that made things worthwhile.

Overall, I would NOT recommend working at Office Depot unless you literally have no other options, you are a full-time employee, or you are a college or high school age person that doesn't need to take working as seriously.

Even then, Office Depot needs a serious overhaul.

1.0

Solutions Advisor (Current Employee)

27.8.2022, Job Location: San Antonio, TX

Office Depot really isn’t the best place to work. It was ok starting for only starting but that’s kinda it. 2 or so years ago the company REMOVED multiple positions making many people losing their job or relocating to another Office Depot.
They used to have employee commissions and incentives, not good ones but they quickly took those away at the same time the positions were removed thus providing nothing to employees working there to do “better”.

Tech services are half baked and are basically a scam for the most part. Just having basic tech knowledge is enough for them, trying to fix computers in any way for what feels like more than 5 min is considered a waste of time and you’ll be told to leave it and do something else. If you couldn’t properly do the service for somethings, like a factory restore that popped up an error constantly, some managers WILL tell you to NOT refund the customer if that happens.

Working at a fairly busy locations the typical busy day is actually bad. Customers that go to Office Depot seem to forget all forms of common sense and are especially lazy, always ready to complain, and will want a manager over the smallest stuff (like a coupon not working on something it states it doesn’t work for) While this doesn’t apply to all customers, a large majority of them are like this. While it’s a retail store and problematic people are everywhere in retail, it just seems especially bad when they are in Office Depot.

Because of the axed positions they basically made it so nearly all employees MUST learn all departments of the store. Which would be Cashier, Logistics, Copy and Print, Tech, Sales Floor, both in person and on phone customer service, and Furniture. All for the reason of not being able to say that you can’t help the customer, however this works against itself as they provide you no proper training. They actually DO NOT set aside time for you to do so and it’s learned on the go, but because there are so many spots you’ll be placed at you won’t be able to really practice that part of the job enough realistically. Then you’ll be questioned why you’re not able to do the job despite all that.

In my case I was blamed for not getting tech bundles and I wasn't even part of those computer sales. Then I was told to either do better or step down, get paid less and get less hours, or do a review process that can lead to termination for continuing to “under perform”. It’s pretty ridiculous to be blamed for something that’s not in your control like that.

2.0

Store Sales Manager (Current Employee)

4.8.2022, Job Location: Beachwood, OH

When faced with a management shortage at one store (literally half the management staff positions were either open for hire or out on extended medical leave), the district management decided that they could not offer help to the store even for a day or two a week.

At the same time, they expected the remaining management staff to be able to complete ALL of the management tasks of ALL of the managers including those who were not currently working and to have the tasks ALL completed at a high level of performance. The result was that the remaining management staff worked 50-60 hours a week and suffered nothing but complaints from higher management because of store conditions or missed tasks. Never have I ever experienced a situation where all of the remaining management staff wanted to find new jobs so as to leave until this situation appeared.

The complete lack of concern about how the decision would impact store conditions showed that they didn't care about the store/business. The complete lack of concern about how the decision would impact the physical and mental health of the remaining managers showed that they didn't care about their employees. In short, they don't care!

1.0

Copy and Print Services Associate (Former Employee)

9.6.2022, Job Location: Kansas City

Managers and coworkers were all friendly and helpful, probably the only good part of the job.

Working as a cashier was fine, could be boring at times and you have to push rewards and upsell items which is typical. I believe they have gotten rid of the ink subscription program since when I was there, but that was a horrible service to sell.

The real problem is the print center, where you are overworked and face the worst customers in the store. Often it will just be you at the counter juggling 2-3+ customers in line + all the jobs sitting in the queue. Many customers can be EXTREMELY impatient and demanding. Many want design services, which can be done through a complicated system outsourcing the job to another department outside of your store, but the work produced is rarely up to standard + customers rarely will want to pay the price of that design work. Self-serve printing is meant to reduce work but you often have to nudge customers in that direction and then hold their hand through the whole process anyway because they don't want to learn how to use it.

Also, bulk orders are sent to a regional print center and meant to be shipped by a certain deadline back to the customer, and many of those orders when I left were late and wrong and now you are the face of that issue at the store even though it is out of your hands.

You will get a lunch break but you will never get other mandated breaks.

Managers WILL help you at the print center when it gets busy, which is appreciated and does help, but the issues presented still stand.

2.0

Print Specialist (Current Employee)

15.5.2022, Job Location: Newville, PA

I enjoy my job for the most part. Once Covid started everything went downhill from there. Management doesn’t seem to exist anymore. Employees basically do what they want when they want and if they don’t want to do something they simply don’t do it. They show up when they feel like it and some show up high.

The training program doesn’t exist anymore so most new people are thrown into whatever job they are doing with little to no training, and we wonder why we have so many mistakes and have to do jobs over all the time.

I’ve talked to management about these issues over and over. They say they agree and understand and see it. Honestly a lot of this is fixable, if they would attempt to fix the little things it would make the world of difference. But nothing ever seems to change and things are only getting worse.

1.0

Sales Advisor (Current Employee)

6.5.2022, Job Location: Steubenville, OH

Do you like to work hard, be harassed by customers, and treated like garbage from managers? Office Max is for you! This amazing work environment will fill your day with gaslighting, lazy managers that hide from customers and push their work on to you, and carrying 3x the workload while your coworkers get paid the same as you to wipe off counters and sweep.

This company will drain you of all your energy, leave you feeling not only physically but mentally drained too. Do you like a job where a General Manager works 10 hours a week and gets triple your pay? Again, Office Max is for you! As someone who loves technology I immediately turned away from it while working here. The wonderful feeling of walking into work and being told "get those rewards signups!" while all of the management refuses to pull their on weight. I have wasted almost a year and a half of my life working at this place and I am seriously looking forward to getting out and never coming back (even as a customer).

This place is nothing but a cesspool of entitled retired people, corrupt management that want you to work for them, and a general manager that only comes in to sit in his office and put together a meaningless schedule. There are so many different places that I recommended you work at, and do not make the same mistake as I did. Never again will I allow myself to be taken advantage of again like I did with this company.

Do not work here.

2.0

Sales Associate (Former Employee)

21.4.2022, Job Location: Rosedale, MD

Since it was my first job being 19 at the time (two years ago), I was pretty naive and didn't know what to expect so I came in with an open mind ready to learn. I did enjoy it at the beginning.

I worked as a sales associate stocking shelves, helping customers, and whatnot. But after some time, maybe because we lost some people I was switched to the cashier and learned it for a week which was a nice learning experience. Then I noticed when I came in I stopped doing my main job all together which was pretty annoying. But at least the cashier work day was slow sometimes which personally was nice. After a while though I just couldn't take it anymore, unfortunately.

They had me working as the cashier which I wasn't that fond of, I also while checking customers out I had to answer the phone and answer complicated questions that couldn've easily been googled, while there's people asking questions where the ink isle is at and that I'm taking too long checking items at while I'm on the phone. I felt as though with all that I was going through, I wasn't appreciated enough. Not to mention I was always meeting the quota for the sign ups that I've forgotten the specific name of but it is what it is.

TLDR;
Decent pay for someone out of high school. Realized we were pretty understaffed after a while, didn't enjoy it, got overworked, didn't feel appreciated. They also care a lot about their sign ups/sales metric. If its too low they "re-train" you and if you're still under performing, probably fired after that. There was a time I was supposed to but I didn't because there was barely anyone else we had to work with lol

5.0

Senior Sales Consultant - Technology Supervisor (Former Employee)

2.4.2022, Job Location: Sacramento, CA

I started working in OfficeMax right in the middle of the merger with Office Depot, so I had the pleasure of learning from the best parts of both companies and was proud to see the merged company improve over the years. The manager who hired me was the best!

She brought doughnuts every Friday and often did morning hype events to get us excited to work. Managers often bought pizzas to reward us for working hard. There was never a boring moment. I started out as a cashier and shortly moved into working on the floor. After close to three years of exceeding sales quotas, my manager advised me to move up the company and gave me a recommendation for an opportunity at a nearby Office Depot store where I supervised the Technology department and trained new employees.

My favorite part of the job was helping customers take care of business! I worked mainly as a tech and got certified to perform PC and Smartphone repairs. I also learned a lot about paper and marketing from helping the Copy Center and got certified to perform digital printing and copy services. My least favorite part of the job was moving heavy boxes, but teamwork made the dream work and the guys at the Furniture department taught me safe lifting procedures.

Stores have more products and provide more services than most people know so it was great to learn about everything Office Depot offers. I also went to college during my time working at Office Depot and the company was extremely flexible with my school schedule. And the employee discounts are amazing!

1.0

Client Engagement Manager (Former Employee)

24.1.2022, Job Location: Lexington, KY

Used to be an interesting and rewarding place to work, but became too demanding and demeaning as the company struggles to keep its head above water. Expectations for meeting/exceeding goals (sales, loyalty, services, etc.) are unrealistic in most markets as the company becomes less relevant in today’s retail environment.

Store-level management are frequently documented or terminated for failure to meet goals that are out of their control.

District managers are manipulative and push dishonest sales techniques. Everything is focused on driving up the bottom line. You will be expected to cross-train and perform duties beyond your job description, despite being paid far less than is fair for the single role you were hired to perform, and less than you can find at virtually any other major retailer these days.

1.0

Machine Operator (Former Employee)

1.11.2021, Job Location: Buford, GA

There’s new management and they don’t care about the employees. They want you to work every weekend. No motivation and low morale. When I started I was in stocking. I was trained the right way in that department. Then management switched I got moved to put away.

They didn’t train me anything, just threw me to the wolves. They brought in temps because we were under staffed, and they made $7.00 more than we did. They said it’s because temps don’t get benefits. But we pay for the benefits and they are a terrible. Management worries about the employees instead of fixing the issues the warehouse has, like the unsafe conditions.

Company hasn’t gave out bonuses in 3 years. We’ve worked every weekend since June and when they hire you they say the barely work weekends. This job is a joke.

3.0

Sales Advisor (Current Employee)

4.10.2021, Job Location: Conyers, GA

Recently I became sick and needed time off to rest and get well but like most work places, management didn’t care. I was told I had to be there regardless or I’d potentially lose my job. It really just put a sour taste in my mouth but I went to work because I need my job.

Also, I was recently told by a manager that we would’ve been at “war” if we didn’t have a civil conversation about why I hadn’t returned his text. Mind you, we are told not to text managers regarding our schedule, and that everything had to be done over a phone call with the store number (instead of a personal phone).

My overall experience with them wasn’t all bad but recent interactions with management definitely has me looking elsewhere. I’m not sure about how I feel about moving forward with this company.

3.0

Sales Associate (Current Employee)

5.9.2021, Job Location: Volusia County, FL

I generally enjoy working here. It’s not a bad retail job, as retail jobs go. Pretty laid back except for constant pressure about customer rewards sign-ups and fundraisers. If you take some initiative and do things consistently without being told, you can have a pretty chill day apart from occasional negative interactions with customers.

I think the “customer is always right” philosophy is wrong and has created monsters out of shoppers. About half the shoppers are old - really old - like ‘how did you even get out of your bed’ old. The majority of customers are for copy/print asking for things to be printed off of smart phones they haven’t a clue how to use.

The self service printers are really, “I demand someone come and help me,” printers. But, employees stick together here and support each other. No gossip or backstabbing. Mostly only smart people work there.

2.0

Sales Associate (Former Employee)

4.8.2021, Job Location: Severna Park, MD

I worked for this company for the better part of 4 years and in that time I never made more than 11.44$ an hour, and even then that was only after my state raised minimum wage twice and performance review raises were applied. My store was was chronically understaffed to the point where there were several month spans where I was the only employee in my department (Copy and Print) that needed 3 people minimum and more than once my department had no direct manager due to poor hiring.

I was offered management positions multiple times but only during those same periods where I was the department’s sole employee so the gesture felt very hallow as I’d be given more responsibility with no additional support. This felt like a last resort, not a choice made with the company’s best interests in mind. Turnover was extremely high and management regularly did not release the coming week’s schedule until the day before so there was no ability to plan ahead and very inconsistent hours.

By the time I left new hires were brought in with no experience at 13-14$ an hour and when I asked to negotiate this I was told flat out that no, it would not be possible to raise my pay even if I quit and went through the hiring process all over (which would have included resetting my PTO and retirement benefits). I was an employee that was recognized at a regional level for my excellence in customer service and regularly got high marks on customer surveys, but this did not seem to factor into my pay whatsoever.

Doing high quality work is not rewarded and going above and beyond sees the same 3% pay increase as doing the bare minimum. Management had no commitment to training at my store and while I was expected to have base knowledge of the rest of the store’s departments they were not expected to know basic elements of mine which meant they could call on me for help but I had no additional support from the staff when my department was busy and they were slow.

I don’t claim to know for certain that this is how the entire company operates and I only ever worked at this one location, but this location was also one of the best performing in the district so I imagine that is a good indication of company standards and what Office Depot considered acceptable treatment of hard working staff. The work itself is not the problem, it is management’s flippant attitude toward employee retention.

3.0

Operations Manager (Former Employee)

8.7.2021, Job Location: Erie, PA

Company eliminated most full time positions except management. So all the long timers who had an investment in the job got kicked to the curb. Lost the people who cared about what they were doing. Most (not all) part timers were there to collect a paycheck and do as little as possible to earn it. Not encouraging for advancement, high turnover.

Company very focused on customer engagement but near impossible when payroll only allows for 3 associates in building including managers.

Much improvement in recent years in streamlining and eliminating task work but more needed.

No overtime allowed but sometimes impossible to avoid.

Associates expected to learn all areas of store but no time/payroll allocated for proper training.

Worked with some really good people.

2.0

Logistics and operations (Current Employee)

16.6.2021, Job Location: Dallas, TX

The company isn't awful. Most days are spent completing tasks rather quickly and directing customers to the items they're looking for.

The problem lies in the fact that the company isn't actively pushing to hire anyone, so some positions are left vacant for months, or even years.

In general, low end management (store and assistant) are chill and will do what they can to assist with issues that crop up. However, upper management only sees numbers and won't sacrifice those numbers for anything.

This means your store location may be without air conditioning over summer or heating through winter, the work crew may be bare bones until another location closes and your store picks up their workers, etc.

The job is seriously easy for any position, the compensation is garbage though. Most basic positions cap out at 11 or 12 an hour, while assistant managers are uncapped and can make upwards of 20 an hour for standing at the store front directing customers (rarely saw managers doing anything else).

3.0

Retail Sales Associate (Former Employee)

6.4.2021, Job Location: Modesto, CA

This was my first job, and honestly, if you are looking for a decently paying job, Office Depot isn't that bad. (You could do a lot worse).

The job isn't that bad unless if you hate working with your hands, moving products, and walking around the store all day. You might get lucky and work in the printer area, but you have nowhere to sit, and the managers don't wanna see you sit around of course.

The management in my location wasn't bad at all, but the company itself isn't very good at managing locations well. Regional managers were a pain, apparently being rude to employees and such. Luckily I never had to interact with a regional manager.

Your coworkers make or break this job if anything. At my specific location, my coworkers were great. Very friendly, very nice to talk to. If you are going to an interview for OfficeMax/OfficeDepot, go a little early and maybe chat with some of the employees. They are usually very good people.

This job doesn't work on your schedule at all and doesn't seem to care much about your time. You can't call a day off unless if it's 2 weeks in advance, or at least during this covid time if you got covid. So if you have events coming up, plan them out in advance.

This job also is not for the people looking for a career. I mean sure you can advance to full-time or maybe even manager if you work there long enough, but the pay is low, and it's just not the best place to work for advancing or staying there for more than a year or two.

In general, it's a good starting job. I liked my time working there, even if it was bad on my back, or was a little annoying sometimes. I prefer this to anything with a lot of traffic like a grocery store or something.

4.0

Operations Manager (Former Employee)

16.3.2021, Job Location: Cranberry Township, PA

I've worked at Office Depot for 8 years before my location closed permanently. I stuck through thick and thin the entire time because of the workplace culture that lives within the stores. You become life long friends with the people you work with.

I started as a part time basic sales consultant earning minimum wage and worked my way up to management. Management positions are paid fairly well for the work that you do. Part time positions are not.

It's over-all an easy job. The company is financially struggling so hours are very often cut and you will spend a lot of the time working with one other person covering the whole store, save for truck days. Your work day will often consist of covering multiple areas of the store, either print/freight/tech along with front-end register duties - depending on your location's tier.

You will be trained on ARC-3 (Ask-Recommend-Close/Cross Sell) as a sales approach. The company is very services focused now as products do not earn enough profit. You'll be expected to service computers, do print jobs, and perform logistics processes.

Training is mostly hands-on. There will be many times when nobody knows what they're doing as the company-provided training is almost non-existent - although it is improving. Most knowledge passed on will be from experienced managers who have a tenure.

The company as a whole is very unguided in the direction it wants to take. The company portal will often have announcements of things being abandoned or new ideas being thrown around to save money. For example, we previously had a cellphone repair program to repair cellphones customers brought in, but it was so poorly implemented that it had to be dropped as they didn't ever retrain new associates that came in through turnover and many associates were breaking customer cell phones just attempting to wing it.

The workplace is very relaxed most of the time as most stores only serve a max of around 10-20 customers at a time. It can be stressful when you have multiple duties to perform quickly while also focusing on customers, but overall it is not bad compared to comparable careers.

Through all thick and thin attributes of this company, the thing that I loved most was the people I worked with. I have multiple life-time friends that I have made through my 8 year tenure and I would trade nothing in the world for the experiences I've gained working for this company. Your mileage may vary, but I definitely enjoyed my time at Office Depot.

Job security is the biggest issue as you never know when your store is going to close.

1.0

Print Center Supervisor (Current Employee)

31.1.2021, Job Location: Inverness, FL

The only thing that made the tough times worth it at this job was the awesome people I worked with. I’ve never had a better team any other job. But a few months ago, 3 of the 4 managers in the store lost their jobs unexpectedly because of another OfficeMax closing down.

People who worked there for over a decade lost their job. The message this sends is that it doesn’t matter how good of a job you do, you will always be disposable. There is NEVER enough payroll, and every day you find yourself running around like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to accommodate the customers.

You get barked at by customers for not having anything in stock when we can’t even order anything from the warehouse. ALSO the “best” thing about this company is that you lose your quarterly bonus because we have NOTHING IN STOCK because of COVID and YOU CANT ORDER ANY PRODUCT FOR CUSTOMERS.

But somehow, that’s the hard working employees fault, and WE get screwed out of bonuses. That’s always cool! Any person that comes in and asks about an application, I wish I could pull them aside and tell them to run for the hills. No, no, and NO!!! The worst place ever, unless you like to feel like you don’t matter, then I say go for it!

4.0

Sales Advisor (Current Employee)

8.10.2020, Job Location: Maplewood, MN

I have worked at Office Max for a while now. It's alright, as far as workload, it's a lot when I first started, but now it's no problem. Although, it's fun to work with people and know your way around the store. I have had a few fair share of feeling frustrated with training and learning the logistics system.

I like the people I work with, they're friendly, upbeat, positive, and it's been great so far. Since working there I feel well respected, and valued to the team. The training went well, but maybe train more on product knowledge. The manager does listen to associate's needs based on the hours, and disabilities.

Overall I'm liking my experience at Office Depot Office Max. I would say at the end of the day, it makes you feel accomplished that you can help customers and learn something new everyday.

1.0

Customer Service Representative (Former Employee)

2.9.2020, Job Location: Atlanta, GA

Let me start off by saying that Office Depot is not actually the problem, it's the management. They're based in South America which was no problem until I realized that just because they speak English doesn't mean they actually understand you. It's so hard to get anything done with them.

If you need help with something good luck getting it. May take anywhere from 24hrs to 1 week if you don't press the issue. They constantly bug you about not having your customer on hold for long but they haven't even assisted you so that you CAN finish the call.

There's no way to keep up with your hours daily, they keep track of your time instead which usually isn't correct. If you don't get paid all of your $ on payday you'll be waiting another 2 weeks for it. They question everything you do. I was scolded for not offering to place an order for a customer who called in.

But the notes on the account clearly stated that "NO PHONE ORDERS", but yet I was wrong apparently. Like I said it's not Office Depot, its the company they're contracted with. F*cking terrible....