More than 1.4 million people are employed in Australian retail and fast food businesses. Sadly, it’s not always a happy or safe place to work.
A union survey of more than 4,600 frontline workers found 87% had experienced customer verbal abuse in 2023 – consistent since 2016.
But incidents have become more frequent: in 2023, 76% of those who’d been abused experienced it daily, weekly or monthly, compared with 54% just two years earlier.
