I work in the fried food department at a Stop & Shop (east coast United States grocery store chain)

b-but i don't want to make lunch for work

ONE MORE QUESTION besides the one I'm replying to. If I do report this to the FDA, what will happen to my deli co-workers who did nothing? Will the FDA shut us down? Will they lose their jobs?

>People could die. Could probably report this to a regulatory body, FDA or some shit.

As far as I know, there is absolutely no law that holds grocery stores at all accountable for any illnesses you might or might not obtain through their foods. Nor do expiration dates or times have any real meaning whatsoever. They are completely arbitrary numbers that no regulatory body assigns or even acknowledges because of how meaningless and random they are.

The basis of you being pissed that the chicken if over 4 hours old is completely moot when it was a policy the grocery store arbitrarily set for themselves to begin with. If they wanted to, they probably could have set it to 6 hours for all the difference it makes (for reference, the inter webs recommends you throw away food after 2 hours. That goes to show how inexact and meaningless that initial 4 hour limit really was, since I’m sure plenty of us have eaten next day pizza or chicken and been perfectly fine)

In any case, If you get salmonella or food poisoning, that sucks and maybe you’ll never go back to that grocery market, but they’re not really culpable. The grower or distributor might be, but not the grocery store.

Now... because it’s a *cooked* product. You *might* be able to get your local health department to take a look at their storage and cooking conditions, but even then I’m not entirely sure because food service licenses and permits are a fucking complicated web, and I have no idea if grocery stores found a legal loop hole that puts them outside of it. Your best bet is to look for a food service license and see if there’s a number on there to talk to someone about this.

Alternatively, if you’re a big enough chain , you might be able to report this to corporate as they tend to take issues like this a lot more seriously than the local managers. They set the policies for a reason and generally want their employees to adhere to them to curve off potential trouble like this

Thank you very much for your insight. You're making me reconsider this a lot. Perhaps reporting it to corporate would be best.

I would report it to the health dept.

A quiet, user complaint to health and safety got my company in a huge batch of trouble, cost them money and got the maintenance guys in deep shit too.

OH&S is big fucking news because slight screwups lead to huge fucking lawsuits. Forget 'when you quit,' find a new job now before you get blacklisted for covering for her, report her anonymously to OH&S with pictures, and get that shit behind you before you go to court for serving someone literal salmonella.

>lose their jobs
W H Y would nobody be more concerned that knowingly-- in any way-- serving expired food would make them accessory? Even if 'other managers' told you you 'have to let her continue,' you're still knowingly serving bad product.

Their jobs? Nibba, if they don't get their poop in a group and get the fuck out, they might lose their employable status.

The deli clerks don't know about it. I'm the only part timer that's been told because I work in food prep and I've been "mistakenly" have been throwing the expired food out so they had to "correct" me.

I'll most likely take this course of action.

I can say, in my defense, that I've been trying to stop her. I've been letting her refrigerate it and then throwing it out once she leaves. However, this is still on the same shelf as the other food prep products and the same cooler as all the deli's products.

Plus, a manager tells me she'll take it out of our trash cart the next morning and, instead of scanning it to keep track of loss and throwing it out, she prices it up and sells it refrigerated after it's been sitting overnight.

I plan to record her admitting to it.

My idea of announcing it over the intercom is basically dead now.

Welp, the thread's dead but you've all helped me tremendously

This will be my course of action

I will be recording my walk-in to work, punching in, and the times of the food in the hot case. The punch-in clock displays the current time, so it will show what's expired.

I will secretly record a video of my manager telling me we have to sell expired food the next day. I'll induce her by throwing out the expired food in front of her. I hope to get her to admit who's telling her to do this, and get some video of her talking while she's looking away so I can prove it's her.

Then, I will submit all evidence to the health department/corporate. Whatever I can find in Stop and Shop's chain of command.

Thank you all for helping me think through this.

Hey op stop and shop fag here. I have worked in a few stores. If your part time dont bother with this it will just get you fired. Yes even if you go to corporate. You will be labeled as "that guy" and people in the company will actively make your job harder and harder until you quit. If your full time your best bet would be talking to hr or your stores union rep. Their honestly the only people that ever get anything done. You will NEVER see a store manager rock the boat. Maybe the grocery manager but thats a different department so good luck. Ps how do you feel about the upcoming strike?

Yeah, just complain to health and safety and gently suggest an inspection would be in need. Have days of evidence; prove their cleaning would be the exception.

We didn't get warning. OH&S barged right the fuck in and wrecked us. It was a whole thing over similar laziness.

I'm looking forward to the strike. And you're right, I should definitely go to the union first. Absolutely. They'll at least tell me who else to go to about it.

I live in a small town with a pretty boring newspaper. Think I should give them a call sometime afterwards?

And trust me, I don't really care about being "that guy" because I will be leaving my 2 weeks notice when the news breaks. That wasn't my original plan, but all of you at Jow Forums have helped me realize it's the best course of action.

I can't thank you guys enough. Who knows? Maybe you helped me save a life.

But you're so so right about going to the union first. Only a true Stop and Shop day would've suggested that.

Nah, you don't wanna do that OP.

But you DO want to record everything on black and white paper. Present this evidence to your manager's manager and let them deal with this. We're talking about food safety and potential illness lawsuits, which will affect everyone, including you.

It's your manager's manager's job to handle this kinda shit and keep things regulated. Let him/her do their job once you give them proof.