Workplace reviews and discussion: 財團法人台灣敦睦聯誼會所屬作業組織圓山大飯店

1. A birthday banquet meal voucher and a lucky draw event.

2. There is no discount for regular employee meals, but 50%-off vouchers are issued during holidays for use at the restaurant (with an expiration date).

3. Employee meals are provided. You can also swipe your employee card to use them when you are not working (though the food is very unappetizing; most colleagues would rather order delivery or bring a packed lunch themselves).

4. At the year-end banquet, employees eat a set meal upstairs at the Grand Hotel. Every department is required to perform, and there is also a lucky draw.

5. No need to work overnight shifts.

6. Employee discounts are available for company trips.

7. The job is stable, and the longer you work there, the higher your salary becomes (but many people are already ahead in the queue).

1. Colleagues: There are some enthusiastic supervisors, but they are a minority. Most supervisors avoid responsibility or even let others take the blame. Some supervisors are also indecisive, constantly changing their decisions. There is a serious problem with cliques: people create private groups to criticize other colleagues, and there have even been cases where a private group was created to vote on dismissing a newcomer. You cannot advocate for your rights or put forward your ideas.

2. Salary: The company is basically always short-staffed. As long as you do not offend senior employees or make mistakes too frequently, you will pass the probationary period. After passing probation, the salary is barely above NT$26,000 including the perfect-attendance bonus. Senior employees who have worked there for 10 years earn approximately NT$30,000.

3. Bonuses: The three traditional holiday bonuses are generally provided, and the year-end bonus is 1.5 months’ salary. Upselling bonuses are not individually commission-based as they are at other hotels, and the amounts are very opaque. The payment schedule is also inconsistent. One colleague discovered a month after leaving that bonuses for the four months they had still been employed had been paid, but they were never notified.

4. Overtime: Overtime pay cannot be claimed; employees are required to state “personal reasons” when explaining why they work overtime.

The Grand Hotel has 500 rooms, and three to four front-desk employees must handle check-ins and check-outs. During peak season, there are roughly 300 check-outs and 300 check-ins per day, so there is often no time to eat. Supervisors sometimes require staff to proactively introduce hotel and tourism information, then demand that things be handled quickly; at one point they say not to collect a deposit, and later require one again, with the amount having been changed several times. When helping guests arrange extra beds or room changes, staff may also be mocked or sarcastically criticized by the housekeeping department. A colleague was once cursed at by housekeeping for informing a guest that an extra bed would be arranged.

There have been several occasions when the hotel was fully booked and reservations were oversold, with guests being secretly downgraded without being informed. The problems are not limited to management and policies; there are also serious ethical issues. It is nothing like a five-star hotel. Both the hardware and software are extremely outdated, and management is unwilling to spend money updating the systems.