I have been in communication with wordpress’ “happiness” engineer, another brainwashing emotional labour term by yet another big company.
wordpress moved my blog expret.org to the mature/adult section where they host porn sites after Pret A Manger raised complaints to get me shut down.
wordpress claim to not censor, so they did a compromise to move my blog into the adult section, meaning wordpress users within the reader section can’t find my blog.
The following are parts of my interaction with the “happiness” engineers (emotional labour terms of big companies) where wordpress co-founder Matt Mullenweg is copied in.
I also wrote to wordpress co-founder Mike Little on another platform.
These guys of course don’t give a toss.
wordpress staff are instructed to tell me that my blog is in the mature / adult section due to having used the F-word, yet I posted to them several curretn and past websites that use worse words.
But nevertheless, I am being censored and discriminated against.
I now have contacted the press and will continue to do so.
I also know that a wordpress “spy” is monitoring and copying y blog.
wordpress work for and cater to Pret A Manger, and this needs to be called out.
If my blog gets shut down, you will know why. I called Matt Mullenweg and Mike Oittle out now.
Partsof my emails with wordpress “happiness” engineer, please press “ctrl & +” to increase size or download the screenshots:
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NOTE:
I asked in the email where wordpress Co-founder Matt Mullenweg is copied in, quote:
“please explain the reason for censorship and moving my blog to the “mature” section”
The reply from the NAMELESS (they never sign their emails) “happiness” … repeat “HAPPINESS” engineer, quote:
“We have reviewed your site and can confirm that the Mature designation will not be lifted as a result. We do not provide detailed site reviews for site owners”
Again, “we” as in Matt Mullenweg, co-founder of wordpress and the nameless wordpress staff censor my blog under the excuse I used the F-word, fuck a few times, despite countles sites using “cunt, fuck, pieces of shit” etc.
WordPress censor free speech and free press for Pret A Manger.
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wordpress take my money but censor my free speech and free press on behalf of Pret A Manger, a little company that pretend to be big.
I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret and what Shop Managers and HQ Staff say about Pret and their leadership. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review and was mentioned by the BBC.
Dear reader, the following is my email to Pret executives and journalists today (28.12.2023). Even though I’m inadvertently doing advertising for Pret, this needs to be written about.
Journalists I openly copied in for Pret to see include Sarah Butler (Guardian), Vivienne Nunis (BBC), Mike Powell (BBC, Times, freelance etc.), Janet Eastham (Telegraph), Amy Sharpe (Mirror etc.) …. and many others.
I copy my mail verbatim and haven’t changed a word here except corrected spelling mistakes. I only squeezed in the word “being” in brackets below.
Please also note that current CEO Pano Christou was UK Managing Director under former CEO Clive Schlee who patronised me and had a LAUGH about the state of my mental health (calling me his “late night girl”). Pano Christou was Schlee’s #2 right-hand man when customers died and when I was targeted at Pret under HR and management. He can’t wriggle himself out by saying he wasn’t CEO then. He was the #2 guy in Pret.
My email:
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To Pret A Manger executives, HR, journalists and others,
I hope everyone had a good Christmas and will have peaceful New Years celebrations and healthy new year.
I am openly copying (CC) journalists and others in, including Dr. Shani Dhanda, whose emails are in the public domain (Twitter, Linkedin etc.). I am blind carbon copying (BCC) others in who reached out to me and/or their emails are private.
Anyone who doesn’t want to receive my mail, please block me. I write so SUBSTANTIALLY for journalists to know NOW and have a reference as I still don’t know how long I can survive.
Upfront to anyone who doesn’t know me, I write so BLUNT after what I survived in Pret during bereavement with many managers shouting at me, gaslighting me/us, pretending our work is not good while we work(ed) our butts off. And behind all this is Pret A Manger’s CORE team in head office. Make my day and sue me Pret! You don’t because it would open a can of worms for you, and you have already bad press as it is.
I write to you Pret regarding your latest PR stunt which you ONLY post on Linkedin because on X/FB/IG you would get backlash from current and former Pret employees, especially frontline shop staff.
Scrolling up in the following X feed that was posted today (28.12.2023) where a former Pret staff is appalled about Pret’s PR stunt on Linkedin. I don’t know him, but have read his previous call-outs on Pret.
Please scroll up in the following X feed where a former staff with mental health problems calls you out after Dr. Dhanda spoke in your company. Quote by Juan Aquiles Gomez: “How can you have the audacity to publish something like that, when I am a victim of dismissal for reasons motivated by my mental health in pret? It seems very miserable to me.”
(Please note, my tweets disappeared due to censoring).
I don’t know him, but I believe him after what I and many others suffered in Pret.
PHYSOLOGICAL “ABUSE” VIA STRICT WEEKLY MYSTERY SHOPPER VISITS:
I could post countless blog posts I wrote with screenshots I took to show how Pret is NOT disability-friendly. Pret might be accommodating disabilities in head office where staff are not required to be super fast under extreme stressful conditions in shops, but even if Pret really wanted to have a disability inclusive work environment in SHOPS, they simply can NOT achieve this BECAUSE the objective of Pret has always been, remains and will always be: LOW wage workers working under fast and stressful conditions, having to smile and love-bomb customers or they don’t get bonus and then get penalised.
Please google Timothy Noah’s “The Enforced Happiness of Pret A Manger” and see examples of Pret’s shopper scheme on my blog. I stopped updating any new reports as the core effort remains the same: low-wage shop staff HAVE TO smile, up-sell, and bend in all directions to get a few pennies more bonus, and even then it’s not given or withheld:
I was reprimanded by management after the mystery shopper commented that I didn’t smile, despite also commenting that my service was polite. This was days after I buried my brother. The mystery shopper did not know I was traumatically bereaved and had no choice but to work and STILL even helped shop after shop after shop to succeed, incl. becoming #1 and the top 10 in the premier league DURING traumatic grief!
NEW PR STUNT USING DISABILITY-FRIENDLY SPEAKERS: (But ONLY on Linkedin 😉 )
Pret, you purposely don’t post Dr. Dhanda’s talk in your company on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter/X because you know very well that Pret staff would raise their voices again and you have a hard time trying to hide their comments, like you did a while ago when PR-stunting again looking for staff. And you know how I call you out on the BS you post on social media. But you feel safe on Linkedin because business people who are mostly working in PR and marketing, which involves putting out a fake image to the public, they love you and tell you all day what an awesome company you are! You have always surrounded yourself with “yes-men/women” and avoided platforms where people with inside knowledge and common sense call out your bullsh!t, pardon my French, but “foreign branding” works both ways.
And YES, it would be helpful to have a more inclusive work environment for staff with any disabilities, but to Dr. Dhanda, please know that this is yet another of Pret’s PR stunts to appear ethical and caring in the public. Reality is VERY different and I keep imploring journalists to go into Pret for longer than a week, which Amy Sharpe from the Sunday Mirror did. She only worked a week in the late shift. But it needs a journalist to work for at least 1 MONTH in both shop and kitchen in the morning to SEE the systemic issues and dodgy things staff are forced to do to achieve targets!
I KNOW Pret having worked there 10 years in over 30 shops, and survived their antics DURING traumatic bereavement. Please see my post about Lila Warren. I declined Pret’s “hush money” and never signed an NDA.
To Pret, I did screenshots of what staff said before you hid/deleted some comments by staff and then disabled the comment section for further comments by staff.
So, Pret you only use Linkedin where mostly business and marketing people frequent and most low-wage staff and customers don’t hang out or if they do, they are still brainwashed by your lies, yes LIES! But even if I speak out on Linkedin, you’ll get my Linkedin account reported and disabled again as usual. Make my day!
You used NHS workers for PR when you made the announcement on 18. March 2020 just before first lockdown announcing free coffees and 50% rebates for NHS workers. And the very next morning 19. March 2020 Pano Christou sent a mass email to all shops to announce cuts to staff (beginning with hour cuts on their contracts to save money and later cutting wages as well while Pano got a juicy payrise and millions in bonus).
Low-wage Pret workers PAID for your NHS freebie PR stunt.
I was contacted again as usual by staff with your full CEO email, but this SLIPPED by journalists as everyone was DISTRACTED by this PR stunt: https://expret.org/2020/03/26/to-nhs-employees
You made Pret workers pay for this PR stunt. Are you not ashamed?! Do you have NO shame?!
You read my blog and copy ideas as you usually do because I keep pointing out how badly you treat staff with mental health problems. I even wrote an open note to the Pret Foundation after you did NOT take on a man with mental health problems, even though he did excellent, but he was too slow! You didn’t even take him on in the shop like I often fought for when my manager wanted to fire a staff in the kitchen and I pleaded to put them in the shop where they’d thrive!
Your newest PR stunt, that you only post on Linkedin is to pretend to be disability-friendly while your workers suffer mentally as well as physically and financially. And no, your pay-rise PR stunt came because the government raised the minimum wage and will raise the min, wage again in April 2024. You had and have no choice to raise pay a few pennies above min. wage when the govt raises the pay again, and you will PR your way through the media again in 2024 proclaiming to be so generous.
The Guardian’s Sarah Butler’s article again from 2021, and I have already seen that CEO’s bonus has reached over £5 million now.
“Pret CEO handed near-£4m bonus in year staff pay was cut.
Pano Christou also given 27% salary rise in 2021 as chain took more than £50m in government support” LINK to article.
DISHONESTY, LACK OF INTEGRITY, DISCRIMNATION, CARELESSNESS … WILL ALWAYS BE EXPOSED:
I will stop here as I tend to write long emails and blog posts, but I will never stop speaking out against Pret’s fake façade, hypocrisy, discrimination towards staff with mental and physical disabilities and how you targeted me under the watchful eye and involvement of your corrupt HR department, David Carter, Lila Warren (development manager), Sarah Bohn who also held a grievance and blocked me on Twitter/X already a while ago after I posted to her about Lila Warren, her direct colleague’s conduct under Pret’s leadership. (Please note, my tweets disappeared due to censoring).
And then I was fired days after my dad came out of a three-week coma which you knew about after what Lila has done which confused me further!
I will never be silent Pret, Clive Schlee, Pano Christou, even Julian Metcalfe whom I chased off Twitter, but screenshot his appalling tweets before he deleted his account after 2 days on Twitter:
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And now you jump on the Disabiliy-inclusiveness bandwagon to appear great again!
I am sickened by your ongoing disregard for human beings, customers and employees alike. I am still appalled that you didn’t tell us, didn’t do ANYTHING when 2 customers died and 20+ got injured.
73% of customers on Trustpilot (1&2 star reviews combined) disapprove of Pret on a variety of issues, many having sworn to never set foot inside Pret again
Go on, send some people to post FAKE reviews like it is alleged that you tasked someone to post false info on Wikipedia until the person got banned! Because you don’t want the public to know that Jeffrey Hyman founded Pret before he went bust and sold the rights, incl. name and LOGO to Beecham and Metcalfe which you still use at HQ and some shops! A friend of Jeffrey Hyman spills the beans on this, and yes, I already screenshot in case it gets deleted/hidden:
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GROWTH DOESN’T EQUAL (being) ETHICAL AND CARING:
You will grow as you are tasked by JAB to speed-open worldwide. Pano Christou will set a legacy for himself to have grown Pret worldwide, but the truth about your work conditions and how horrifically bad you treat your employees will continue to be told, not just by me.
You can keep on trying to get me shut down everywhere, I will pop up again and again and again and again and again and will NEVER be silent about your appalling way you treat employees who helped you become so successful, as well as having carried you through the pandemic and as a thank you get their pay, benefits, paid breaks etc. cut.
I am proud to have put Pret on the map of reality where 5 years ago hardly anyone believed me how badly you treat your staff, and now it’s become more common knowledge and customers also call you out publicly. And I am extremely proud of having made the step to speak out publicly even while I was shaking in my boots. I don’t shake any-more. You have become the laughing-stock of many.
I have PTSD and am still only surviving and have written thousands of posts and emails in traumatic state and work on the drinking bit, I have written to GOOD people who deserve better in my traumatised state and had Pret managers and HQ staff LAUGH about me. I have many regrets with GOOD people, journalists, friends and strangers, but after what you Pret did via Lila Warren it has destroyed my trust in people. I hope you’re proud to have destroyed yet another staff member on top of customers’ lives, now continuing to sell Mislabeled and even MOULDY food due to the immense stress you put on understaffed workers.
To ALL journalists, friends, former and current Pret staff who reached out, my ongoing apologies to you for my mails! It’s NOT you, it’s me.
To Pret, I apologised enough to you and was gaslit by your disgusting conduct from the CORE of Pret employees incl. executives (Clive Schlee calling me his “late night girl” having a laugh about my mental state). I will NEVER ever regret having called you Pret out on their lies and appalling treatment of myself and many other staff. My www.LateNightGirl.org url remains as a reminder of your poor conduct with hard-working employees. Weeks after he called me that, he gave the green light to fire me, KNOWING my dad just came out of a coma. You have no scruple and will be called out until my last breath.
I continue to put in my late-night-girl shifts and will never be silent.
If anyone outside of Pret wonders WHY not more staff speak out, they are EXHAUSTED and disheartened! And many are “brainwashed” to function and believe Pret are good to them. They feel stuck without a choice of a better employment. Pret degrades hope and confidence in people. I was brainwashed for a while and then too exhausted to find another job. Staff, mostly from other countries, have been conditioned in fear management. I don’t fear Pret any-more. Not one bit!
Having survived and still surviving, I will never be silent! All I hope is for Labour to enter government and in time change the appalling work conditions in companies! Hope dies last.
For anyone OUTSIDE of this toxic Pret A Manger team, my apologies for this long mail. This is mainly for reference for journalists and friends and for Dr. Dhanda.
Kind regards,
expret.org aka former CEO Clive Schlee’s “late night girl”.
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret and what Shop Managers and HQ Staff say about Pret and their leadership. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review and was mentioned by the BBC.
Many of my favourite people are broken, those who lost a lot in life, “a lot” might be 1 person who meant a lot, or those who endured a lot in life, anyone who has their lot in life.
My favourite people are those who might have not experienced loss or hardship yet, who might have had a protected life – so far, but still have an instinct of compassion and love for broken people and their struggle to go on.
My favourite people are those broken and unbroken ones who just have the simple courage to find a way to learn how to love (and endure) broken people without judging, avoiding or mistreating them. Recovering from mistakes, and moving on, not away from them, but towards and together with them in their brokenness.
In time, we all will be broken, so broken we won’t survive. We have an unknown expiry date on our lives we don’t want to know and we don’t want to go to. And avoiding the thought of it won’t change this fact. Best Before is the best compromise we can handle right now.
Maybe in-between brokenness and wholeness, between facing the facts and denial, we can hand a cup of cold water to a burning soul or a tissue to hot and salty tears and lend a presence, even if in silence to a broken, paralysed life.
Not all of my broken people are favourites to their surroundings trying hard to be
They just survive, not knowing how to live.
All my favourite people are people human at least more than enough to hold on
All my favourite people are real in their fear and courage
All my favorite people are broken Believe me, my heart should know Some prayers are better left unspoken
I just want to hold you and let the rest go
All my friends are part saint and part sinner We lean on each other, try to rise above We are not afraid to admit we are all still beginners We are all late bloomers when it comes to love
All my favorite people are broken Believe me, my heart should know Awful believers, skeptical dreamers, step forward You can stay right here, you don’t have to go
Is each wound you’ve received just a burdensome gift It gets so hard to lift yourself up off the ground But the poet says we must praise a mutilated world We’re all working the graveyard shift You might as well sing along
Cause all my favorite people are broken Believe me, my heart should know As for your tender heart, this world’s going to rip it wide open, It ain’t gonna be pretty, but you’re not alone
All my favorite people are broken Believe me, my heart should know Awful believers, skeptical dreamers, you’re welcome Yeah, you’re safe right here, you don’t have to go
Cause all my favorite people are broken Believe me, I should know Some prayers are better left unspoken I just want to hold you and let the rest go
Unless otherwise stated or linked to, this website and all writings within this site are the property of expret.org and are protected by copyright and other intellectual property laws. Reproduction and distribution of my writings without written permission are prohibited.
Granted, sounds like a Daily Mail or Twitter/X sensational clickbait post, but having worked at Pret, I believe the story. I worked with colleagues who gave freebies for many months to the same customer while other customers went empty handed. I write about the discrimination of Pret’s freebie marketing here.
For new readers, I have been exposing Pret publicly since May 2018 (before the customer deaths and injuries became public, we staff weren’t even told!). Journalists have taken the info I passed to them, please see expret.org/media for press reports I passed on, but only journalist Mike Powell, freelance and for the BBC, mentioned my blog. Amd I will never stop mentioning him. So, please be aware, that most journalists just want a Pret story under their belt without crediting back to the source of my blog and work.
Back to the freebies:
If you have the Club Pret coffee subscription, best cancel it and with it the direct debit/bank payment as Pret have continued to withdraw money from bank accounts even after people cancelled the sub.
If you want free coffee for life, just say you were mis-gendered. The gender craze is putting so much fear into Pret staff who are drilled via strict weekly mystery shoppers, clever customers know how to utilize it to the max.
Someone on a social media platform said (December 2023) that they were mis-gendered one morning 18 months ago. Not only were the staff “extremely apologetic” but since 18 months and counting the customer now gets free coffees!
Quote, “In the Pret next to my office one of the team accidentally mis-gendered me one morning about 18 months ago. They were extremely apologetic …. and I have not paid for a coffee in there since.”
Why get the coffee subscription or be nice to staff when you can just say you were mis-gendered? Easy peasy! A better money-saver than what Money Saving Expert can advise. 😉
I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret and what Shop Managers and HQ Staff say about Pret and their leadership. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review and was mentioned by the BBC.
…. a video and channel I can highly recommend by Dr. Ramani who covers a lot about narcissism.
I don’t want to get too much into detail about my own traumatic experiences with narcissists. But when my brother died and I became traumatically bereaved, I had a set of friends, especially one couple whose dog I dog-sitted for years when they went on holidays, even to the point when the dog was deadly sick after an annual vaccine backfired.
These people I knew for years only used me, but once I became unwell in bereavement (unwell is an understatement), not only did they drop me, but one of them even accused me of stupid non-important issues because he lost me as his FREE of charge dog sitter. He didn’t stop there, but that’s story for another time and spot I am in the process of publishing elsewhere.
I told these “friends” at the end, that I don’t regret having watched their dog for years, but I regret having done it for free!
Needless to say, with all my heart I am grateful these people are not in my life anymore!
If you always feel/felt off with some “friends” or a partner, even family, especially when you are in need for a change and find no help, watch some of the videos on narcissism and how to recognize it.
Narcissists are 100% about themselves. It took me loss and grief to realize I had the wrong friends for many years. They are ONLY nice to you when they need something, never forget that!!!
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review and was mentioned by the BBC.
Bullied during bereavement in Pret A Manger 
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