More than half of Australia’s retail workers have reported increased abuse or hostility during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new report from researchers at the ANU and University of Sydney.

The report, Pandemic Pressures: Job Security and Customer Relations for Retail Workers, is one of the first to look at the impacts of the pandemic on essential workers thrown into the frontline with little preparation and a high risk of exposure to the virus.

It highlights the challenges faced by retail, fast-food and distribution workers during the pandemic and recent lockdowns, as well as COVID-19’s impact on job security and worker-customer relations.

Lead author Professor Ariadne Vromen, from the ANU Crawford School of Public Policy, said 56 per cent of retail workers experienced a notable increase in customer abuse during the pandemic.

“The experiences and concerns of these workers have tended to be overlooked or underestimated by the media and governments, relative to other frontline workers,” she said.

Professor Vromen said the retail sector can learn some valuable lessons from the pandemic well beyond the battles in supermarket aisles for toilet paper and other essential items.

“Questions remain about why there has been continued job insecurity and unpredictable hours in such a significant sector, and why workers were not redeployed into new online sales and warehouse roles,” Professor Vromen said.

“Women, linguistically diverse people and young people working in retail were also much more likely to report increased customer abuse during the pandemic, while also being much more likely to say they felt stressed enforcing customer COVID-19 safety compliance.”

Professor Vromen also said the pandemic precipitated a rapid adoption of new, contactless technologies to the benefit of many in the online retail space.

“Despite initial job losses and reduced working hours in the sector, the pandemic has been highly lucrative for many areas in retail, with record sales in food, household and recreational goods, and a shift to online shopping,” she said.

The report is the result of a representative online survey of more than 1,100 retail, fast-food and distribution workers in September during the height of lockdowns in many parts of Australia. The team of researchers also conducted 30 interviews with senior stakeholders from across the industry.

Almost half (49 per cent) of retail workers felt their job security had decreased as a result of the pandemic.

According to the report, those who were likely to feel more insecure during the pandemic were:

• Women (51 per cent)

• Those under 30 (56 per cent)

• Those from a non-English-speaking background (60 per cent)

• Frontline (51 per cent) and casual workers (55 per cent)

• Those working in a locked-down region (53 per cent).

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