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American Red Cross

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Not for everyone - Mobile Phlebotomist II American Red Cross Employee Review

2.0
28 Oct 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good-ish training Good medical benefits after 3 months Meet amazing donors

Cons

No work-life balance Constant Refusal to use accrued PTO No sick days-you use your PTO days but will get an occurrence (allowed 6 per year before disciplinary actions) Poor wages for the amount of responsibility Mis-managed, under staffed, and poor communication It’s unionized, so you can bust your butt and someone else can sit around and you’ll get the same raise. PTO accrual doesn’t start until 3 months in and is accrued very slow. You basically can’t plan a vacation or be sick the first year of being there. If you have small children and need to call out to be home with a sick child, you will get an occurrence. Forget doing anything extra curricular with your children-even attending a graduation, before you have any PTO. Forget dinners or weekends. Everything is seniority based so you don’t have any benefits or say on anything, even what time you need to take lunch, or the days and times of the week you work, which changes weekly. You are at the whim of drive leads who have zero experience on how to manage a team of people professionally or appropriately. They are rude to donors, talk about personal problems and other staff in front of donors. Will cuss and make rude and inappropriate comments about donors. You will be talked about behind your back if you make a mistake. You’ll be held accountable for things out of your control like if someone’s blood pressure is too high and you need to defer them…it goes against you!! Unethical practices of purposely deferring donors because staff wants to get done early. Time stealing, mileage stealing, excessive waste of materials. They don’t pay well enough to not provide a better schedule & better work-life balance. Things were omitted, twisted, and just plain wrong during the recruiting process. You will be made to recruit for a certain blood product which makes you feel like you’re a high pressure salesperson. And if you don’t meet a certain goal, be sure that you’ll hear about it!

Explore other reviews about American Red Cross

5.0
4 Jun 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good work life balance, fair pay and great work environment

Cons

Not a lot of upward mobility unless you find a different role in the organization. It’s also hard to switch between departments

2.0
15 Mar 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

You feel connected to a larger mission, and go to bed knowing you did good work. Most of the volunteers are amazing people. The job is a good stepping stone to other disaster management jobs elsewhere. PTO policy is generous and Healthcare is decent.

Cons

You are INCREDIBLY overworked and GROSSLY underpaid. You get zero work-life balance. Even when you're not on call, you'll still get tons of calls from volunteers with questions and concerns. If a volunteer is unavailable to respond to a fire call or tend to any other responsibility day or night, you're on deck. You're salaried, so there's no overtime pay. Your pay barely covers the basic cost of living in today's economy ($40k-$50k). Diversity is bottom heavy, meaning there are lots of employees of color in entry level or lower management roles, but beyond that there's a steep drop off. Most of the volunteers are great, but the Red Cross is so desperate to keep them, that poor behavior and language (racist/sexist/phobic) is not properly disciplined or responded to, if at all. Employee retention is poor, especially in the Disaster Specialist role, because they burn you out so quickly without decent pay.

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