Guide to hiring Christmas casuals quickly and effectively

Your Christmas trading success hinges on having the right team in place. How you recruit, onboard, and manage your Christmas casuals could be the difference between hitting your targets or falling short during the busiest time of year.

We’ve covered everything you need to know in this in-depth guide. 

What’s covered in this guide?

Hiring casuals can feel like a race against the clock. Just when you need experienced and reliable staff the most, you’re scrambling to recruit and train newcomers. In this guide, we’ve taken this challenge head-on with practical solutions that won’t eat into your limited time.

In this guide you’ll find: 

• The benefits of casual employment: Understand how Christmas casual jobs can support your business needs, while offering flexibility for your store and seasonal workers.
• Your legal obligations as an employer: A straightforward breakdown of what you need to know to ensure compliance, without getting caught in red tape when hiring new staff.
• How and where to find the right talent: Practical approaches to finding talent who can deliver excellent customer service during your busiest trading period.
• Ways to streamline the onboarding process: Time-efficient strategies to get casuals up to speed quickly, ensuring they’re equipped to create exceptional customer experiences from day one.
• How to reduce admin through employment software: Sensible solutions to cut out paperwork and free up your time for what actually drives success in your store.

We’ve also included a job description template and an onboarding checklist, so you have everything you need to bring your casual employees into the fold quickly.

What industries typically need Christmas casual jobs?

The hunt for Christmas casual staff intensifies across several sectors as the holiday season approaches. Each industry has its own particular pressures, and understanding these can help you craft more compelling job descriptions and attract the right team members.

Let’s look at some of these below: 

Retail

Retail stores face enormous pressure to maintain great customer service, despite transaction volumes doubling or tripling during December. 

When advertising sales and team assistant roles, emphasise the festive atmosphere and potential for an immediate start. Your edge against competitors? Highlight structured training that enables new staff to confidently deliver great customer experiences from day one.

Hospitality

Restaurants, pubs, and catering businesses struggle with balancing multiple Christmas events whilst maintaining regular service levels. For wait staff and kitchen assistant positions, your job listings should acknowledge the fast pace, but highlight the team support available. 

Candidates choose employers who demonstrate clear systems for success, particularly during the busiest trading period of the year.

Logistics and delivery

At Christmas time, warehouses and delivery services face extraordinary spikes in volume and tight turnaround times. 

When recruiting warehouse staff and drivers, emphasise the satisfaction that comes with contributing to holiday celebrations, rather than just the workload. Job seekers are drawn to roles where they can see their direct contribution to the store’s success and customer happiness.

Tourism and events

During the holidays, tourist attractions and event venues need to handle increased visitor numbers, whilst delivering memorable experiences. Position your tourism and event assistant roles by highlighting the joy of creating special moments for guests. 

Your recruitment will stand out when you showcase how even temporary staff become essential team players in your operation.

Customer service

Call centres and support teams face heightened enquiry volumes and more complex customer queries during the festive rush. In advertisements for support agents and returns processors, be honest about the challenges but transparent about the training provided. 

Candidates gravitate toward employers who demonstrate how handling difficult situations well contributes directly to achieving sales targets.

Understanding which industries need seasonal staff is just the first step. Now let’s look at what makes recruitment particularly challenging for businesses during Christmas. 

What are the common challenges when hiring Christmas staff?

The holiday season brings a welcome pool of candidates eager to earn extra income, particularly students looking for casual jobs between terms.

Here are the key challenges you’ll face and how to address them effectively.

Ensuring staff availability during peak holiday periods

Another common challenge when hiring Christmas casuals is ensuring their availability during the peak holiday period, particularly from November to February, when many people travel or attend events like Schoolies. 

To address this, it’s important to include a clear section in your hiring process focused on staff availability during key trading periods. During interviews, be upfront about the specific dates and times when shifts will be most critical, and ask candidates directly whether they have any holidays or commitments planned. This proactive approach can help avoid last-minute scheduling issues and ensure you have a reliable team in place when you need them most.

Finding staff who can deliver excellent customer service with minimal training 

The limited timeframe between a successful candidate signing a contract and starting their first shift can leave your store vulnerable to service gaps. Focus your screening on candidates with natural customer service aptitude and previous retail experience.

To help assess suitability for the role, consider role-playing scenarios during interviews, allowing you to hire with confidence and without extensive training. To make the hiring process even smoother, you can use recruitment platforms like EH Jobs, which lets job applicants submit short video introductions instead of traditional cover letters. 

This feature gives you a quick, authentic insight into candidates’ presentation and customer service skills. By seeing and hearing applicants firsthand, you can better assess their fit for your team and save time screening resumes. It’s a modern, effective way to tackle common hiring challenges in the retail industry and to find the right people faster.

Managing compliance and award requirements 

Your casual employment arrangements carry specific legal obligations that can’t be overlooked during the rush.

Create a compliance checklist covering casual loading rates, required breaks, and maximum shift durations. Share this with all hiring managers to ensure consistent application across your store operations.

High competition for quality candidates 

When every business seeks Christmas casuals simultaneously, you need to stand out. 

This is where you can highlight the benefits beyond an immediate start. Emphasise your supportive team culture, the skills candidates will develop and the benefits they’ll receive.

Rapid onboarding without overwhelming new staff 

The challenge of integrating new hires into a team without information overload requires structure. Develop a streamlined onboarding and induction process, focusing on essential customer interactions first.

Pair new staff with experienced staff who can provide real-time guidance during initial shifts. Schedule brief 1:1 sessions at the end of their first week to address questions and reinforce expectations.

Retention throughout the entire season 

Preventing mid-season departures that disrupt your critical trading weeks can throw a spanner in the works. To keep employee happiness and engagement high for your new team members, schedule brief check-ins after the first week and again mid-season. Recognise strong performance visibly, and create simple incentives aligned with your store’s success metrics to maintain motivation through the entire period.

For employees who aren’t meeting expectations, a brief performance improvement plan can quickly address issues before they impact your Christmas trading.

When to start planning your Christmas casual recruitment? 

Many businesses delay Christmas casual hiring until they’re already feeling the customer rush, forcing them to settle for available candidates rather than building a team with the right people. 

Start your planning three months before peak trading, typically September. Develop targeted job descriptions that will attract genuine team players suited to your store environment.

Launch your advertising campaign 6-8 weeks before your busy season begins. This timing captures students planning their holiday work and experienced staff seeking Christmas casual jobs with immediate start options.

Allow 4 weeks for interviews and selection to avoid rushed decisions. Schedule onboarding sessions 2 weeks before your Christmas rush begins, giving new employees enough time to absorb essential information without the pressure of peak trading.

Plus, moving even slightly earlier than your competitors gives you first access to the strongest candidates on the market.

Ready to streamline your Christmas casual hiring process? Don’t let the holiday rush catch you unprepared this year. Download our complete guide today to access all templates, checklists, and practical steps for building a strong seasonal team.

Looking for software that can do it all? Our Employment Operating System handles recruitment, onboarding, compliance, payroll and so much more in one easy-to-use place. 

Connect with top talent via SmartMatch, move successful candidates straight to onboarding and have all of their new starter paperwork sorted before their very first day. It’s the easiest way to recruit and onboard casual team members before the festive recruitment rush hits.

Keen to ensure your Christmas hiring experience is quick and effective? Talk to one of our business specialists today.