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I worked for a small private Japanese teaching company and the hours were insane. Everything was carefully set so that I was technically only working 40 hours a week, but it was really more like 60. It was pretty common to be at work for 12 hours on one day then 4 the next. Long days would have big gaps in the schedule that were unpaid. Basically all hiring of foreign teachers is done in march to line up with the Japanese school year. I was able to give about 5 weeks notice when I quit. The owners acted like I was personally destroying the company. My girlfriend is a real teacher in Japan and the hours are unbelievable. She rarely gets home before 7-8 at night and basically never knows in advance how late she'll work on a given day. It's extremely rare that she gets a whole weekend without having to go in for at least a few hours, since there's constant meetings and other weekend activities she has to attend.
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Nov 10, 2014 02:25
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Peven Stan posted:I was impressed by the amount of sushi and japanese food in columbus and then someone told me about the marysville plant. Thanks Honda! The favorite restaurant of all Japanese executives in the Columbus area Hyde Park Steakhouse which I think is the one Jack Nicklaus use to own and the Amish buffet in Plain City which has a giant banquet room that's pretty much always booked for meetings by them Weatherman posted:
I do not have a direct public citation for this, but it was about the rate when my father was a senior executive at Honda.
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Nov 10, 2014 17:15
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Keetron posted:Working with a few from India that can apply for a European passport when working here for about 5 years, it came to light that the mothership is actively monitoring that people don't work in the same European country for more then 2 years to prevent this. This was mega-hosed because the guy had literally been in the US for a decade.
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Nov 10, 2014 20:36
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I normally post tons of really angry/angsty poo poo here, but I want to give my company benefit of the doubt today. They just served us a really kickass catered Thanksgiving lunch. Delicious, local non-Aramark catering, and plenty of food to stuff the entire site. It was quite nice. 
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Nov 11, 2014 18:24
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Sundae posted:I normally post tons of really angry/angsty poo poo here, but I want to give my company benefit of the doubt today. They just served us a really kickass catered Thanksgiving lunch. Delicious, local non-Aramark catering, and plenty of food to stuff the entire site. Oh hell, you ate food from their realm? Now you're trapped there forever!
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Nov 11, 2014 19:17
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Sundae posted:I normally post tons of really angry/angsty poo poo here, but I want to give my company benefit of the doubt today. They just served us a really kickass catered Thanksgiving lunch. Delicious, local non-Aramark catering, and plenty of food to stuff the entire site. Our CFO just pushed out an email saying that they were going to modify how the bonus pro-rating would work for everyone who started this year. Instead of basing it on our start date they were instead basing it on when you first became billable. I was really incredulous about this because obviously it meant our final dollar amounts scaled more slowly but it turns out the billable hours scaled even more and it ends up almost tripling my year-end bonus, which was their intent. Not bad. Not bad.
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Nov 11, 2014 19:34
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Necc0 posted:..it ends up almost tripling my year-end bonus, which was their intent. The cynic in me tells me that was the exact opposite of their intent, but once wheels were in motion they couldn't backtrack. Chances are they'll find savings elsewhere. But congrats on the bonus
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Nov 12, 2014 09:58
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modeski posted:The cynic in me tells me that was the exact opposite of their intent, but once wheels were in motion they couldn't backtrack. Chances are they'll find savings elsewhere. But congrats on the bonus No they frankly said that was their reason in their initial announcement. It was quite a breath of fresh air. To restore the karmic balance though I've just finished a meeting with my tech lead detailing how extreme my CYA policy will have to be when working with a specific coworker. She hasn't failed to wait until a team meeting to throw me under the bus for every issue she's had me work on for the past three months and it's starting to really piss me off. In case anyone works with technical workers here's a PSA: When a techie asks you to test something it means we actually want you to test it. We don't know the functional specifics and nuances of what you need and we have other poo poo to do. Please test it asap and come back to them with any issues. DO NOT wait until an hour before you show it to the client two weeks later and bitch them out for not being perfect the first time. That's not how this poo poo works. Necc0 fucked around with this message at 17:34 on Nov 12, 2014 |
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Nov 12, 2014 17:32
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Also when we ask you to schedule a meeting because your functional requirements are too ambiguous don't say 'ok' and then call us out in next week's team meeting for not getting any work done and calling us incompetent. It makes us really really not like giving you anything but the bare minimum.
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Nov 12, 2014 17:41
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Necc0 posted:Also when we ask you to schedule a meeting because your functional requirements are too ambiguous don't say 'ok' and then call us out in next week's team meeting for not getting any work done and calling us incompetent. It makes us really really not like giving you anything but the bare minimum. Go read The No rear end in a top hat Rule.
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Nov 12, 2014 18:03
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ItalicSquirrels posted:Go read The No rear end in a top hat Rule. Fantastic book. Should be read by anyone and everyone regardless of rack or position.
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Nov 12, 2014 18:32
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I hate open enrollment. We have until the end of the week to submit our changes, and we have to make a choice this year. Suddenly today, our executives decided that everyone needed to do it today. They sent emails saying to do it now and those emails were forwarded by every level of management below them. Then after I spent my lunch filling things out and completing it, I get an email from a VP stating that I still have not completed my benefits. I talked to HR and I am good, but it sounds like they ran a report an hour after the first emails were sent and sent a nastygram to everyone that didn't drop everything and do their benefits right then.
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Nov 12, 2014 23:00
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Our shithead insurance broker basically went "surprise, your rates are going up 35%, we gotta renew now" while we're in a dispute with the insurance company who retroactively cancelled 20 peoples insurance giving us a refund. Problem is they've been overcharging us by 30 people for the past 3 months.
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Nov 13, 2014 01:38
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Harry posted:Our shithead insurance broker basically went "surprise, your rates are going up 35%, we gotta renew now" while we're in a dispute with the insurance company who retroactively cancelled 20 peoples insurance giving us a refund. Problem is they've been overcharging us by 30 people for the past 3 months. Your company needs a new broker. Your average broker will throw a shitfit, bitch to the insurance company and market your plan if rates increase like that. Trust me, that's what I deal with ALL. loving. DAY.
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Nov 13, 2014 02:21
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My office doesn't currently have a 401K program set up. Theres only four of us, including my boss, for the US based office. The lady who worked here before me didn't want to contribute to a 401k so they never did it. My coworker has been here 15 years and has apparently wanted to start a 401K program, but "never really pushed for it". She outright said she has no retirement savings. I've been reminding my boss to set up the 401K and its being done now with a guaranteed match from the company (percentage currently unknown, but I imagine it'll be a good amount). All I had to do was remind him a couple times to talk to the accountant about setting it up. 
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Nov 13, 2014 21:29
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1500quidporsche posted:Your company needs a new broker. Your average broker will throw a shitfit, bitch to the insurance company and market your plan if rates increase like that. Trust me, that's what I deal with ALL. loving. DAY. We ended up switching, but getting anything below 15% was impossible.
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Nov 13, 2014 21:35
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ladyweapon posted:My office doesn't currently have a 401K program set up. Theres only four of us, including my boss, for the US based office. The lady who worked here before me didn't want to contribute to a 401k so they never did it. My coworker has been here 15 years and has apparently wanted to start a 401K program, but "never really pushed for it". She outright said she has no retirement savings. I've been reminding my boss to set up the 401K and its being done now with a guaranteed match from the company (percentage currently unknown, but I imagine it'll be a good amount). All I had to do was remind him a couple times to talk to the accountant about setting it up. My last employer actually sent out an e-mail reminding their employees to use their damned 401(k) accounts because they identified that they were WAAAAY under-budget on retirement matches. Something like 75% of eligible employees were putting away less than 5% of their salary, the amount you'd need to add to receive the full company match.
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Nov 13, 2014 21:36
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Sundae posted:My last employer actually sent out an e-mail reminding their employees to use their damned 401(k) accounts because they identified that they were WAAAAY under-budget on retirement matches. Something like 75% of eligible employees were putting away less than 5% of their salary, the amount you'd need to add to receive the full company match. I don't understand why companies who want employees to use their 401(k)s just don't automatically enroll people set at the percentage they receive 100% matching and default to the appropriate retirement year fund. If you hate that or have other plans you can just change it, but at least it forces a decent decision on those who don't do anything. My company does that if you haven't made any 401(k) choices a month or two and several emails after you start.
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Nov 13, 2014 22:41
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Solkanar512 posted:I don't understand why companies who want employees to use their 401(k)s just don't automatically enroll people set at the percentage they receive 100% matching and default to the appropriate retirement year fund. If you hate that or have other plans you can just change it, but at least it forces a decent decision on those who don't do anything. I think you'd be surprised how many people would opt out, or not pay attention and then be angry they didn't opt out. My last place was getting a new plan that was automatic enrollment, and on the conference call like 50 people were on, this person interrupted the presenter asking how to opt out before he even finished the sentence.
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Nov 13, 2014 22:48
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I'd never considered retirement planning but an iteration of my previous company set me off on the right foot. The owner was my mentor imparted on me how he though it would be a good idea. Since I've always taken a "long view" of life, it was an easy sell to me that saving the maximum allowed toward the future was way smarter than the junk I was likely spend it on as a young, single guy. And at the time, they matched so it was stupid not to so. Fast forward several years later. The matching had long stopped but seeing the effects of that saving only solidified my beliefs. That company had new management who switched to two different co-employment services. Getting retirement funding set up was made incredibly inconvenient. Lots of paperwork and for each enrollment, a couple of month wait to start. I got the impression that I was the sole employee doing it and felt a small wave of resentment coming my way for making more work for everybody involved. gently caress 'em, but I could see how someone else might think "It would just be easier to not do this." The current company was much the same. But the reaction I got when I told HR to set me up with my standard (maximum) contribution (no matching) was the shock of "Why on earth would you bother doing that?".
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Nov 13, 2014 23:39
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Necc0 posted:No they frankly said that was their reason in their initial announcement. It was quite a breath of fresh air. At my second last job I volunteered to be a part of a team testing a new error management system. I put that thing through. its. paces. I had like 20/30 tickets detailing things that didn't quite work right, while the other people involved all had one or two. I thought I had been a little over zealous but the client we were working for commended me on my good work and gave the other ones a dressing down.
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Nov 14, 2014 02:16
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Sundae posted:My last employer actually sent out an e-mail reminding their employees to use their damned 401(k) accounts because they identified that they were WAAAAY under-budget on retirement matches. Something like 75% of eligible employees were putting away less than 5% of their salary, the amount you'd need to add to receive the full company match. I've forgotten the finer points since studying all this, but it's likely that the top people aren't being allowed to get all their retirement benefits if they're sending out reminders like that. Basically, once someone is being paid enough not to qualify for any of the tax-preferred stuff, there is a new line of options, but they are only available if (I believe) certain percentages are met when comparing what they have for retirement with what everyone else has. It's part of why 401k matches are a thing. They encourage the regular employees to sock away money, which lets the top brass sock away even more money.
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Nov 14, 2014 04:25
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Solkanar512 posted:I don't understand why companies who want employees to use their 401(k)s just don't automatically enroll people set at the percentage they receive 100% matching and default to the appropriate retirement year fund. If you hate that or have other plans you can just change it, but at least it forces a decent decision on those who don't do anything. This is the law in the UK now, every employee is auto enrolled in a pension scheme and you have to opt-out. Great idea considering the amount of people I know who weren't enrolled because they couldn't be bothered.
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Nov 14, 2014 09:35
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ladyweapon posted:My office doesn't currently have a 401K program set up. Theres only four of us, including my boss, for the US based office. The lady who worked here before me didn't want to contribute to a 401k so they never did it. My coworker has been here 15 years and has apparently wanted to start a 401K program, but "never really pushed for it". She outright said she has no retirement savings. I've been reminding my boss to set up the 401K and its being done now with a guaranteed match from the company (percentage currently unknown, but I imagine it'll be a good amount). All I had to do was remind him a couple times to talk to the accountant about setting it up. I've always been curious about what people like that have in mind for retirement. Like, what do they believe will happen when they have no option but to retire (health, etc.) and the paychecks stop coming in? I think in 20 years or so we're going to find out, because there will be lots of old people who weren't lucky enough for pension plans and yet weren't smart and proactive enough to plan their own retirement.
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Nov 14, 2014 10:28
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Generally they're expecting to die before it becomes an issue. In other news updates, three weeks out and I still haven't been paid for a week of time. In a new and shocking twist, they -also- messed up my direct deposit in the process, and rather than call my bank they mailed me a paper check. HR is on my poo poo list.
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Nov 14, 2014 11:12
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Pantsmaster Bill posted:This is the law in the UK now, every employee is auto enrolled in a pension scheme and you have to opt-out. Great idea considering the amount of people I know who weren't enrolled because they couldn't be bothered. This is actually the recommendation of the book Nudge by Keetron fucked around with this message at 13:30 on Nov 15, 2014 |
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Nov 14, 2014 14:04
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As it stands right now I have four pensions, two of them need to be combined when I sort out the paperwork but the other two are state pensions that will just kind of hang around.
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Nov 14, 2014 14:14
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enraged_camel posted:I've always been curious about what people like that have in mind for retirement. Like, what do they believe will happen when they have no option but to retire (health, etc.) and the paychecks stop coming in?
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Nov 14, 2014 14:34
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Also means testing ss or making it a private savings acct.
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Nov 14, 2014 15:13
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Sundae posted:My last employer actually sent out an e-mail reminding their employees to use their damned 401(k) accounts because they identified that they were WAAAAY under-budget on retirement matches. Something like 75% of eligible employees were putting away less than 5% of their salary, the amount you'd need to add to receive the full company match. PurpleLizardWizard posted:I've forgotten the finer points since studying all this, but it's likely that the top people aren't being allowed to get all their retirement benefits if they're sending out reminders like that. Basically, once someone is being paid enough not to qualify for any of the tax-preferred stuff, there is a new line of options, but they are only available if (I believe) certain percentages are met when comparing what they have for retirement with what everyone else has. It's part of why 401k matches are a thing. They encourage the regular employees to sock away money, which lets the top brass sock away even more money. That's the short answer. The top people get their contributions (and/or matching) reduced to maintain an equity ratio across the plan if the underlings aren't contributing (and/or getting matching). The longer answer is that your 401k plan fails the "top heavy" rules put out by the IRS (http://www.irs.gov/irm/part4/irm_04-072-005.html). Basically restrictions come into play if the officers" or "key personnel" (people owning 1% or greater of the company) have assets in the 401k totalling more than 60% of the entire assets in the plan. It's designed to keep corporations from using the 401k as an generous retirement benefits vehicle only for the executives and owners. So are we surprised that your company has issues with a "top heavy" plan?
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Nov 14, 2014 15:19
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My company doesn't have matching. It used to until last year when it was cut because the parent company didn't like it. I learned that if our website ever hiccups in the middle of the night, the CEO of the parent company will call and wake up our director of IT to bitch about it and get him to look at it via VPN, where most of the time he can't recreate the problem. His sleep interrupted, he will be pissed off and grouchy for the rest of the day. I've been told this has happened a number of times.
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Nov 14, 2014 15:23
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OGDanDogg posted:That's the short answer. The top people get their contributions (and/or matching) reduced to maintain an equity ratio across the plan if the underlings aren't contributing (and/or getting matching). I always thought companies pushed 401k contributions because they were getting kickbacks at some level from the plan offerings. My wife's plan only options are different variable annuities. I'm sure someone got something for making that decision. My previous company would send out invites for 'Retirement Investment' seminars that were also annuity sales.
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Nov 14, 2014 16:27
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Keetron posted:This is actually the recommendation of the book Nudge by It's a great book that I really recommend.
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Nov 14, 2014 16:28
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Solkanar512 posted:I don't understand why companies who want employees to use their 401(k)s just don't automatically enroll people set at the percentage they receive 100% matching and default to the appropriate retirement year fund. If you hate that or have other plans you can just change it, but at least it forces a decent decision on those who don't do anything. I mean, I'd love to actually use my company's 401k program, but they'd first have to pay be enough to afford to give up even a small portion of my current salary to be able to do so. If you don't know people's expenses, you're gonna piss them way off if you assume that you auto enroll them to take out a chunk of their money, even if it's something that benefits them long-term.
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Nov 14, 2014 16:36
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OGDanDogg posted:So are we surprised that your company has issues with a "top heavy" plan? It's the pharma industry. That's like asking if there are issues with compensation inequity in the financial industry or if bears do things in the woods. I mean, my first company paid its CEO hundreds of millions of dollars in parachutes to sell off a highly profitable branch of the company and then "spend more time with his family." Sketchy financials are par for the course in this industry.
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Nov 14, 2014 16:54
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Harry posted:We ended up switching, but getting anything below 15% was impossible. Yeah when you see something like a 35% increase you're going to see some sort of increase unless you want a short period of savings followed by being hosed in the rear end so the insurance company can recoup their cost. The insurance companies that undercut will usually just hike the rates back up as soon as a rate guarantee expires to recoup the loss. I've had one extreme case though with a rival company that undercut rates and promised a 4 year rate guarantee...  (me): so we've got no info on the group, can we get something here to get the ball rolling? (broker): I really don't have anything for you, just quote please.: Well okay why are you marketing the plan though?: Oh well you know they were with Insurance Company X, they had a 4 year rate guarantee, that's expired and now they're seeing some heavy increases.: Okay that's reasonable, how big was the increase?: Their health rates went up 900%
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Nov 15, 2014 00:43
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Lyon posted:I live there too and my taxes aren't nearly so ridiculous. I make about half of what Sundae makes but my effective tax rate was 26% based on my last paycheck. 44% just sounds insane to me.  or something.Xibanya posted:PA is hosed up for having local income tax in philly and Pitts (maybe some other places) and a reciprocal agreement with NJ. Oh Christ, this happened to me at my last job. I barely made money as it was, and after working there a while it gets to tax time and lo and behold! The 1% local tax was not withheld by my employer so I had to fork it over all at once. 1% is not a lot in theory but when you make ten bucks an hour, dropping a few hundred bucks unexpectedly is not a happy thing. When I brought home around $14K a year (or whatever it was) I still somehow always owed Uncle Sam come tax season, even after I had my local withholding straightened out. Although most of this is just a "gently caress my former employer" issue.
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Nov 15, 2014 18:00
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yoyomama posted:If you don't know people's expenses, you're gonna piss them way off if you assume that you auto enroll them to take out a chunk of their money, even if it's something that benefits them long-term. This shouldn't be a problem if both the auto-enrollment and the way to opt out of it are clearly communicated to the employee at the time they are hired. I don't think anyone is suggesting auto-enrolling people without telling them.
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Nov 17, 2014 08:34
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enraged_camel posted:This shouldn't be a problem if both the auto-enrollment and the way to opt out of it are clearly communicated to the employee at the time they are hired. Certainly in my company in the UK we had about 6 months of consultation before auto-enroll began, and someone was even hired to manage queries about it and to help payroll deal with pensions and auto enrollment in general. People had no excuse to be shocked about it. It was plastered across out intranet for months, yet still there were people acting all pissy about it like the company was taking away THEIR money.
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Nov 17, 2014 10:09
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Dravs posted:Certainly in my company in the UK we had about 6 months of consultation before auto-enroll began, and someone was even hired to manage queries about it and to help payroll deal with pensions and auto enrollment in general. Exactly. It's not about what actually happens, but the perception of it that people react to. General rule is, don't auto enroll people in poo poo that takes their money unless you want a lot of angry people asking you why you're taking their money. Doesn't matter how many meetings and posters you have about it, either someone will miss it or forget about it. Or someone will be okay with it at first, then their financial situation changes and they'd rather not be enrolled and are now pissed and worried that their money will be taken before they can opt out. Too many possibilities to get into, but you get the idea.
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Nov 17, 2014 15:11
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