Laughing at other people’s misfortune has a way of coming back and biting you in the ass in the future.
Not sure where you’ve gotten the impression that I’m a PhD, as I’m mostly certainly not. …thanks? I think? Also, it’s not a particularly esoteric field. It’s just smaller than I feel comfortable revealing here, given the sensitive nature of the topic to me. I’d rather be safe than sorry in this situation. Especially if legal action is on the table.
As requested from the letter:
“We are pleased to confirm your employment with <work> as a <job> with a salary of X per annum.” The rest of the letter is just details about benefits/forms.
I did meet with the supervisor today. Basically, I was supposed to know this already (huh?) and they’ve always done things this way. In other words, tough luck. Apparently, I should have realized salary x was too high.
There’s a chance I could move to a different division here, although it wouldn’t entirely fix the financial stuff. It would get me away from these people, whom I no longer trust. Or I could look into changing jobs entirely - I’m not sure about this. It would be highly satisfying in the short term, but it would be farther from home and would involve going through the hassle of moving again, finding health insurance, screwing over my roommate, etc. I’m not sure that the net positives outweigh the net negatives. I’m looking into the different division option, since I think that’s the best I can hope for at this point. I really should be used to being screwed by my work by now. It appears to be a recurring theme.
IANAL, but this sounds like a pretty good basis for a lawsuit.
It will continue to be so, if you don’t fight back.
Is “we are pleased” some sort of term of art for “the rest of this sentence is a lie”? Otherwise, sounds like you have been defrauded.
What percentage of the full-time salary are you receiving?
You certainly appear to have grounds for an employment practices suit. You should at least be able to get an initial consultation with a lawyer for less than $100. At that point, you can decide if you want to file suit, or just threaten your hr department with a suit (at which point they would hopefully start paying you what they promised [and possibly looking for reasons to get rid of you]). You owe it to yourself AND every other prospective staff member at that shithole to pursue this, if you can possibly afford it. Because if they do this all the time, as they claim, they are quite likely breaking employment laws all the time. Stand up for the little guy, even if you don’t care about yourself.
If nothing else, you very well may be able to collect unemployment if you quit, because they subtantially changed the terms of the offer without informing you first. Consult with an employment lawyer in your state (again, consultations aren’t horribly expensive, even if you eventually decide not to go that route).
This does not constitute legal advice, I am not a lawyer, and please do not quit your job without talking to a lawyer in your state! (or having a backup plan/savings) I don’t want to be responsible for causing your bankruptcy.
I know a lotof employeers tell there employees they are exempt. There are some true exemptions for non supervising employees. Retail stores are finding this out. There are a lot of assistant store managers that are recieving checks because the NLRB said they are not exempt.
Well, when I work “overtime” I get comp time, so it’s not an issue for me.
For the OP, on the other hand, this is definitely grounds to at least SEE a lawyer. You don’t have to do anything! But if you see a lawyer and your lawyer craps his pants and picks up the phone and calls his wife and says “Eat dinner without me”, yes, you have to stick with it. If nothing else, for the same reason why rape victims have a responsibility beyond themselves to report - other people are getting the same thing and they might not have the guts to do anything about it.
(Do you know how many times I accidentally wrote something about “other people are getting fucked” there? Do you know how hard it was to not accidentally be insensitive after my bedtime and three glasses of wine? That’s how much I care about you.)
However, document it. Before the meeting, write down the questions you want to ask. This will help you to stay on topic if they try lead the conversation elsewhere. After the meeting, write down the date, time and who you spoke with. Document the answers you received to your questions and note other discussion topics you thing were important.
The answers may come in handy if you find you need to talk to a lawyer. Yes, this sounds like they are abusing your goodwill and giving you crap wages for your work.
Not at all - someone could well work a part-time schedule, with the general assumption that your “normal” work week is, say, 3 days a week or 24 hours a week, with reasonable overtime as required. I did this for some time after each of my kids was born. I’d occasionally do a few hours here and there, with no expectation of overtime (so for example I frequently charged 26-27 hours a week to the client), but rarely did any work those other days.
There’s “salaried, work what it takes to get the job done” and there’s “slavery”, which sounds like what the OP has signed on for.
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Continue to pursue another job, you’d be a fool to do otherwise. (250miles is not the end of the world, you need to get over that. Your roommate is not ‘getting screwed’, by your leaving early. It happens all the time with roommates. Give them as much notice, in writing, as you can and stop feeling freaking guilty about it.)
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Consult an Attorney. Request he send them a letter saying, you’ve retained counsel, counsel feels there’s a strong case, client wants to give employer an opportunity to make things right before proceeding to court, against the lawyers advice. Any retaliation on the client will result in more law suits, you have one week to make things right for client, if they’d rather not, you’ll see them in court.
Then, I’d wait and see what shakes out. If this is their practice, well, they deserve this to be pursued.
You got tricked, you got screwed. The question is: What are you going to do about it?
(I’m betting lie down and keep taking it. If you start letting yourself get taken in, at this stage of your work career, over something as important as your wages, your future looks mighty dim to me.
Having to shift jobs again, the annoyance of moving, the leaving of a roommate, a further distance to travel, all seem like excuses/justifications for avoiding doing the ‘right’ thing-stand up for yourself.
I say, they knew exactly what they were doing, when they hired you, correctly assessing that you would complain but, in the end, just suck it up. I think they’re right.)
Not at all. I’m not in a supervisory role and I’ve always been “exempt”.
I don’t know what the legal requirements are for determining exempt vs. nonexempt, but supervision is not one of them.
Hmmm, it sounds as if you already have a reputation, and it’s one you should strive to change ASAP. Don’t continue to be a doormat.
I won’t tell you not to seek legal counsel, but I imagine the company could easily make your life a living hell if you win a lawsuit and they are legally forced to pay you more than they want to. You may or may not wish to put yourself in such an environment. Suing for back pay once you’re gone from there might be a good option, though.
My advice is to pursue the other job. If you get an offer, take it – even if it’s less than you currently make – as long as they are honest about the pay. Then, when you quit your current job, tell them exactly why you are doing so, in writing, copied to multiple executives. I would avoid using words such as “tricked” or “scam.” Be very professional but also very clear that their actions were unacceptable. Get a reputation as someone who doesn’t take shit lying down. (And as one who does excellent work, of course!)
Aha - cite!
I think my own job would fall under the heading of “exempt professional” or “exempt administrative”. And of course I collect the same salary even if I work fewer hours (though some may be charged to leave).
Was there a position announcement or anything you might still have a copy of? Maybe it states that it was supposed to be a full time position in it.
I’m sorry, but I cannot endorse the ‘find an attorney’ strategy. I have no doubt that if this company/university screwed over the OP, that they have their legal bases covered by the fact that the OP herself agreed to the position under the sketchy terms of the offer, which were vague to begin with and could obviously be interpreted multiple ways. I’m guessing the stance of the company/university is that she is free to quit if she doesn’t like it and it’s probably an at-will state. If it really is as small a field as the OP says it is, one certainly does not want the reputation of being someone who sues their employer, even if the employer is in the wrong, and given that money is the issue here, I’m sure most lawyers will want money up front that the OP doesn’t have. I’d pursue the other job as quietly as possible.
I’ve experienced similar screw jobs myself in two different jobs. When I was getting my MBA, a company told me they were offering me a job at a specific salary at graduation, which caused me to stop interviewing, then never sent the paperwork and changed their mind. At another job, I left a company for a $20,000 raise at a new one. A year after that, despite having a very successful year, the CEO decided that the economy was tanking so he could get someone to do my job for less money, and he gave me a $30,000 pay cut with ‘bonuses’ that would allow me to get back to my old salary $5,000 at a time. Yeah, except he would determine what qualified for the ‘bonuses’ and because they would be ‘bonuses’, they would be taxed at a much higher rate. No thanks. I got out of there as fast as I could. My policy is get everything clearly stated in writing so there is no question about it. I don’t worry about pissing off HR people with my “dumb” questions when something is vague in a job offer, and if they press me about it, I would simply explain that I didn’t want any misunderstanding since I have to move, etc.
What is “sketchy” about a written offer for a specific salary?
An at will position can be terminated at any time, for any reason. But they still have to pay for the time already worked, at the salary they offered when the employee was hired. “At will” really doesn’t have anything to do with the dispute the OP is having about salary.
A verbal offer isn’t worth the paper it is printed on. Not the same as the OP at all, who had a written offer at a specific salary.
I also say ‘wait on bringing in the lawyer’. Not because I think you have no chance, but because it would screw up your relationship with your employer. Until you know that relationship is toast, don’t let them know you’re working with a lawyer. And even then, you’d need to decide what a lawyer would get you – at best a few weeks of back pay, because if a lawyer gets involved, you’re not keeping that job long term, right?
Which isn’t to say you shouldn’t be prepared if things end up going that way: document everything (save e-mails, especially save copies of any relevant e-mails on your work account to your own computer), write down exactly who said what in important conversations, and so forth.
But before you start talking legal issues, always try and resolve things informally. Who knows, maybe there was a screw-up on their end somewhere that they’re willing to make right.
So first of all, tell your boss that you’re surprised. Don’t be angry, but let them know that this was a big surprise to you. Point out that you’ve been working full-time in expectation of a full-time salary (show the e-mail with the full-time salary offer). Make it clear that you really can’t work full-time for a part-time salary. Ask your boss how this is going to be resolved (are you going to get a real salary, or are you going to start working part-time?). Depending on your relationship with your boss, and how much you think they really want you, as opposed to any other replacable warm body, you might want to hint that your long-term goal is full-time employment (so if they choose to go with your part-time, they should expect you to leave at some point fairly soon).
And of course, if they tell you ‘no more money, sorry’, you have to tell your boss "OK, then no more hours than 30 (or whatever forty hours is prorated according to what you’re being paid), sorry’, and stick to it (“Sorry project X wasn’t done, but my time’s up. See you next week, boss”). Of course, write down everything, and if things are resolved to you being part time, write down the details and e-mail it to your boss to make sure both of you agree.
You’re not going to get a bad reputation for calmly standing up for yourself as far as being clear whether you’re in a full-time or part-time situation.
What Quercus said. Just walk in and act VERY surprised that your paycheck is what it is. Tell them there’s been a mistake and you really need it corrected ASAP. It might have been an unfortunate error.
You shouldn’t really have to ACT surprised or shocked, because you are/were, and had very different expectations, for very good reasons. So, yeah. Burden’s on them, not you. Keep reminding yourself of that.
Whoops - that’s completely wrong, or at least misleading.
Bonuses are taxed just like regular income. On April 15th, your 1040 has no place to record bonuses vs. salaries, and the tax tables don’t count them any differently.
Withholding, on the other hand: yeah, typically a bonus is subject to a flat-rate withholding, vs. being calculated as if it were just another paycheck. 25% seems to be typical (and it’s often higher than what you’d have withheld from a regular paycheck of the same amount, because it doesn’t account for withholding allowances etc.).
But it all nets out in the end. Say your monthly pay is 4,000 and they withhold 600 dollars from that. One month you get a 4,000 bonus, so they start out at 4+4 = 8,000, subtract out the 600 for the regular income, and 1,000 for the bonus (let’s ignore state, social security etc. for now).
If your annual income winds up netting out to, say, a 15% tax rate, you have a bit of a refund coming. You’ve paid 8200 dollars (600/month plus the 1,000). Your income is 52000 (4000 a month plus 4,000 bonus). 5200 + 2600 is 7800. So you’re due a refund of 400 dollars.
/hijack