Well, where do I begin? I've had the most rollercoaster couple of weeks and although I wanted to avoid using this blog for negative rants and self-pity, I feel that I just have to document my experiences these last couple of weeks in order to get it off my chest and hopefully learn and move on from this nightmare. Here goes....
So.....my last blog was about my shiny new job - a dream come true for me to finally get my big break and put behind me the dark months of unemployment and rough financial times. A very good wage, brilliant benefits, dreams of my guy and me getting our own place suddenly in reach....it seemed too good to be true.
It was.
It was apparent from day one that this start up company was indeed very 'green' and was far from being any kind of established. We had no office
'being refurbished', no kit
'on it's way, just negotiating a deal' and a very small team with a gigantic work load and very little time to do it. But we had an enthusiastic boss, with incredible contacts and a great team of people who were willing and able to put in the hours and hard graft to get these events off the ground - the main one being a 6week festival celebrating films, comics, music and more. So we did what we could given the circumstances and had weekly breakfast board meetings to keep everyone on track and in the loop of what was going on.
We were each sent our individual contracts early on to check over, sign and bring in to get signed by our boss (let's call him 'Lou') and have all of our payment and tax details sorted out. Now, since we were all working remotely from home, apart from the odd meeting, it was a while before we could take these contracts in. The ever busy Lou took my contract and said he'd sign it and get it back to me that afternoon when he found a photocopier. That afternoon never came, but I shrugged it off and figured it was no big deal and that it would get sorted out the next time I was in.
A couple of days later, Lou speaks to all his staff and explains that due to the finance department not starting until June, would we mind if we invoiced him as freelancers for the work we had done, and that he would null and void our contracts, drawing up new ones to start on June 1st along with the payroll. After a few concerns, people agreed, afterall it was only a week or two - no big deal, we would still be paid in full by BACS at the end of May. Sure enough, we got emailed the new contracts the following day and everyone sent Lou their invoices for the work they had done from the start date to the end of May.
Friday. The end of May. No pay. Lou gets in touch to say the payments have been set up to clear on Monday or Tuesday next week. Annoying, but it's only a couple of days to wait for the money.
Monday. No pay. Suspicions are raised but we'll give him the benefit of the doubt and wait til Tuesday before we question it.
Tuesday. No pay. A bunch of staff go in to confront Lou first thing about where our money is. Rumours start flying around that Lou owes a lot of people a lot of money, including the company within which our offices were to be based. In response Lou sends all of the staff a confidential email apologising for his cock-up and explaining that he was waiting for money from another source, which had bounced - and was unable to pay us until this money cleared. He apologised profusely, genuinely embarrassed and sorry that he'd screwed up - but that he was chasing up the money owed to him, and that he was in the process of finalising sponsorship deals for our festival and that he would soon be back on track and that things would be fixed by the end of the week. He asks everyone what they would like to do in the short term, stop working until the money comes through or continue work without pay.
After much stress and consideration, I tell Lou that I am willing to continue work, but that I could not spend any of my own money on commuting in, until my pay cheque comes through. Despite the fact that cracks are beginning to show in Lou's method of working, a job is a job to me and I'm not in a position where I can turn down full time work, plus I want to ensure I get paid before I make any rash decisions about finding work elsewhere. Afterall, if this guy is genuine , he'll have it sorted in a couple of days and everything will pick up, including the payroll.
The following day, I email my design colleagues to discuss what the work load for the day is. AK, tells me to hold off on everything as he's been hearing more and more bad shit about Lou, that he owes one company £80k and that he's been booted out of the office space we'd been based in. As the day goes on, more and more rumours come to light including major news that none of the acts or events for our festival have been confirmed (the festival is due to start in two weeks and Lou's been telling us from day 1 that all content is confirmed and locked down). People start talking about looking for new work as they think it's going to fall flat on it's face. I'm panicking at this point, and start to get upset. We've heard no further news from Lou himself, despite our efforts to contact him and things are generally looking bad.
That evening, all staff members (minus Lou) get sent a confidential email from one of the project managers explaining that a bunch of staff have done their research on this guy and discovered that the situation is a lot worse than we realised. There is stuff all over the internet about Lou and about our festival, with people calling it a scam, a con and a joke. Some of it is unbelievable and my hopes in keeping the job start to crumble, let alone the idea of ever seeing any money. The staff arrange a meeting in London to share all the details (which I can't afford to attend as I haven't been paid!), and my colleagues bring me up to speed that they were looking into the legalities and that everyone will stick together and not walk away from the fight in getting the money owed to us.
We wait two days before we get an update from Lou himself. He name drops all these companies that he is negotiating sponsorship deals with and sounds positive about things being finalised in terms of money and new acts for the festival. He apologises many times again but builds all of hope up in the idea of the event going ahead as planned, as well as a written confirmation that we will get paid in full. Good news at last!
The next day and Lou updates us again - things are falling into place and getting finalised including confirmations of festival guests and specific monetary amounts that are due to come in. Things are looking up, and he tells us we'll get paid early next week. Relief! Maybe the rumours were just rumours and this guy just made some stupid mistakes. I start to grasp at the hope of retaining my job.
To give his claims more weight, and fill us with more hope - one of the project managers (and one of the biggest cynics) emails all of the staff to say that Lou has pulled something out of the bag and has got the festival back on track, with a different line up, but great all the same. She admits that he had been irresponsible and made a huge cock-up, but that he was turning things around. My hope pics up and I start sleeping better over the weekend. Looks like I still have a job afterall, and although it's a bit sketchy - I need the full time work and the brilliant wage, so as soon as I get paid, my worries will be over. Phew!
Friday, and Lou sends a new update. Things have been slow in terms of responses, and he won't have anything concrete until Monday but he is confident that it will be positive. He says he is scaling the festival down (great news) to a more manageable size, and that all money will be locked down and transferred by end of play Monday. I look forward to a more stress free weekend and although I'm still skeptical - it's just a case of waiting now.
Monday comes and we're all waiting by our emails anxiously. Lunchtime. No news. Dinnertime. Still no news. Concerns start flooding back as nobody across the staff base has heard anything.
Tuesday....it's not until the afternoon before we finally get an email from Lou. It goes something like this:
'Due to financial problems causing serious cash flow troubles, I have decided to completely scale back the company and will now be operating with a skeletal staff structure until further notice. I will contact each employee individually by the end of the day to update them on their position within the company and the money owed to them.'
As a final f*ck you, he adds that he would not be paying for the time since his original email saying we could stop work or work without pay.
And so we wait. Do I have a job anymore? Do I have a
full time job? Are we actually ever going to see the money owed? Is this legal? etc. I get upset again. I'm hardly a core 'skeletal' member of the company - I'm in a junior position. I start to feel very vulnerable, and although I don't really want to work for this guy after the last two weeks, I'm grasping at straws. I can't be unemployed again. I just can't.
2hrs, 4hrs, 6hrs - No news. I hear of one guy being dropped, but no news of anyone else. The nerves are getting worse and worse, I feel like I'm waiting to be executed or something. Surely he won't be cruel enough to leave us stewing over night.
Wednesday, still no news. A bunch of us email Lou, but with no response. I have no idea where I stand in terms of the company, and the wait is torture.
Thursday! Still no word from Lou. Nobody knows if they are employed anymore, but we're all assuming the worst. What a joke. What a dick. How can he leave people hanging like this? I get an email from AK, he says he just ran into Lou and arranged to meet him for a meeting to get to the bottom of what was going on. Later that night we get an update from AK. Still nothing from Lou though, when will he face up to us? AK explains that there are 5 confirmed staff remaining in the company as well as Lou who are continuing to work on the events. When was Lou going to tell the rest of his staff that they had been dropped? Did he think everyone would go away if he ignored us!? The story now is that the three areas of the company have now been scaled down to one, and whilst we're lead to believe everything is signed off for the festival - we won't receive payment for the work we did in May until the end of June! A month overdue. And still.... it's only a promise of money.
Well, to end my incredibly long-winded story (I wonder if anyone has actually read the whole thing).....it seems I am out of employment and my god I took it pretty hard Thursday night. I was just devastated. How would I tell everyone who had been so proud of me when I landed this job? How would I face all the family at the weekend who would ask me 'so how's the new job going'? (which they did, by the way!). How awful it is to feel the need to validate ourselves to other people with a career. I literally feel ashamed of myself when I'm not working and my self-confidence just drops to below zero.
But, enough of the self pity, nobody wants to read that. Although this nightmare will undoubtedly continue for a while, this chapter ends with the possibility of freelance design work over the next few weeks for this company, and the potential of a full time job there one day, but no certainty that I'll ever see any of the money or that it's all legit.
'Lou' still hasn't been in contact.
Sorry for the really long post, has anyone else got any employment nightmares to share?
