business closures/job struggles formerly 'its the waiting that is hell'

[SidelineKick]

A mate of mine lost his job about 6 months ago and is in the process of trainiing to be a driving instructor! Still think theres a shortage of those around - he seems pretty confident he'll get a job quickly enough or go out on his own! Just a thought!

Same here.  Thought that was an original idea alright! He seems confident too and is rightly on in the process!

[thebigfella]

Well I got into work this morning and got told by our head buck cat in the states I was taking a salary cut effective from March. Little does he know their are employment laws in Europe that prevent him from sending a company wide email out declaring this without consulting me and everyone else 

Not Agilent is it?  A few  mates work for them and had a similar mail, kicked off a huge Ruckus!!

Nah, they must had the same idea as our place - seen HP & EDS trying it and though we would all roll over like the Yank's and Indian's and take it.

Problem the is the c**** on the board didn't understand the different employment laws for Europe that were in effect. First of all they tell us the bonus fund is safe and double the dividend to shareholders. A month later get told bonus's have been cut and there are no promotions to prevent pay offs. 2 days later lay off a load of people and start f**king people over on expenses. 2 weeks later get informed without consultation we are taking a pay cut from immediate effect and will continue till they see fit to return it.

A ruckus is not even close to what they started in our place      Personally I would consider it for a period of time to stop more redundancies but as the board has lost the trust of the company, no one is going for it.

I'd say there are very few of us who haven't taken drastic cuts, at times like this employment laws go out the window and the choice has to be either pay cuts or lay offs, of course pay cuts mightn't be enough and the lay offs will probably still happen, but....

I'd be one of the few then    

Actually they lay me off and they are going against their previous criteria for redundancies and will p*ss a pretty major client off by putting a number of high profile projects at risk. Swapping me out of a client site that has signed an agreement to keep me here till next year for another resource (with no experience of what they have to deliver) so they can make me redundant would add up to constructive dismissal.

The problem is also if you work for a consultancy and are billing, like myself, and know how much guaranteed revenue you will make them for the next year, it's a bit hard to swallow pay/bonus cuts ect.... just to save people who are sitting at home (one for 8 months after I effectively removed them from a project myself for their attitude and should have been sacked) who can't be billed out. I don't mind saving the good resources but there is some dead weight in our place (quite alot of people been at home on full salaries since last august) and its caused a complete division. When you read some of the reports I get sent each week for what internal work/training ect... they have done, it's a f***ing joke, especially the team here (expected to take a pay cut) are doing 50/60 hour weeks.

[longball]

Post here early 2day still no news. applied for a couple more jobs this morning.

[muppet]

Aye, Euromillions is £85 million tonight, Jaysus that would be tasty

Got updated this morning, one of the head honchos is coming over on Monday & Tuesday, so there may be a move on things pretty soon. I doubt if he will deliver the news as the top boys normally leave it to other people to delievr the sh1te.

They have taken a lot of our duties off us in the last week, leaving us very fecking little to do.
Just makes it easier for them to deliver the news
Hoping they keep half of us leaving me with a 50/50 chance 

Have you been there longer than most or will that not even come into the equation?  Hope you get on the right side of that 50/50.

Only 2 people have been here a shorter time than me, so I hope the fcuk they dont use last in first out scenario

LIFO is illegal in the North assuming that's where you are.

[muppet]

adviceguide.org.uk

Read the above for the Law for all of the UK but I am fairly sure that Northern Ireland has additional laws preventing LIFO (last in first out) as selection criteria for redundancy. (There may be ways around that such as transferring you out of the North and then doing it).

Phone equalityni.org for some facts, no harm in being fully informed before any such meeting or if you have a union get your rep to do it.

[longball]

FB have u got ur mortgage insured. A lot of the fellas when they got wind of us getting layed off got their mortages insured for loss of job. If u are on notice or protected notice before you make this upgrade the insurance company will not cover u. just a thought!

[longball]

[longball]

seen a sign in a shop in dungannon 2day saying 'closed for crunch' 

[longball]

Any word on ur job yet FB?

[Tony Baloney]

Any Nortel employees here as I hear they are for the heave-ho soon too (again!)?

[Rois]

Where'd you hear that Tony?

[screenexile]

A mate of mine lost his job about 6 months ago and is in the process of trainiing to be a driving instructor! Still think theres a shortage of those around - he seems pretty confident he'll get a job quickly enough or go out on his own! Just a thought!

Same here.  Thought that was an original idea alright! He seems confident too and is rightly on in the process!

Funny you should mention this as I'd seen loads of ads about becoming a Driving Instructor and thought I might go for it until I did a bit of research and it doesn't sound all it's cracked up to be.

http://www.ukadi.co.uk/2008/06/becoming-driving-instructor-dont-do-it.html

[tyroneboi]

Any luck in the post today Longball?

I have an interview for next week so fingers crossed!!

I thought about that RED Driving school as well but read into it and it definitely isn't all its cracked up to be.

[SidelineKick]

In what way lads?

[tyroneboi]

The article which screenexile posted a link to pretty much sums up what i have read about it as well. The training (time and cost) as well as the actual franchise fee seem to be the main difficulties.