Dealing w/ Relocation Package Bait and Switch? 443
An anonymous reader asks: "I got a R&D job offer with a large company in Philadelphia area last week. It includes a relocation package that they told me was standard for my position. After I accepted the offer and made plans to terminate my current job, the recruiter handed me off to their relocation department, where I was told that my relocation package is significantly less than what I was promised. The relocation manager tells me that whenever there is conflict between their relocation policy and the offer, their internal relocation policy supersedes. Is this type of switch-and-bait common practice in corporate America? If you have gone through this nightmare before, any advice on how to respond to it?"
You do (Score:5, Interesting)
refuse the job offer (Score:2, Interesting)
This hurts you personally, but if I were in your shoes, and I was able, I would refuse the job offer. I know it isn't an answer anyone wants to hear, but if everyone did this, it would be extremely effective at stopping this kind of manipulation! The problem of course, is that few of us are able to do this, as most of us live hand to mouth, with little savings. And lets face it, the IT industry isn't as fertile as it was even recently.
Perhaps the next best thing to do would be to publicize the companies with these kinds of practices. That is also very risky, since the company can then turn around and fire you without a reason, and I expect most would do that. So perhaps you don't publicize this practice until you have procured another job.
Perhaps you can talk to a lawyer, but I expect there is little that can be done legally, unless you have a contract which spelled out what you were actually promised...
At the very least you should consider looking for another job. Any company with these kinds of practices won't stop at the relocation packages they promise. I would expect more of this kind of behaviour, and by staying you are rewarding this kind of practice.
Re:Talk to the person who offered the package (Score:5, Interesting)
Why don't they call it personnel anymore?
Talk with your hiring manager (Score:1, Interesting)
If the company does not end up delivering what was promised, DO NOT join that company. DO NOT move your entire life for a company who renegotiated the deal after you accepted it. Even if it wasn't in writing, even if the company might not have even made the offer (maybe it's a contract recruiter talking out of his...?), it doesn't matter. There was a deal on the table, you accepted it, and now after that you're being told, gee, sorry, standard policy, we're not going to honor our end of the deal.
Don't go to work for a company where there's any question about ethics on day one. Usually it takes a while to decide that a company is crooked or incompetent or disorganized. You haven't set foot there and you're already personally getting screwed by this. That bodes poorly. Joining a company and then immediately leaving looks bad on your resume and can haunt you for future reference checks. If you get a bad enough vibe, don't even go.
But give the hiring manager a chance to make it right. If he goes to bat for you and gets the problem fixed to your satisfaction, you owe him. But at least you are coming on board knowing that (a) you have a manager who's going to work to take care of you and do what's right, and (b) your company is not so disfunctional that "policy" trumps doing what's right. If he shrugs and says he can't do anything, what do you think he's going to do the next time the company tries to screw you? Your manager's job is to be your advocate, here's a chance to see if he tries to do his job and whether the company lets him.
So take this as an opportunity to let your potential future employer demonstrate to you their true colors. Think of it as their employer interview.
asdfassdffdsd (Score:3, Interesting)
So write this out and send it off:
Dear Big Company,
I'm afraid the apparent change in conditions of my employment makes it impossible for me to accept the job. While I understand and appreciate that this difference may be an honest mistake, no effort to provide an explanation has been given, and this issue has soured our relationship. While I incur great personal hardship in making this decision at this date, I cannot in good faith accept work for a company that unilaterally changes the terms of my employment.
If you need to, spend a couple hundred bucks on getting a lawyer to write it up for you.
After you work it out . . . (Score:5, Interesting)
I will tell you a related story. I was a consultant on an open-ended contract for 2.5 years. The company re-organized and I was given less than two weeks to either take a 30% pay cut or leave. I immediately started looking for other work, but stuck around for a couple of months while I found a new position. The one thing I did do was to calmly, rationally let everyone that was in a similar position know what had happened. After I left, they gave a whole group of consultants (about 20 people) the same ultimatum. Since they were prepared for the new offer from my story, all of them resigned, simultaneously. The company back-pedaled on the ultimatum and allowed those consultants to stay on under their current terms. It was still detrimental to the company, however, because 10 of the 20 left anyway.
Several of those 20 people thanked me for sharing my troubles because they were better prepared. The details of your experience may help someone else not make the same mistake later. It may even make the business involved change their practices.
Re:Talk to the person who offered the package (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:new one on me (Score:2, Interesting)
ImClone, working through a recruiter, did the exact same thing to me in 2003. The salary quoted on the phone was "in the low 80s" and the relocation package was "we'll arrange the process". When the offer showed up in the mail the salary, in print, was 56 (for New York!!!)and the relocation package was reimbursement up to $2500.
I politely refused to sign the offer and instead got screwed by the other company, Battelle. They were more honest about the salary, in a less expensive area, and they arranged for the full relocation. The job itself, though, turned out to be bait and switch. After four months doing what I'd been hired to do I was thrust into a position which would be more suitable for a high school graduate with some excuse blaming some vaporous upper management decision requiring that resources be reallocated, blah blah blah. There's always some lame excuse.
Other possibility (Score:3, Interesting)
But what it comes down to is which person made a mistake:
A. The recruiting person described the standard package badly or
B. The employee heard/remembered it incorrectly.
Without something in writing, the employee may in fact be in the wrong. That is part of the reason why it is so hard to prove in court. For something like a relocation package, I would definitely want a written, signed copy of what was offered.
If you have that, show it to the relocation guy and say "This is what I was promissed. If I don't get it, I have a valid cause for legal actions. The fact that you have a company policy of ignoring written promisses is neither a legal justification nor is it an ethical act. It will cause the company many problems. Please explain the siutuation to your boss and have him call me back to discuss this extremely important ethical issue."
If you don't have that, your only hope is to call the recruiter and discuss with them what was originally promissed and any compensation you can get if the recruiter agrees the company has reneged on his original offer.
Better Than Offered (Score:5, Interesting)
I accepted a promotion with the company I had been with for two years, but in a different city. They offered full moving expenses, days off and travel expenses to look for a place to live, etc.
Turns out that my wife and I decided to split at that time. Since she got the majority of the household goods (which was totally okay with me), the company agreed to move her to a town that was actually 100 miles further away than my destination, AND reimbursed me for a self-move rental truck for my stuff.
While the split (and subsequent divorce) were tough, my company's compassionate attitude made an unpleasant experience much less stressful.
Re:You do (Score:5, Interesting)
I dunno...jobs I took in the past had everything we agreed upon spelled out in writing. I'd expect no less if I were working salaried jobs again....something I hopefully will never have to do again.
I'd like once again to try to advise those that have some job experience....quit being a salaried employee if at all possible. Never work for free. Always have exactly what is expected of you, and exactly what the compensation is by contract.
This way...you don't get screwed, and neither does the company you work for. Hell, if you're good enough, you don't NEED to relocate...they will pay you a hefty bill rate, often will pay for your air fare for the commute, and maybe even per diem for your time in that location.
And heck, these days...some times you can do your work offsite via VPN, and not even have to leave your home.
Seriously...working salaried, unless you are just starting out...is for the birds. If you incorporate yourself...you get some major tax breaks (read about S Corp breaks here [selfemployedweb.com]) you don't get screwed over by working for free, and you make enough to take some nice time off and travel...etc. Sure, it is a scarey step to take at first (have some FU money saved up in savings first), and there is a bit more paperwork involved...but, worth it in the long run, if you are good enough at what you do to be in demand.
But, at the very least...make sure no matter how you are being employed...get everything in writing. Pretty much everything IS negotiable...and if they won't do that, something is fishy...and you might not be getting the deal you thought you were.
Easy as pie! (Score:4, Interesting)
1) Talk to your recruiter and find out what is happening. This could just be left hand doing something that right hand does not know about. If you don't get this resolved how you want it to be resolved, don't take the job. There is plenty of work out there for people who want to work and have skills. Recruiters and HR in general hate it when this happens. When Amazon.com moved me and the moving company screwed up and I asked my HR rep what to do. They made me sit down and tell them everything about the move so they could contact the moving company and get it resolved. To quote them, "If they screw up your move, we're not happy because you are not happy and we also paid them."
2) Do not act on or believe anything that anyone is saying until you have the written contract to sign. Read it, understand it, don't quit your job until you have signed this and sent it back and the recruiter says they have it. Make it clear that you will not take the job until you get the paper work. Make a copy of everything for your records.
3) If they still screw you over, then you don't have to stay there. You may just work one year and then find another job. The company will lose in the long run because they will not be able to hold top talent. Your life does not begin nor end with a job. Trust me, this will hurt the company in the long run much more than it hurts you.
4) Move on with your life no matter what happens. If you get screwed over, then just suck it up and move on. Don't be bitter and don't hold a grudge (Although, you might suggest to others in the industry not to work there). Just move on with your life and enjoy it.
Re:Talk to the person who offered the package (Score:3, Interesting)
Get a Lawyer (Score:3, Interesting)
You are entitled to the compensation in the offer. Anything less is "substantive dismissal".
You can now NOT work for the company, and receive ALL benefits for a period of at least your probation. Settle out for three months of salary, and all (potential) relocation expenses, signing bonus, etc.
Since you are now entitled to this much, the offer on the table is: (1) you are going to be a nice guy, and accept the original offer, or (2) will accept a payout, or (3) will take a higher signing bonus (to pay for your unanticipated legal expenses), and take the offer.
The ball is in your court.
This is not legal advice -- talk to your lawyer.
Re:You do (Score:1, Interesting)
Sure. It's called your brain doing research.
If you're going to enter into a relationship with a company, you make sure you know as much as possible. Both about the company, and about the laws governing your relationship, and anything else that's relevant.
Complaining that you don't know these things (I've been salaried all my life, and even I know that I should be incorporating if I do any kind of contract work), then really, there's not anyone else who can take the blame.
You can rant and rave about what schools didn't teach you, or what your parents didn't teach you, or what the government doesn't tell you... but at the end of the day, if you're driven enough to make sure you're doing the optimal thing, and not just the easiest thing, you'll find these things out.
Finding stuff out by talking to other people in the same role, doing research *before* taking risks, and talking to people who are smarter than you about stuff you don't understand -- that's how your "privileged" section of society works.
Re:There's more to this: (Score:1, Interesting)
Don't accept relocation to begin with (Score:2, Interesting)
Reality is that all these costs are taxable and added to your income. Further the costs were ridiculasly high. Thousands for the 30 day stay in the furnished apt, a "service" that met with me once and basically just provided a written list of available apts - charged hundreds of dollars, movers who did a great job but were very expensive, in addition since they were storing my stuff for me, the storage costs were very high. In the end, I found an apt on my own so the expensive service was no real help to me at all just a waste of hundreds of dollars.
All told, the relo bill was very high and written into my employment agreement was that I would have to reimburse the company if I left before 1 year. Fine - that seemed very reasonable at the time.
Well, it turned out this company was a nightmare to work for - that was why they had to go to a headhunting service to find someone to begin with. No one local would work for them! Within a couple weeks, I knew I had made a huge mistake but I was stuck since I didn't want to repay the thousands of dollars in all these relo charges. In addition my taxes were higher since all these costs were taxable!
When I did quit (just after 1 year) and move back 500 miles, I used U-Haul and did it for a couple hundred bucks.
Now, my rule is to NEVER ACCEPT RELOCATION. If a company offers it, I will decline. If they need me to start instantly and can't wait for me to move myself, I say NO THANKS to that company.
Two Words... (Score:5, Interesting)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estoppel [wikipedia.org]