Monday, January 26, 2009

As if it getting a raise wasn't impossible already

Our latest submission deals with one employee's quest to get the wages promised at the interview.

"I am going through a situation with SPS currently even though I've been gone for the past month. After about 3 months working there, I was dense enough to not look at my pay stubs and see that my hiring manager put me on for $7.50 an hour instead of the 8.50 that she told me from the very beginning. And I'm sorry but I know people that work at Target who make more than $7.50 and I'm pretty damn sure if I would have known she hired me for $7.50 I would've rethought my options. However, she said $8.50 and after finally checking my pay stub I realized I was getting gypped.

This is not the first time this particular hiring manager has done this. One of my co-workers overlooked her pay stubs as well and noticed that she hadn't received her two $.50 raises for the past year and when she went to the manager she said she would 'take care' of it and apparently never did. My co-worker later heard from the asst. manager that the hiring manager was almost going to fire her so payroll wouldn't find out that she never updated this girls pay. Fortunately she didn't fire her because if she had that would've counted as a lawsuit against the store and in the end my friend - the co-worker - got back her money which amounted to well over $500.

But now, it's my turn and I was only hired for a seasonal position. I quit before they even got to lay me off and I was told that I would receive my retro-pay with my last paycheck and guess what? I didn't. I'm almost 100% my manager didn't even call or email or talk to payroll about my situation at all."

Anyone else have similar problems? The above problem might not even be the studio manager's fault. I know at my studio, one of the associates had the problem that she was getting paid too much. She told the studio manager who tried time and time again to get it fixed. Eventaully, the associate said "I'm going to tell you one last time and if they can't fix it, they can't fix it."

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was asked to be assistant Manager in January, so i started working the hours (which my husband had to switch shifts for at his work) and doing SOME of the duties..... My manager wouldnt let me do all of them until i was being paid for Being the Asst. Manager.

I didnt get my raise and Title until August.

Anonymous said...

Our payroll person at CPI is impossible to get ahold of. There have even been times when she has been at her desk and chosen not to answer the phone. I know this because each of those times I selected another district's payroll person at the prompt and asked them whether or not our person was nearby. The answer each time: she was sitting at her desk and choosing not to take calls.
With people like this running payroll, it's no wonder that people aren't getting paid correctly. One of our associates was promised a 50-cent raise at the beginning of the busy season and still hasn't gotten it. Now the DM is trying to tell her that she can't give retroactive pay. Bull...shit.

Anonymous said...

When I was a manager, I put in the 50 cent pay increase for the WGTP program for one of my associates. My DM requested it through payroll but it kept not showing up in the associate's pay. My DM had the e-mail/fax she had sent about it over a month prior and she battled back and forth with payroll to get the associate her increase. Payroll was insisting that they could not do retro active pay (which I guess is a policy), but my DM ended up working it out because it was obviously an oversight on the part of the payroll department.

Anonymous said...

Does anyone remember in 2007 when the raises kept getting delayed and delayed? It was a month after we were told we'd get a raise that we finally got it, and there was no retro active pay.

Anonymous said...

I got my review one year and my DM said she didn't know exactly what my increase would be because corporate was having some issue with my original online training--it wasn't showing up that I had completed it for some reason (even though it was clearly on my studio's computer). My raise went through and it was for a 33 cent increase. I called my DM because this seemed like an insanely small increase. She said it should be for more, and she kept trying to get an answer for corporate. Then she ended up leaving the company before there was a resolution. I contacted my Regional Manager who called me and said that 33 cents WAS my increase. I don't know what the real story was. No matter what, 33 cents is the smallest raise in my 15 year job history and it wasn't even 1% of my pay. My studio was really performing well at the time and my review was extremely positive. The raise I got in no way reflected my achievements or contributions.

Anonymous said...

when i started in 2002 i was making $7.00 per hour. i left in 2003 for 6 months and returned. while i was gone our studios payrate was increased to $7.50 my mgr failed to mention it. a year later another associate and i were talking rates (she started when i came back)i learned of the the rates. my WGTP raisees came through but i fought for the extra $.50 plus retro for a year. i got the $.50 after another 5 months of haggling but never any retro which should have been in upwards of $600. It would have taken longer or not happened at all if i hadnt called payroll myself. my mgr at the time never looked into matters like this and i was the only one smart enough to catch on and open my mouth. then came the silly rule that only DM's can talk to payroll they will no accept calls or emails from associates. so imagine how many people are getting screwed. and these are the backs this company stands on.

Anonymous said...

As I've always suspected...CPI really is Cheat People Incorporated.

Anonymous said...

I complete WGTP back in august of last year. I never checked my pay until a few months ago. I never got my raise. Apparently my completion never went through the system so they never gave me the raise. I had to do it all over again - and still havent gotten my raise. Its said "pending" for 4 months now. I can't even get retro pay because aparently it's my fault for not checking to make sure WGTP went through...even though I printed the completetion forms and faxed them to the DM and payroll.

Anonymous said...

Did you keep the forms that you faxed? I would call human resources if your DM can't resolve this.

Anonymous said...

This may be something for the fraud hotline. It happens all to often, and it is not right.

Anonymous said...

I didn't get paid for about 15 hours I worked one weekend. I told my ex-manager (I had just quit a couple weeks before) who said she would get it fixed. I ended up getting paid for about 4 of the hours. I'm so frustrated I gave up. I don't know even know who to begin calling.

Anonymous said...

When I interviewed for the ASM position in April of last year, I was hired on at $12.00/hr. This was my pay rate & at no point did the manager ever mention that it would go into effect WHEN I received the position... 3 months later! I started out at the bare minimum... an insult since I was very experienced with the industry, photography, sales techniques, & management in the industry... $6.50/hour!
Stupid me didn't even look at my 1st couple months of paychecks... I just assumed... ASS-of-U-&-Me!... that they had managed to get my payrate correct. My husband actually pointed it out one day while looking over my pay. I was livid... to say the least... but they did retro pay me for the loss of wages due to the error... but not for $12/hr, nearly double what they were paying me... NO... for $8.50, since I'm not a manager! After working with the company from May until August at... hmmmm... $8.50/hr, I complete my WGTP, both the 1st & 2nd phases. I should be making $9.50/hr at this point, but I never heard anything as far as my raise goes. So until September I was still making $8.50/hr. Then I get my promotion... only 4 months after I started working for the company under the pseudo-manager standing. Instead of factoring in my WGTP raises then getting the promotion, I just get $11.50/hr, still less than the agreed upon amount. NOW!! NOW they're saying no more raises!? HELL NO!! I'm fed up!