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ippy
Joined: 25 Aug 2009
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 Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:47 am Post subject: |
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promised or contracted? This is irking me. Sure retro engineering a policy that actually screws you over AFTER youve been given permission to do something is annoying. But if theyre saying to you that you dont have to come in to school to deskwarm during the days when youre NOT on official leave, and you people are whining about that, im absolutely gob smacked!
What a sense of entitlement some people have. On JET, every summer/winter and easter vacation the teachers scheduled to turn up would pop in for a couple of hours and then go home. I, on the other hand, was stuck there until 4.10 unless i decided to take nenkyu (official paid leave). Id sit and watch movies, but i was still expected to be there. In person. And do nothing. In person.
Fact is, if youre contracted to work, the very least you can do is be available to work ESPECIALLY if you get the absolute luxury of not even having to stay at home, but just inside the national borders of the country.
Dont get me wrong though, if people are complaining about restrictions to their official paid leave that are arbitrary and being forced through via a contract change im all sympathy. But not having to come to school when your contract says youre supposed to! the horror!  |
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calicoe
Joined: 23 Dec 2008
Location: South Korea
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 7:05 am Post subject: |
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| CONTRACTED! Under EPIK, we get contracted leave in the summer and winter, which exceed 14 weekdasy. This thread is now purporting that they will attempt to limit this to 14 days. THAT's the issue, on top of MORE unnecssary desk-warming. |
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BigBuds
Joined: 15 Sep 2005
Location: Changwon
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monkeyteacher
Joined: 05 Jan 2008
Location: near the magic mountain
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 9:56 am Post subject: |
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| As far as the earlier point being made re: Do THEY (EPIK, GEPIK, etc.) have any concept of what a contract actually is/means to a westerner?----A case in point---about one year ago, my GEPIK school told/asked me to teach some extra classes on Saturdays. I pointed to the clause in the contract clearly stating NO TEACHING ON SATURDAY, SUNDAY, OR NATIONAL HOLIDAYS. Clearly my refusal was covered. This was over 10 months into my contract----obviously they had never read it or cared what was in it. Then I drew their attention to the part stating that I was to be given 60 days written notice whether I was being renewed or not, and where was my notice? Then a similar VP/Co-teacher self-interpretation of when a Doctor's note is required for a sick day. So, good-bye, GEPIK school. Oh, and then I had to wait an extra 2 months for my apt. deposit refund and severance. I don't have enough posts to PM, so write me at <[email protected]> if you'd like. |
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cruisemonkey
Joined: 04 Jul 2005
Location: Hopefully, the same place as my luggage.
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:44 am Post subject: Re: New international travel limitations? (Yeosu, Jeollemond |
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| TheUrbanMyth wrote: |
Article 96 (Observations of Collective Agreement)
(1) The rules of employment shall not conflict with laws or decrees or the collective agreement applicable to the workplace concerned.
(2) The Minister of Labor has the authority to order amendment to the rules of employment which is deemed to conflict with laws or decrees or the collective agreement. |
What the hell does article 96 have to do with individual contracts? No FT in Korea (I know of) is a member of a union and has a collective agreement... in fact, it's illegal! |
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Demophobe
Joined: 17 May 2004
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 1:28 pm Post subject: |
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| calicoe wrote: |
| CONTRACTED! Under EPIK, we get contracted leave in the summer and winter, which exceed 14 weekdasy. This thread is now purporting that they will attempt to limit this to 14 days. THAT's the issue, on top of MORE unnecssary desk-warming. |
Seeing this as unnecessary would put you on track with those awful Koreans who view contracts in a similar way. |
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Gillian57
Joined: 14 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 2:25 pm Post subject: |
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| william.mekemson wrote: |
I was told that Seoul sent a memo to ALL cities to start enforcing it this way. The cities sent a memo to the principals. As far as I can tell, it's just a luck of the draw if your principal enforces this or not.
After hearing that some people have to warm the desk all break, I consider myself more lucky that I have "vacation" time even if I have an arbitrary rule stating I must stay in Korea.
I have had lots of people say that they will travel anyway, or that this came up last year and they traveled anyway. I wonder how you'd get caught?
Gillian - how did they find out about your travels? Had you told them before / after winter and before / after summer exactly how long you had been gone for? Did they ask to see your passport? Or did they simply talk to immigration?
That's my biggest worry, is that people will travel without telling their school, thinking that its no big deal, and then immigration tells education, education tells their school, their principal docks their pay big time. If this is even a possibility, I'm not going to risk the travel when the fines are so much.
Most people I know who have had this effect them told their schools because they had no idea that this was the new interpretation, and the schools OKed their travels, either not knowing, or not caring that there would be penalties. Did you receive ANY money in September then? That's a lot of penalties. |
The school was fully aware of our travel plans. There are two native English speaking teachers at my school, me an one other. I am through the JCP program, the other teacher was hired directly through the school. Our contracts are almost identical.
The other teacher had his plane ticket to Canada fully paid for by the school, so they knew exactly how long he was going to be out of the country. I planned to go home over the winter, so I paid my own way to China/Hong Kong. Neither of us knew of the "New interpretation" so there was no reason for us to not say anything to the school. It was not until school started back up and BOTH OF US had re-signed our contracts, that this little bombshell was dropped on us.
When we tried to discuss this with our co-teacher, she threatened TO, and then DID, go all the way back to LAST WINTER and deducted our "Time out of country." She THEN said that if we didn't accept this, she would go back ANOTHER ENTIRE YEAR, and do the same. Needless to say, we both just sucked it up and took our medicine.
And, yeah, September's paycheck sucked big green donkey dicks..... |
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Gillian57
Joined: 14 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:10 pm Post subject: Re: New international travel limitations? (Yeosu, Jeollemond |
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| TheUrbanMyth wrote: |
| william.mekemson wrote: |
Someone else, who had their summer schedule approved by their principal, HAS been fined for each day beyond the limit (a full 1/20th of their month's pay, about)
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From the Korean Standards Labor Act:
Article 95 (Limitation on Punitive Provisions)
If a punitive reduction in wages for a worker is stipulated in the rules of employment, the reduction amount for each infraction shall not exceed half of one day's average wages and the TOTAL AMOUNT of reduction shall not exceed one-tenth of the total amount of wages during each period of wage payment.
(Capital letters are mine for emphasis)
Article 96 (Observations of Collective Agreement)
(1) The rules of employment shall not conflict with laws or decrees or the collective agreement applicable to the workplace concerned.
(2) The Minister of Labor has the authority to order amendment to the rules of employment which is deemed to conflict with laws or decrees or the collective agreement.
What all this means is that they can not deduct more than 1/10th of your monthly wage and that should they do, the Minister of Labor can tell them to shut it and pay back the excess money.
Whether or not he actually will, is of course anybody's guess.
OP was this "someone else" fined 1/20 of their monthly wage for each DAY or was this the total fine for all the days? It's a little unclear. |
I was fined 13.3% of my total September pay and the other teacher was fined 40.7% of his September's pay (he was gone longer than me) To the best of my knowledge, it was a straight deduction--for each day "Out of country," that day's pay was deducted. |
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calicoe
Joined: 23 Dec 2008
Location: South Korea
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 5:31 pm Post subject: |
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| Demophobe wrote: |
| calicoe wrote: |
| CONTRACTED! Under EPIK, we get contracted leave in the summer and winter, which exceed 14 weekdasy. This thread is now purporting that they will attempt to limit this to 14 days. THAT's the issue, on top of MORE unnecssary desk-warming. |
Seeing this as unnecessary would put you on track with those awful Koreans who view contracts in a similar way. |
How exactly? - except in your own limited arguments. Unlike "those awful Koreans," I have honored every bit of my contractual agreements, including the "unnecessary desk warming" when no other Korean teachers are there. In the English version of MY contract, there is nothing that states I get 3 weeks and 2 weeks vacation, with only two weeks to be spent out-of-country. That seems to be becoming a new, retroactive condition.
So please state to me again how I am just like awful Koreans. |
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calicoe
Joined: 23 Dec 2008
Location: South Korea
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 5:36 pm Post subject: |
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| Gillian57 wrote: |
| william.mekemson wrote: |
I was told that Seoul sent a memo to ALL cities to start enforcing it this way. The cities sent a memo to the principals. As far as I can tell, it's just a luck of the draw if your principal enforces this or not.
After hearing that some people have to warm the desk all break, I consider myself more lucky that I have "vacation" time even if I have an arbitrary rule stating I must stay in Korea.
I have had lots of people say that they will travel anyway, or that this came up last year and they traveled anyway. I wonder how you'd get caught?
Gillian - how did they find out about your travels? Had you told them before / after winter and before / after summer exactly how long you had been gone for? Did they ask to see your passport? Or did they simply talk to immigration?
That's my biggest worry, is that people will travel without telling their school, thinking that its no big deal, and then immigration tells education, education tells their school, their principal docks their pay big time. If this is even a possibility, I'm not going to risk the travel when the fines are so much.
Most people I know who have had this effect them told their schools because they had no idea that this was the new interpretation, and the schools OKed their travels, either not knowing, or not caring that there would be penalties. Did you receive ANY money in September then? That's a lot of penalties. |
The school was fully aware of our travel plans. There are two native English speaking teachers at my school, me an one other. I am through the JCP program, the other teacher was hired directly through the school. Our contracts are almost identical.
The other teacher had his plane ticket to Canada fully paid for by the school, so they knew exactly how long he was going to be out of the country. I planned to go home over the winter, so I paid my own way to China/Hong Kong. Neither of us knew of the "New interpretation" so there was no reason for us to not say anything to the school. It was not until school started back up and BOTH OF US had re-signed our contracts, that this little bombshell was dropped on us.
When we tried to discuss this with our co-teacher, she threatened TO, and then DID, go all the way back to LAST WINTER and deducted our "Time out of country." She THEN said that if we didn't accept this, she would go back ANOTHER ENTIRE YEAR, and do the same. Needless to say, we both just sucked it up and took our medicine.
And, yeah, September's paycheck sucked big green donkey dicks..... |
Straight up - when you RESIGNED, then the bombshell was dropped on you, with the totalitarian response that you had no right to protest or you would be punished further.
Very simple - I'm not resigning and giving them that kind of power over me. Bye bye EPIK. True colors come out when they think they have more control because of the market. |
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DWAEJIMORIGUKBAP
Joined: 28 May 2009
Location: Electron cloud
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 5:39 pm Post subject: |
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My understanding with EPIK / GEPIK etc is that it is up to the principal's descretion whether the ft has to desk warm during hols or not. All my
Principals have liked me so made me not do it and I've had nice long breaks.
But they always said that I was supposed to stay in Korea and 'learn about teaching and mke materials etc.'
Of course I just did as I pleased and no-one chekced up.
This is from 2006 onwards.
I guess they're going to start to enforce this one more strongly.
Which is fair enough. Contract staes you get 10 days vacay in summer and 11 in wiinter (differs between programs, I'm in the sticks.)
The 'uneccessary desk warming time' you claim it is is really time you're supposed to spend developing yourself as a teacher and improving your school's English teaching materials etc (you know making new lessonplans, f/cards etc...)
Hey how many folks you know around the world get a paid copuple of weeks to sit at a desk make some bingo cards and watch 'The Office' all day?
Stop being self entitled, whining babies and making yourselve's and the rest of us look ignorant, arrogant, stupid by complaining to program co-ordinators about this kind of stuff.... |
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calicoe
Joined: 23 Dec 2008
Location: South Korea
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:24 pm Post subject: |
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| DWAEJIMORIGUKBAP wrote: |
My understanding with EPIK / GEPIK etc is that it is up to the principal's descretion whether the ft has to desk warm during hols or not. All my
Principals have liked me so made me not do it and I've had nice long breaks.
But they always said that I was supposed to stay in Korea and 'learn about teaching and mke materials etc.'
Of course I just did as I pleased and no-one chekced up.
This is from 2006 onwards.
I guess they're going to start to enforce this one more strongly.
Which is fair enough. Contract staes you get 10 days vacay in summer and 11 in wiinter (differs between programs, I'm in the sticks.)
The 'uneccessary desk warming time' you claim it is is really time you're supposed to spend developing yourself as a teacher and improving your school's English teaching materials etc (you know making new lessonplans, f/cards etc...)
Hey how many folks you know around the world get a paid copuple of weeks to sit at a desk make some bingo cards and watch 'The Office' all day?
Stop being self entitled, whining babies and making yourselve's and the rest of us look ignorant, arrogant, stupid by complaining to program co-ordinators about this kind of stuff.... |
Excuse me, I don't officially complain about "unnecessary desk time" to coordinators or program officials, because it is my OPINION. I self-develop myself as a teacher by getting trained in certificate and degree programs, not by making frickin' bingo cards. All of my lessons are planned and well-presented, with plenty of good, homemade material that they can use again and again.
And, I am not contesting the desk-warming, "non-working" time here. I am merely giving my opinion on that use of time. I am contesting the fact that my contract grants me a finite amount of non-deskwarming vacation days, which now may be dictated to how more than half are spent. If that seems self-entitled and ignorant to you, then I will happily live on in my ignorance as I find a better job with more defined vacation benefits. Some of us actually have choices.
Enjoy your bingo cards! |
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DWAEJIMORIGUKBAP
Joined: 28 May 2009
Location: Electron cloud
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:41 pm Post subject: |
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^^^^^^ What made you think I was specifically responding to YOU? Weirdo. I didn't even quote you! My... someone has a complex...
Neither do I sit around making bingo cards,I was just saying to those that are complaining and quitting over this - wise up, it's not so bad.
Deep breath calicoe, deep breaths. Read, then think for 30 seconds before posting eh.... |
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calicoe
Joined: 23 Dec 2008
Location: South Korea
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:52 pm Post subject: |
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| william.mekemson wrote: |
And as far as I can tell, this is an uphill battle not worth fighting.
The argument about the 14 day limitation on international travel simply comes to this:
My contract (in English) does not say this. But the contract (in Korean) can be INTERPRETED to say this. They claim that this has ALWAYS been the interpretation. But if this was the interpretation for years, then why did it take until now to make the English match the Korean?
But the English is not legal. The Korean is. And they can claim that they have always interpreted it one way, and you can't prove they didn't. Even though logically the English would provide a good hint as to how they interpreted it at the time of the contracts writing.
I was told that Seoul sent a memo to ALL cities to start enforcing it this way. The cities sent a memo to the principals. As far as I can tell, it's just a luck of the draw if your principal enforces this or not.
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Actually, though, your contract is a city contract. Isn't that a different governing authority than the EPIK contracts? I don't think they would be able to enforce a 14-day rule on EPIK contracts, after the fact, but we shall see. There were already attempts during the summer over the swine flu scare.
If they are attempting to restrict how and where your alloted vacation days are spent, that definitely changes the understanding and agreement of personal vacation days, and I would definitely walk.
*edit: However, I am certain they are going to retroactively penalize people for time off they approved. I am just waiting for the resigning/contract ending drama to begin in a couple of months.
Last edited by calicoe on Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:54 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Gillian57
Joined: 14 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:53 pm Post subject: |
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| DWAEJIMORIGUKBAP wrote: |
Stop being self entitled, whining babies and making yourselve's and the rest of us look ignorant, arrogant, stupid by complaining to program co-ordinators about this kind of stuff.... |
I AM NOT complaining about the "Enforcement" of the contract. I am stating that I was NOT informed of this "Change" until AFTER THE FACT. If they want to change the enforcement, FINE. But have the decency to TELL ME FIRST, before I go on vacation, and BEFORE I re-sign for another year! I have been teaching at this school for SEVEN YEARS and this is the first time I have HEARD about this.
I am NOT a "Self entitled, whinng baby" and I am certainly NOT ignorant, arrogant, or stupid. I am simply requesting to be treated like a normal human being.
I have discussed this issue with my Korean friend, who is also a teacher at this school. She assures me that there are times when the Korean teacher's contracts are "Ammended" but that it is NEVER done after-the-fact. They are ALWAYS given lots of warning. I just want the same consideration. |
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