Job Discussion Forums

[Moore]

After finally gettting an "asesor" (accountant) to do my yearly taxes I discovered that loads of schools are using a rather shady (and very widespread) practise to pay you a lot less than you think you're getting.

Basically, until I became an "autonomo" (freelancer) halfway through 2007, I was on a contract from my school, where they paid me 16 euros an hour.

Only they didn't, or rather, not entirely. I assumed, naturally, that what you got at the end of the month was yours, all the normal rate of tax and social security having been taken out at source like any other Spanish job. But because it's a temporary 10-month contract they are able by law to only deduct 2 percent tax, instead of the 12 percent that most Spanish people get deducted every month so they don't end up getting a nasty surprise when they do their tax declaration.

At the end of the year, assuming you stay in the country and reach the tax threshold, then you will be asked for the other 10 percent come summer: if you work an average of 90 hours per month over 9 months, that works out at a 1300 euro tax-bill in summer when you're already at your financial limit.

So the bottom line is that you are not being paid (for example) 16 euros per hour, but 14.40 per hour. So basically, when you accept a job, ask for (for example) 16 euros per hour NET at a twelve percent tax rate, that way at the end of the year you will owe nothing at all or maybe even get a rebate.

Personally I feel totally ripped off by my school (I don't know why this surprises me really, they are all total cowboys here in Madrid), and now realise I've been paid loads less than I thought for years.

I know that at the end of the day the responsibility for finding out all this stuff is your own, but basically schools will not tell you unless you specifically ask, which I think is really rather dodgy.

Conclusion: check how much tax your school is paying or you may have a very ugly surprise waiting for you when you least need it.


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[Insubordination]

Thanks, planning on working in Spain after the summer so this is good to know. Bummer about your tax bill. You'd think they'd have advised you. when you signed up.

[Bradfrd12]

Moore-

You got doubly duped actually. You have hit the nail on the head but it goes further than that and I will gladly enlighten anyone looking to get a job in Spain.

It's tough but this is it. Technically, as of 2006, it is illegal to offer a seasonal worker a temporary contract. Temporary contracts are for a specific amount of time and a specific job or project. For example, helping to construct building X from Jan. to Oct. or picking these strawberries from this month to the next. (I do not want to get into immigration contract issues so don't try to argue my examples, please. I understand full well the dodgyness of all construction companies and industrial farming operations.) Bringing back the same employee every September on a temp. contract until May or June is illegal. They have to offer a "contrato indefinido" which specifies the duration of the work, time off, and compensation for said work. This is very "bad" for any academy as it obliges them to pay soc. sec. (37% of contracted wage/month) through the summer non-income months. So what happens is that many jump through the massive loop hole and only hire people on for school year thus effectively shooting down anyone's hope of trying to make a long term living teaching English in the private sector (at least with any hope of any decent pension).

It is quite bureaucratic and I haven't touched the tip of the complexity iceberg here. I have had many many conversations with my account and lawyer over this and I came to one conclusion. The teacher gets taken for a ride because the academies are taken for a ride. It's not a justification but it is the cold hard reality. And this is why many academies are very dodgy and very underhanded when informing their employees of their rights.

[barmadu]

Excellent reply Bradfrt, but it brings about the question, hat can we do about this? Many of us are married here, have kids or are thinking about, trying to buy houses etc...It is simply insane to think of a future of 9month contracts. Spaniards do have a proper sense of justice and injustice and there seems to be places to go to fix these things...but the WHERE is not always evident.

Any ideas as to what to do and where to go in these cases?

Should we form some sort of list, naming all the academies who do what they should (i.e the indefinido contract)? Or is there one out there?

There are many "english teachers" out there in Spain, but those of us who have plans to stay long term are limited. Organization seems to be the key, no?
[url]troyshouse.blogspot.com[/url]

[sheikh radlinrol]

[Bradfrd12]

Ok.....

I have read your comment and have taken a few minutes before answering so I don't say anything out of line.

Please let me believe that when you say " the kind of outfit you run" you are not referring to me personally because that would be quite aggressive seeing as that you don't know me or my academy.

Who takes the academies for a ride? That's a very good question and looking back at my previous post I can see where that would be confusing. Let me say that first of all the gov't does not help at all in making the process for opening an academy easy. You can't just get a place and say ok I'm going to give classes here. The regulations an academy has to meet to open are quite costly. Second, having an academy has overhead that needs to be covered (teacher's pay, rent, books, utility bills, etc...) which free lance teachers don't have. This leads to academies generally charging higher prices for their services. However, every company and potential client is trying to get cheaper and cheaper services (which is their right) and therefore forces academies to try to directly compete with freelance teachers. Their is no competition. In the end academies try to offer classes for lower prices in order to get some business and this translates into lower wages.

So when I say academies are taken for a ride I mean to say that the situation is not as easy and straight forward as it appears. At the same time, I don't mean to say that all academies are legit operations that deserve the benefit of the doubt. A lot of them are dodgy. The only way, in my opinion, to get these schools to change or close is to boycott them. Within reason of course.

You will never get an academy to give you a 12 month contract for 9 months work. It's not feasible or fair on the academy and the gov't should know that. And the only way to afford that would be applying prices for classes that no one would pay. There are a couple of things though that I feel academies should offer. For example, you can get an academy to give contracts for all hours worked. I DO IT FOR MY TEACHERS! I also pay all school holidays. I don't think that's too much to ask either from a school. These are a few examples of things that schools should offer and that many don't.

To make a long post just a tad longer. I have to admit that it makes me angry when someone tries to do things by the book and treat people decently while at the same time trying to run a successful business in a difficult sector. I don't care what anyone says, academies do NOT make that much money. If they did then I would have a new Lexus instead of a 13 year old Opel Astra and all of the people complaining about academies would run one and get minted.

My advice to any job seekers: Approach academies knowing what is reasonable and what isn't. Know that you are getting into a field that doesn't pay very well (in Spain) and probably never will. It's not the best occupation to rely on for raising a family but it is possible with a bit of work because in the end that's what this is; work. And if you don't like what an academy offers you, don't take the job. If you don't find a job then I guess find another field or country.

I've been teaching now in Valencia for going on 8 years and have had my own academy going on 4. I have a working wife, 2 daughters, a mortgage, and a car. Teaching English has helped provide these things.

Good Luck to all and please no more generalizations on the types of academies run in Spain.

[barmadu]

Hi Bradford

I don't think that people here are saying all academies in Spain are bad, but I do think that caution should definitely be thrown to the wind, some very bad ones are out there. Teachers who come to Spain also tend to be first-timers and need all the help they can get.

I congratulate you on your offering contracts for all hours worked. You say you have been open 4 years and seem to be doing well, which means that it is in fact possible to do. What we as professional teachers have to do is demand this. Together with a little solidarity rather than undercutting each other out of existence, I really think that this can be achieved and if forming a professional Union is the way, well then so be it.

A Union like this wouldn't be a threat to "good" academies, but would actually be a help. It would show the academies and their clients that their teachers are in fact professionals who do this for a living, train to improve and are not backpackers on a gap year.

Good post

And to add one more thing, remember that the Spanish government is now sending letter directly to workers stating exactly how much their employers are claiming they work and how much social security they are paying. Read it carefully, as it is hard to understand for the laymen and if your academy has been cheating you, go directly to the Ministry of "Trabajo"...another way of weeding out the bad guys.

[Bradfrd12]

I couldn't agree more with the fact that there are a lot of really bad academies out there. Certainly.

I do want to make sure that I make myself clear on one thing though. I think that a English teachers' union would be the death of English academies as a whole, bad and good.

Although I am doing my best to comply with all laws I cannot. It's impossible. For example, I am just not able to put a returning teacher on a 12 month "indefinido" contract, which I must do by law, if I'm not mistaken. It's quite simple actually. I also take a massive hit in the summer. I cannot afford to pay rent, utilities, etc on the academy plus my bills at home and then on top of that teachers' social security payment which, by the way, is 39% of what they earn. A LOT! So a teacher on a 1000� contract will cost me 1390� a month. Now, again, I don't mind paying this while I can but in the summer it's just insane and I guess this is at the bottom of what I was saying when I made the comment that "academies get taken for a ride" in another post.

So, while I agree that there are bad academies out there and they need to be weeded out I think that a union that applies the law as it is written would spell disaster for the would-be good schools because I know a few good schools and can promise you that they are ducking a few laws too.

One very simple solution for good teachers is to go "autonomous" or freelance. Now you would have to pay your own soc. sec. but I, for example, would be willing to pay a higher wage knowing that I am saving the soc. sec. What it amounts to is a share of the sec. soc. I pay and a share you pay or I pay it all during the school year and you pay it during the summer. The downer to this is that you will not be able to claim unemployment in the summer as a lot of teachers do. You would have to pay what I am trying to not pay in the summer. And thus you see the way it works.

Of course going "autonomous" isn't a bowl of cherries and will have it's ups and downs. But if you properly educate yourself on it you will not be taken for a ride (as Moore duly warns us in the first post).

[sheikh radlinrol]

Bradford
Do the teachers you employ make enough money to get a mortgage on an apartment? Are they able to run a small car? Can they afford a decent annual holiday? Can they save? Are they paid 1,300 euros a month (every month) with two extra annual payments?

[Bradfrd12]

This is a waste of time but needs to be said if I am going to take time out of my day to write these. I don't mind trying to help and work for a better teaching sector in Spain but let's keep it productive. Otherwise, it's just a waste of time.

sheikh radlinrol.

Are you trying to provoke me now?

At first I thought you were serious and therefore tried to answer as best I could. Now there have been several great posts on this thread and another (why do we take it every year?) that have been answering the questions you have just posted. If you are not going to read the posts then maybe it's better you not post. If you have read the posts and insist on asking redundant questions then no one will take you seriously and see that you are just trying to digress and keep the conversation moving in a ridiculous circle.

Please refer to my older posts for the answers to your questions.

[sheikh radlinrol]

I'm not trying to provoke you or anybody else. I'm asking legitimate questions which you have chosen to avoid answering. I will assume that answers to my questions are NO.
Regards
SR

[sheikh radlinrol]

[Bradfrd12]

This is my final post here.

I hope that everyone can find their ideal job and that all's well. I know I'll be busting my ass in order to try to give my teachers the best positions in Spain.

It's a sad day when one answers his own post with an "i assume" without reading....

Sheikh and his cynical hate-ridden posts have accomplished nothing except marginalize the people that are actually trying to make heads or tails of the situation. So be it. If this forum is to be trolled by such people I see no place for me.

Again, I wish everyone the best.

[jonniboy]

It's quite obvious why salaries are so low in Spain - lots of academies and lots of teachers is hardly a recipe for a high wage profession. As for playing it by the book, who does? It would be great if I could charge my students enough to pay social security on all my private classes but I know if I tried that, there would always be some clown somewhere doing it under the table and so rather than increase prices by 50% or cut my earnings by 50% it's easier just to cut corners and work cash in hand. Academies are in the same boat and until standards are enforced across the board by the central or regional governments the situation isn't going to improve.

[Moore]

I think Jonniboy has got it right when he says there are too many academies: in Madrid especially there seems to be an insane "race-to-the-bottom" where academies try to charge ever less for classes whilst promising ever higher standards of feedback/quality control/experienced teachers etc, and while trying get enough teachers to cover the crucial early morning/lunchtime/evening classes. Teachers wages for these classes are creeping up steadily, especially for those with EU papers and especially for autonomos. The effect is that schools profit margins are taking a battering. If they try to raise their rates, the client will simply pick up the next language school brochure that arrived on their desk and call them and they will be more than happy to gt their foot in the door with a new client, even if that does mean a wafer thin margin.

This means that the problem is that it is almost impossible for these schools to pay their teachers over summer (and most autonomos are not paid over Christmas or Easter either). Not such a problem for people who are just here for a year or two, but those who stay and who (like me) resent the idea of going off to the UK for 2 months to teach there, or teaching a bunch of brats in some summer camp, it's really a problem.

At the end of the day, Spain is a very difficult place to work in for the whole year - our wages are excellent in comparison with a typical Spanish workers wages, but they are paid every month and often have 14 pay packets per year. We take a hammering when we least need it: at Christmas and in summer.

Basically the only immediate solutions to this are:

1) Work like a demon during "term" time: do 30 hours a week for 9 months per year and you won't need to work over summer ...the drawback here being that you risk burnout and it's not always that easy to find 30 hours work per week. Also many teachers are rubbish at saving up, so spend what they earn during these months.

2) Suck it up and accept going to the UK over summer/go off and do Spanish summer camp ...the drawback with this one is that you are supposed to live in Spain, not the UK, that if you have a girlfriend/wife you don't want to leave them, and they will not be best pleased if you zip off to the mountains to spend your evenings getting boozed up with other teachers, which is their real attraction for those younger teachers who do them.

3) Get an alternative source of income: translating, a small business, doing something freelance from Spain in the UK via internet ...the drawback for this being that it's a lot of work, you need the right business, and some things are not do-able over the web.

..in terms of striking, that's really a non-starter: people just can't afford not to go to work and if you do have hours with an academy that are desirable, which hopefully you do, then someone will quickly take them.

...a blacklist would just attract negative comments from dissatisfied workers with a chip on thier shoulder about a company: I've seen schools that I KNOW treat their teachers well (which are a rare thing) have problems with teachers once in a while, and these are the loons who usually make a big fuss.

The only way to be sure of getting better money is to try and work for academies who place quality of teaching staff above all, and if you are a decent teacher then academies are willing to pay more for you and/or give you better hours in order to keep you. I'm now working for a company in Barcelona which charges significantly more to its clients than its rivals, but which can offer more money to its teachers and pays us over Christmas even as freelancers, and gives a summer final payment in order to attract the teachers back the following September, and therefore has a staff of very experienced teachers giving high quality clases to their clients: it's hard to find companies like this in Spain, but if you have experience, speak Spanish and have EU papers then they can be found.


_________________________________________________________________________
...Jobs and language exchanges in Madrid, Barcelona and Berlin... www.lingobongo.com

...send your c.v. around ALL the schools in Madrid, Barcelona or Berlin in one hit with our c.v. sending service... www.lingobongo.com