Job Discussion Forums

[omarr380]

I saw this thread started on Gaijin Pot and I think it is an interesting question. If they're not illegal they should be. Currently I work for what is probably one of the worst ones out of all of them. This is a little of what I posted on that thread:

Lack of job security: As a private ALT, you can be discarded quit quickly when it suites whoever. If the BOE decides it wants to do business with another company, your company loses its contract with that BOE. You and anyone else who works for that company for that BOE loses their job. This is not a hypothetical situation, it has happened.

Illegality: A court in Osaka has ruled that private ALT dispatch companies were illegal, because the ALTs themselves were NOT under the jurisdiction of the principals of the school, technically speaking. The court ruled them illegal. ALT companies CAN acquire a license for themselves so that they are "legal". However the company that I work for is unlicensed and the owner of the company has admitted that he could easily acquire a license, but he sees no need.

Do any of you think these companies are total scams? Being these companies as crooked as they are, why do the Boards of Education use these companies? The companies don't really care about the education of the students, they only care about the money they're making. I don't see why any BoE would trust them. How serious is this country about English education?

[PAULH]

Yet at the same time you still get people who need a paycheck, know what is in their contract but are still willing to work for unscrupulous employers.

What would happen if all these illegal school suddenly discovered that no one wanted to work for them? What we need is teachers to take a stand and refuse to take those kinds of jobs but I cant see it happening as long as you have 'teachers' needing to make money any way they can and trun a blind eye to illegal work rules.

There are several types of dispatch worker, the worst being the "i-in" where essentially the foreigner is treated as a sib-contractor to his employer, not a salaried employee and receive few benefits. You dont work for the school you are sent to either.

[canuck]

Name the company. Dispatching companies are evil. Interac is bad, ECC rakes in the dough off their "dispatching part-time teacher find arm" and Zenken might even be the worst. They often pay on a per day basis, no money in the summer etc.

[6810]

[PAULH]

Put it another way,


do you believe there is a bottom line here? How much is too low for teaching English? 1,000 yen? 750 yen an hour? If thats the case why pay a salary of 250,000 yen a month if employers think they are paying too much.

Its a bit like the story of putting the frog in water and boiling him alive because he gets used to the heat. teachers get used to be being paid peanuts that they think its normal and you are simply justifying it byt saying "well people are here just for a year to party anyway and they dont care what they are paid."

In that case people have no right to complain then.

[king kakipi]

from www.eltnews.com

We Can Get Teachers Cheaper!
The asahi.com site yesterday reported on a development in Hokkaido that will see more eikaiwa schools providing ALTs to schools in the area. The impetus behind the move is local municipalities' lack of budget to cover the cost of bringing in teachers on the JET Program, which incurs costs by going through the central government. Tatsuya Sekitou, who runs a conversation school in Takikawa city, heard in spring of last year from a colleague at the municipal office that they were faced with having to stop hiring ALTs due to budget restraints. Sekitou teamed up with 10 other schools in 7 cities throughout Hokkaido to form a limited company this summer.

The cost of hiring a JET comes to about �6 million a year, including airfare, salary, accommodation and insurance. the new company has secured cheaper air tickets and can provide an ALT for about �4.5-4.8 million a year. Some 123 municipalities in Hokkaido make use of the JET Program, and so far 10 or so have expressed an interest in the new service. The number of JETs is already slightly on the decline, after peaking in 2002.
Story in Japanese
November 16, 2004

[spawnofsancha]

It's interesting hearing people debating the "legality" of dispatch companies. I've worked for a dispatch comapny, and various eikaiwa, in addition to the usual corporate type stuff. I didn't really mind the dispatch stuff. It was a pain in the ass at times- but I set it up with them so I was getting a set schedule and a set number of days per month. I wouldn't have agreed to work for them for a pittance, and I wasn't being taken advantage of at all.
If you're smart, careful, and do your research about the dispatch companies you can parlay it into something more meaningful. It's easy to go from doing occasional stuff for a dispatch company to being a full time teacher at a private school which pays exceedingly well.
I'm curious as to why there's always so much outrage on the part of some of the people posting about people working for what they consider to be below an "acceptable salary scale".

To sum up the contents of job related discussions on Dave's.
Eikaiwa are evil
Dispatch companies are evil.
Universities take advantage of poor gaijin.
People spend far too much time moaning and not enough time improving their lot in life.

This will be my last ever post.

Best of luck to you all,

[Sweetsee]

Think of dispatch companies as introduction agencies, how else to get a foot in the door? Hmmm?