Job Discussion Forums

[Fred Smith]

My school is trying to pull a fast one, what to do?

My contract is almost over and I have been here since September. The contract allows for 250kw of free electric per month but says nothing about how much the cost is for overage nor anything about how to calculate or pay for it.

A teacher who has been here for three years says he has never been charged for electric and this was also told to me by another teacher who has been here for two years.

So now the school is telling select teachers that they will get the electric overage taken out of their final salary for the whole school year. The school provided no monthly documentation or anything that looks official and says here�s the amount you must pay. So of course no one knows the true amount of anything because we don�t have access to the electric meter and have no idea what the starting reading was.

In the past the only time I ever had to pay utilities the building worker would come every month and read the meter with you and show you start and ending readings and tell you the amount and provide a receipt.

So how to protect ourselves here? It�s definitely a rip-off scenario and some of us aren�t going to take this laying down.

Insight please?

[Teatime of Soul]

The money goes to the electric company. Follow the money.

The school should have an "electric book", a booklet that looks like a passbook savings account book. The electric book has posted the payments and debit entries of your usage.

Ask the school to see your book.

If you don't trust them, pay the electric company yourself.

It's pretty straightforward to audit yourself provided you or someone can speak Chinese (on your behalf).

[Fred Smith]

I am not sure it goes like this because it is an on-campus building owned and run by the school.

[China.Pete]

If you are living on-campus in school provided housing, OP, it would surprise me if the school even bothered to meter the individual apartments. If they do, there should be a meter near the entrance (possibly in a closet) of your apartment. This is the first thing you should ask to see. It would be interesting to see the amount of the overage, and how it was calculated, since no itemized bills were ever provided. If one can be produced, you would probably owe a per-unit charge based on the local industrial electricity rate. This is typically higher than the rate charged to residential customers living in a regular apartment building, but the same for everyone in your rate class within your local area.

As electricity is billed on a regular basis, I would firmly request a monthly breakdown of the units used (since how else could they calculate any overage). This should come from the electricity company. If the school is simply checking your individual meters whenever the mood strikes them (assuming such exist), then they should have an interesting time accounting for the usage of units in your apartment by subtracting the end-month reading from the beginning one. If the school is just assigning a pro-rata share based on some bulk billing for your building (or campus), or has been remiss in keeping its own records of your individual usage, or is unable to obtain whatever records the power company may have after the passage of time to reconstruct what you owe them, then you can see how easy it would be to make documenting their claim against you very difficult.

Having raised every possible obstacle to documenting any payment you may owe them, including reminding them that they have not made any such claims against other teachers, you might see if they were willing to drop the whole thing (your wanting to keep a really pleasant memory of them and the school and all that). If not, you could assess the strength of their evidence, and if it is sorely lacking, consider filing a complaint with the local Foreign Experts Bureau (although a casual threat of same may be more effective than actually doing it). But whatever you do, you must act quickly. They are hoping to hand you your light envelopes as you prepare to board the plane for home.

[The Ever-changing Cleric]

a similar situation happened to a colleague a few years back. at the end of the year, when we were supposed to pick up our final salary, they presented the other teacher with an electric bill for about RMB4000 (for ten months). he was also entitled to a certain amount of free electricity, but no bills or documents were ever provided to support this figure. in contrast my power bill (in a separate building and a smaller apartment) for the entire year was about RMB600.

after a couple of weeks of him trying to sort out a paper trail for this power/money owed, he gave up and just told the school he wasnt paying unless they proved he used the power. he wasnt shy about going to the local authorities to get this sorted out and the school knew it (he'd done it once or twice before with other problems at this school).

in the end, he told me (i was gone by the time this all ended) that he never paid and he got everything he was owed.

try to get them to provide you with a decent explanation and some kind of official invoice fred. failing that, consider a visit to the local authorities in your town. i don't think i'd pay either.

[Fred Smith]

Here's the latest:

3 teachers are told they owe the following amounts:

5100
4000 (me)
3100

as well as international phone charges of 1500rmb

We are all mad and have an impromptu meeting with The Dean.

3 of us and 2 of them. We tell him the contract simply says 250k electric a month. They say they have been nice and raised the minimum to 500kw a month.

So I can't imagine I used 900-1000 rmb a month in a small 2 room apartment.

I told them point blank that they are trying to STEAL my money and I won't let that happen. Not at all.

They have no records, nothing official and it's just a SCAM to put some money in their pockets.

So I pressed the dean to give us a time frame on when he will give us an answer and he wouldn't. The translator was the assistant fao and she was highly rattled because I let into her straight up about them trying this crap on us.

I also told them that I am coming back to this city to work after the summer and if they steal my money they they will have much trouble.

I ended the discussion with We can part as friends, as nothing, or enemies - and they don't want to be my enemy...

[Hansen]

Fred, I feel your pain. Another example, and a good one to illustrate that FTs should never trust or think that the school or any individuals connected with the school in a professional capacity related to the FT are their friend.

The provincial level FAO office in this province is a joke. They exist primarily to provide an illusion of options for the FT. In fact, they are thick with the school and will act in the schools interest , not yours; consequently, involving them in the form of a threat may actually weaken your position. The school can be fairly confident that the FAO will act deceitfully in their interest.

[eddy-cool]

I think, Fred, you have a slightly irritable predisposition, judging by your posts in this thread. For instance, the 'school is trying to pull a fast one' sounded highly alarmist to me, and that was the title of your thread EVEN BEFORE you have had your - I hope: friendly - tete-a-tete.

But it seems that face-tof-face ended with yet another blast from you to the college bigwigs. I really believe you are not trying hard enough to win their friendliness and hospitality.

The amount of 900 per month sounds a tad high but I have to add that many laowais do actually exploit their privileges to a maximum, keeping aircons on even during their absence.
I know from running a private household how easy it is to clock up more than 300 yuan worth of electricity a month and have seldom done that. 300 is what I use with an aircon on about 5 hours a day, a whole month, plus other household slaves running.

So if you warm their hearts, maybe they will lower their bills...

Then again: Who ran up that RMB 1500 international phone bill?

Surely not the cleaning lady?

[China.Pete]

"I really believe you are not trying hard enough to win their friendliness and hospitality." -- Eddy Cool

Have to agree with Eddy, here. Even assuming they are trying to scam you, Fred, you will sometimes gain more by remaining cool but firm than by blowing up and threatening people straight away.

[Fred Smith]

Yeah I see your point. A school trying to steal 4000 rmb from a teacher at the end of their contract is no big deal, because that's just the way things go in China.

No reason to get upset about it.

I fail to see your points because obviously you are far superior to me in your intellect.

[suanlatudousi]

If you owe the money then you owe the money. You knew what the conditions were, you agreed to it. Now, throwing a tantrum seem rather childish. Get upset, as you say, all you want, but you have a responsibility that you agreed upon contract signing.

You never once asked what you owed each month ? In your year long stay you never thought to own up to your end of the bargain ?

I have my own house in the city and 200 RMB is the bare minimum - using a refrigerator, a fan around the clock, a desktop computer on 24/7. During the dead of winter and summer my bill exceeded 1000 RMB.

I see no reason for your bill to cause fright.

The school having no documentation is one thing.

Your refusal to own up to what you owe is another.

[Fred Smith]

Yes you are right. The "documentation" is a series of numbers written on a piece of paper in pencil.

That's all they need right?

So I should just accept their word and move on...haha? You guys are hysterical.

[The Ever-changing Cleric]

fred, its easy to get upset, but i think its wise to remain calm at least for now. as the end of the contract gets closer, and if no progress on the situation has been made or is on the horizon, then its time to pull out all the stops and let them have it. I think you might have escalated the situation too quickly.

its hard to remain calm, i know. when i was in the process of being scammed for several thousand RMB once (same time as my former colleague in my post above, different issue), and people who were supposed to be helping me didn't return calls, or weren't in their office to meet with me, and couldn't be found anywhere, i was ready to explode too. but i remained as calm as i could, and in the end (two days before I was leaving town) i finally got what i was owed. fortunately I found a better place to work after that experience and have no such troubles today.

[Fred Smith]

^ Thank you for your advice and reasoning.

[The Ever-changing Cleric]