Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Johnwayne]

If you don't give 30 days notice when quitting your job (and your contract says you should) does that mean the hagwon has the right to not pay you for work already completed (e.g. the past month)?

The only penalty the contract mentions for resigning early is withholding the cost of airfare and charging you for students' tuition fees (if you fail to give 30 days notice), if they have to cancel any classes you were teaching (which they didn't because I finished out that month's classes despite giving less than 30 days notice).

I wasn't sure if there was some obscure aspect of Korean law that I wasn't aware and wanted to see if anyone had experience in this area before I went off on some sort of crusade to get my final pay.

P.S. I quit because I found a better job at the time.

[Typhoon]

There is no such law that I know of. However, some contracts do state that when an employee quits before the end of the contract some money will be kept for plane tickets, recruiting fees and loss of students due to not having a teacher. Since your contract has a provision like that some money will be kept. The provision for closing classes/loss students is very vague so they can keep a lot of money from you using that provision. Even though classes were not cancelled they may claim that students are going to quit once you leave before the contract is up so you are being docked pay for that reason. That being said you should have gave notice. You would want your job to give you notice if they were firing you before the contract was finished.

[Johnwayne]

I gave notice, it was just roughly 2 weeks as opposed to 30 days. The school is one of the better known hagwons in Korea too, so I don't think it was the end of the world for them and I seriously doubt it cost the particular branch I worked at any lost revenue, as they had quite a few foreign teachers.

The part of the contract that talks about withholding money for canceled classes, says they can do that if they have to cancel the classes in the middle of month, which they didn't. It makes no mention of future revenue, etc.

I don't care about them withholding airfare, but there should still be an appreciable amount left over after that.

[ttompatz]

IT IS ILLEGAL under current labor law.

Pick your local labor office and file the complaint for non-payment of wages.

If you get some jackass at the desk that hands you a line of crud, try again and make sure you file the paperwork. (no paperwork = no claim).

[Johnwayne]

Excellent, thanks for the info. That is all I needed to know.