Korean Job Discussion Forums

[zombiedog]

One hagwon I worked at i had to put up with the boss's wife going into religious fervor for hours at a time. She forced the Korean teachers to pray with her even if they weren't Christian.

Another school worked me 40hrs/wk and never paid me OT. They also farmed me out and when I complained by asking coyly if it was illegal boss said "Maybe a little." They also cut my contract at the 11th month and didn't pay me a bonus.

A friend of mine works at a school that never pays on time and won't pay him for some OT classes he taught for the school.

Another friend...

the stories go on and an...

[giwizzef]

Although my hagwon almost never paid on time, it did pay...until the very end. I went to file for my pension refund a couple of days prior to leaving and--SURPRISE! My school hadn't been paying into the pension fund, despite the fact that my pay stub reflected otherwise. So, essentially, my school had been skimming my salary every month under the guise that it was paying into the pension fund. The pension office seemed neither surprised nor concerned. They told me it happens all the time. They did call the school, though, and the owners supposedly agreed to pay within three months. It has been three months. Do you think I've seen that pension? Nope. I had a feeling this would be the case prior to leaving Korea, though, so I made sure I got myself a bit of revenge. I knew that my school and not my landlord was in charge of maintaining and cleaning my apartment. So rather than clean it when I left like I was supposed to, I left it a mess and actually planted more garbage in it along with a little note about treating people like garbage and getting garbage in return. I figured that if they had to hire someone to clean the place, at least they didn't completely make off with the money they stole from me.

For kicks and giggles, on the three month mark (when my pension was supposed to be paid to me), I filed a complaint with the Ministry of Labor who kicked me back to the pension office which told me it was just now three months and that it would urge the school to pay, if I hadn't been paid by the following month to contact the Ministry of Labor...an endless cycle of bureaucracy which, to some extent, probably inadvertently acts as an enabler for hagwons to get away with some of their shady business practices.

[sbp59]

[joelove]

"a sad by-product of the industry"

Yeah, I guess being a greedy criminal is just part of the job.

[Adventurer]

[PatrickGHBusan]

Not disputing that this happens Adventurer. I had to deal with one employer who fudged the lines once but it was pretty mild.

I know others who got cheated pretty badly.

I am just reluctant to throw numbers out there because it is a phenomenon that is really hard to measure.

[some waygug-in]

I think Tompatz has it pretty well sized up.

I miss Korea sometimes, but judging by the daily situations getting posted on here, I'm glad to be gone.

[meangradin]

In my close to ten years in Korea, I have yet to meet anyone who has been ripped off. I have met a few people who screwed over their hagwons, however. That's strange, isn't it?


EDIT: I do remember a case from 2003 of a woman whose director sent some goons to her apartment to take her passport so she couldn't do a runner. However, I didn't know this person; it was just a story that made the rounds, as they tend to.

[PatrickGHBusan]

I knew some people who got cheated but never anything close to 50%, much less a higher figure.

Every has different experiences.

[Underwaterbob]

I know of four different people who were cheated, but they all worked at the same hagwon at different times. Any time anyone new would show up in town working there, we told them to prepare themselves to get gypped, and sure enough they did. They each tried to get the word out that the place was terrible, but inevitably someone new would show up working there.

[some waygug-in]

Well, it depends what you mean by rip-off.

I think the majority of hagwon bosses will and do cut corners in some way, shape or form.


As to out and out non-payment, the percentage is much smaller.



But there are a great many that fall somewhere in between .

Then it becomes a game of whether or not it's worth fighting over.

Of the hagwons I worked at,

all of them tried to cut corners, not pay for certain things and didn't quite live up to the contract,

1 out of 4 shorted me on pay, and another 1 tried an 11th month firing (which backfired on them).

PS jobs were much more stable in that I got paid and got medical, pension etc.

But there were always places where they didn't quite live up to the contract while at the same time expected NET's to do more than what was agreed upon.


It's a crap shoot really, some get lucky some don't. Some are just whiners to begin with, so there is no pleasing them. (and that goes for hagwon bosses as well).

[PatrickGHBusan]