Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Bollocks]

I started at my current job on June 24th 2012. My boss just informed me that they intend to fire me on September 1st, as "although I am a good teacher, I am not culturally compatible with the school. "

They intend to fire me, and dock from my pending paycheque the cost of flying me to Korea. They also plan to give me a letter of release, and then pass me on to another school which works with the same recruiter.

If/when I complete my contract with this other school, I will be ineligible for severance pay, as I will have been working there for less than 12 months.

[NilesQ]

Start looking for a job you really want and refuse to go where the school and recruiter want you to go. Get the release letter first. They are trying to figure out a way to not have to pay the recruiter the fee. If you are on the ground in Korea with a transferable visa, I think you could find a job tailored to your schedule/pay expectations.

Ask for the LOR to be issued to you and tell the school you won't need their help to find a new job, your friend has lined something up. Be polite and don't act as if you are accusing them of trying to do something underhanded. Say you appreciate their concern and help in finding a new job for you, but that you can take care of that on your own. Then check out worknplay, dave's, and other job sites to find a school that needs someone to start immediately. Play dumb and just see what their response is.

[JustinC]

It won't be easy to take them to court, although employees have lots of rights in Korea your current employers have the advantage of speaking the local language, having more connections than you, knowing more about the law than you, probably having more time and cash than you. You have to choose which battles to fight and which to walk away from.

Also how do you know the next school is in cahoots with your own? And, if it is, how do you know they're looking after their own interests at the expense of your own? You may be offered a job at a great school that is more compatible for you than where you are now. I suggest you do some research on the new school and forget any thoughts about suing anyone.

As a by-the-by, I loved the "The behavior of the school is obviously an incestuous cash-grab." Very eloquent. Well done. You could say it's that or you could say something else like "The school has placed me in a more appropriate position". It's subjective. More info is needed.

[Bollocks]

You are correct. I cannot prove anything. All is subjective.

Things known for certain:
I will not have a job on sept 1.
The director of the school I work for says that he has worked for recruiter X for a number of years, and thinks he can get me a job through them.

Maybe he is acting in my best interests. That would be nice.

[iggyb]

I don't think it is sujective: They brought you over to do a job on a one year contract and then cut you loose. To do so, they should need a very good reason. The fact they are setting you up for another job tends to suggest they didn't have sufficient reason to back out of the contract.

We don't know why it happened, but it was this kind of thing that gave the ESL industry in Korea a bad name.

If you don't mind my asking, what do you look like? Are you over weight? What did they mean by not fitting in culturally?

This is the kind of thing I'd expect to hear more and more of as the public school jobs dry up and stop giving hakwons competition - in this down global economy...

...The more it is an employer's market, the more we'll see hakwons doing what they did in the late 1990s to earn such a bad reputation.

There isn't much you can do about it besides get the LOR and move on. I wouldn't go to the school they have lined up.

You'll have to put in 12 months with a new school to get the benefits. And you'll probably not get airfare over.

[JustinC]

Definitely the airfare to Korea has been lost, irregardless of where the OP ends up. That's a given, what more I'm concerned about is where the OP ends up. They have been offered something else and that, more times than not, will be a job in a school that needs a teacher.

[YTMND]

"I am not culturally compatible with the school."
"pass me on to another school which works with the same recruiter."

"You could say it's that or you could say something else like "The school has placed me in a more appropriate position". It's subjective. More info is needed."

I disagree. More info is not needed. If it is a problem with cultural compatibility, then why are they passing him on to another school? Is this a Chinese, Japanese, or Russian international school that doesn't have Korean "culture" aspects? Since when are employers concerned about culture shock?

The airfare should have been paid already, and the employee is not the one who wants to leave. That's the moral position, whether or not it's in the contract is another. I have no problem looking up "thief" in a dictionary and pointing at them. They get rather defensive don't they?

Second point, the recruiter would not want to place the teacher in another school if they really felt the teacher wasn't suitable working in Korea.

Get your termination notice, don't sign anything (more if you did in the contract) regarding airfare payment. You are morally owed airfare, a termination notice, and a LOR.

If they paid your airfare and they will simply deduct the amount from your last pay, then you can make it a labor board issue. If it is something they haven't paid you yet then it will be harder to collect on. If you signed a contract which stated you don't get airfare if they fire you, then you are pretty much out of luck then. Look at your contract YESTERDAY and find out exactly what you agreed to.

Don't let this LOR be used to blackmail you into giving up a huge chunk of what they should pay. I never even addressed the severance issue. If you sign a 1 year contract and work 1 year, you will get severance. I don't see how you think or feel they will short you on it. It's just scare tactics now if they bring it up. If you are thinking it, then it's paranoia.

Go in with the items I listed and get what you can. Find another recruiter, find another school. Use them as a stepping stone. Visit your next school in person. Everyone has a first time for this.

[viciousdinosaur]

Your school has really screwed you pretty bad, sorry to say. It is the worst case scenario to be fired within six months of arriving. Realistically there isn't really anything you can do. If you succumb to their offer of a LOR then you are accepting the deductions they will make from your final pay. If you pull a runner this weekend, then you'll walk away with your Friday's pay and a lesson learned about how Korea is not always the golden egg everyone makes it out to be.

As aside, people who get fired once in this country are likely to be fired again. That doesn't mean you deserve to be fired. People are usually fired for superficial reasons. But you need to decide if living in constant fear of losing your job is something you want.

[ttompatz]

This isn't the Litigious States of America. Suing will get you nowhere. You don't even have a valid labor board case unless there is a contract clause that requires the employer to give notice during your probationary period. If there is then their liability would be limited to pay in lieu of notice if inadequate notice was given.

Bottom line - under Korean labor law you are considered to be a probationary employee for the 1st six months. They can cut you loose for any/no reason during that time without notice.

The fact that they gave you notice and will give you a LOR is nice. It will at least enable you to find a new job, negotiate your best deal (since a visa run or airfare aren't needed) and transfer your visa to the new employer.

If you want severance and airfare back home then sign a new one-year deal with the new employer (it isn't like you have a new job at home to return to after your sabbatical).

.

[Dodge7]

How are you culturally incompatible?

[tardisrider]

[Son Deureo!]

Unless you really want to work at the school your current boss is effectively selling you to, start getting your documents for a new E-2 together now. CRC, diploma, apostille, the whole nine yards. Wait till payday so you can collect whatever you can from them, leave the country and turn in your ARC on the way out so you can cancel your current E-2. Come back on a tourist visa, check into a goshiwon, and look for a new and hopefully better job.

Maybe you can transfer from an E-2 to a 90 day D-10 (looking for work) visa which could save you the hassle and expense of leaving the country and getting new documents? That's a fairly new procedure and one I've never done, so I don't know the procedure or how you'd be eligible for it.

[Redfish]

Take the lor and get a new job. Email if you want, I have used a top rate recruiter [email protected] and I will put you two in touch.

[Bollocks]

The target recipient school needs a teacher. The current boss boss and the target recipient boss have a relationship where they feel comfortable passing along employees. That's all I know.

I may be morally entitled to the airfare. But unless there's a clearcut legal path to getting it, I don't see what to do. Have I any legal recourse when my August paycheque comes up 1,000,000krw short?

This is the 2nd financial disagreement between myself and the school. They didn't pay me for my time there between June 24th and July 1st, as that was "training." And the had a temp teacher filling in for me until July 1st. I was nonetheless there and working.

I didn't pursue the matter legally, as A) the school agreed to forward me some money from my next month's paycheque and B) I didn't want to pick a fight since C) I was glad to be out of Canada.

Since I am now leaving, I would like to know what legal recourse I have to get that money, too.

As for cultural incompatibility: I've "taught" here before. My job was to smile at the students and pat them on the head - tell them that their Englishee is perfect and special.

I did that here, too. But the director expected paperwork, too. I was expected to know all the students names, and what percentage of their homework each of them completed, and how much of it was correct, and how much each one participated in class, and whether any of them were distracting or unruly.

Today was the 1st week I could say that I know more than 70% of their names. So, until now the "daily reports" I was expected to fill out (along with the report slips and the homework check forms and the datalogging on the schools website) haven't been up to snuff.

Also I expressed some concern that the school has middleschool classes that end at 10:15pm, which is after 10:00pm, which is illegal. I mentioned this to the recruiter in July and they haven't responded to my messages since.

I'm good at teaching, at least, I'm good at what Koreans call teaching. I'm not good at paperwork, or knowing the difference between choi jung-hee and Lee Jung-hee, at least not immediately.

The director often complained that foreign teachers are too expensive. And that he has to pay them more than he pays Koreans, and that he doesn't have to give housing to Koreans, and that they do prep work a lot better than I do.

These are all valid criticisms. But I'm left wondering why he hired a foreigner in the first place.

Edit: As for weight, I am heavy in terms of body mass - I weigh 90kg, but it's well distributed.

[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/FQ6ZS.jpg[/IMG]

[Son Deureo!]