Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Illysook]

It was completely unfair for this guy to ask me for money. I worked for him for less than one full day. The conditions were a joke and his conduct was probably illegal, but I didn't have a choice. I had to pay the guy or prepare to leave the country for lack of a job and a valid visa. I didn't have the money right away and every time my pastor's wife called him he was more rude and would ask for more money.

However, Now that I've got the paper trail and another job, I'd like to report the guy to the proper authorities...but who are they? Would it cost me more money? I swear I'd pay it for the sake of justice...if I would get any justice.

[thegadfly]

Well, he isn't required, legally, to write a letter for ya...and you wanted it. It sounds like a perfectly legal exchange of cash for services...so legal recourse for asking for cash to write the letter? I would expect none.

Not sayin' the fellow is a stellar example of humanity or anything -- just that asking for cash to write the letter wasn't illegal...I would say unethical, mean, and petty, but nothing prosecutable....

[koreatimes]

I would just work it off. It might be too late now, but if you worked a week and then got the letter of release it might have worked. Now there is tension, I am not sure how they would handle it.

In my case, the school I was at wanted 2 weeks to find a replacement. I didn't teach a normal schedule and never planned anything, just showed up basically while in transition to a new school.

[Illysook]

I wish that I hadn't paid the guy because today when I met with the school that I was going to transfer to, I saw a whole lot of red flags waving at me and I decided that I would just go home. Maybe I'll be back, maybe I won't. For now, I'm just really sick of this place.

[World Traveler]

How much money did you pay the guy?

[hagwonnewbie]

I had to pay 200k to get an owner to remove his bogus complaint with immigration.

I still had to leave the country to get a new visa but kind of the same idea,

[Dodge7]

illy, does this now make the 3rd hagwon you quit in less than a month?

[chachee99]

The only thing I had to pay for was 300 won for the school to stamp the letter.


I cannot justify why someone would charge you 200,000 won to write the letter. Furthermore, why would they state if that if you paid them they would remove the complaint with immigration? What was this complaint? Are you sure one was even filed against you? Did immigraton contact you? Did you contact them?

The complaint sounds like they were trying to blackmail you. I would not have taken their word on it and called their bluff. Immigration usually does want to listen to complaints from schools unless, you have broken the law in Korea.

[Illysook]

No, it's not the third hagwon that I've quit in a month. This is the one that I quit on the first day. I didn't have the money he asked for right away and then each time that my pastor's wife talked to him, he demanded more. I ended up paying him 200,000 Won and then I decided that I didn't even want the job that I was going to transfer my visa to because there were too many things that the new hagwon owner wasn't being straightforward about. I'm better off going home and starting from scratch and I should have realized this in the first place.