What is the name of your state? CT, working in New York
I just started a new job in downtown Manhattan on 2/25/2008 as a contracted employee to a Fortune 500 financial firm. It took the contracting agency 6 weeks to pay me my first paycheck after I basically threatened to alert their client.
First they claimed they sent my paychecks to my post office box. I check that post-office box every day, because it is 2 blocks from the train station I use to commute into New York to the client site.
Then 2 weeks later when I asked where the paychecks were, they claimed they were returned by my post office with the words "Never picked up" written on it. First off, there's no way my post office is going to go through everybody's post office box, rifling through the items in each one, and pulling out the ones that were "not picked up". I've had mail in there for 2-3 weeks when I've been away on travel, and it is still there when I return.
So I had the contracting agency issue a stop-payment on those checks, and send paper checks to my physical mailing address (I just recently moved two towns over, and mail hasn't completely been rolled over yet, which is why I have the post-office box in the meantime).
Those paper checks that they claimed to have sent never arrived either.
I emailed them several times about this with no responses back.
(I should note that before I even started with this company, I gave them a voided check from my checking account so they could immediately start paying me with electronic deposits, because I knew it would be a nightmare with the p.o. box vs. physical mailing address, and the time delay between them mailing checks to me and me depositing them, and then waiting for them to clear, etc.)
I decided to contact the client directly about this issue to ask them if this was standard practice with new contractors. They assured me that it was not, and that any holdup was most-definitely NOT on their end.
I also emailed the recruiter handling this relationship letting her know that I now HAD to notify the client, because I could no longer afford to commute into the city on my own dime to work on-site (a 275-mile a day commute, round trip). I'd already spent $5k of my own savings to commute back and forth, none of which was going to be reimbursed by the client or my contracting company. I simply couldn't afford the $150/day commute anymore. I literally had to borrow money from friends to make my rent that month.
That morning, I received frantic phone calls from the recruiter telling me that they'd already wired my payroll into my account, and that I should check my bank. She was very concerned that I NOT contact the client about this issue. I checked my bank 30 minutes before I sent the email, and there were no new transactions or deposits.
I checked my account, and there were indeed two new payments wired into the account, dated AFTER the date of the email where I stated that I would contact the client about this, to let them know I could no longer be on-site, until I was paid. I can't pay for parking and trains with money I don't have.
The amounts of the wire transfers only covered 3.5 of the 6 weeks I'd already worked and both of these were dated with the pay date of 4/4/2008 for the pay period of 3/23. I emailed the contracting agency again on 4/11 to ask where the remainder of the "back wages" were, and asked them to confirm that there were 115 hours outstanding at this point for hours worked after that point. I copied in 3 people in this email. Not a single answer, call or reply.
Another week went by, another 40 hours on the client site, and still no answer, calls or replies from anyone at the contracting agency I addressed my emails to.
The documentation I received from the contracting agency states that 4/18 is a regular payroll day. On this day, I am supposed to receive the pay for the periods ending Sunday 3/30 and Sunday 4/6, and because the last deposits into my account were electronic, these should also be electronic.
On Friday morning (after checking my bank to make sure there were no deposits), I emailed the contracting agency asking them if they were going to intend on paying me per the contract terms (I included the same 3 people; recruiter, finance person who handles the timesheets and the person who manages the relationship between their company and the client). I also stated that to-date, they owed me 155 hours of back wages. If they are always 2 weeks behind on salary, then I am owed at least 75 hours of back wages.
I received no response, and no electronic deposits were made into my account at all on Friday.
Near the end of the day, I emailed them again, and asked them what they intended to do, and asked them to get back to me ASAP, because at this point, I need to involve the client again. Without being paid for 4 weeks, I'm again down to not being able to afford the commute into the city to work on-site. I keep telling them that I don't want to have to involve the client, but they've given me no choice.
Still no response. It is now Sunday at 3:17pm, and I've checked my bank and there are still no new deposits in my account for the missing wages.
To date, I have worked a total of 310 hours for this contracting company, and have been paid for 155 hours of this (which doesn't seem to directly map to any of my timesheets; it appears though they "guessed" at what my pay for the first few weeks should have been, and cut me deposits in those amounts). I keep meticulous records of my time, travel and expenses for exactly this purpose... hoping never to have to use them. I'm glad I did in this case.
I'm about to raise a big red flag with the client, and let them know that I can no longer work for free for this contracting agency. It's not the client's fault, and they love me and love my work... they've even said they can't afford to lose me, so... I want to stay working for them, but I obviously can't continue working without being paid for my work.
I think the next step is to talk to the client and let them know that it would be cheaper in the short term if they brought me on full-time as an employee, dropped the contracting agency and my work with them can continue, uninterrupted.
I'm sure the contracting agency is dutifully invoicing the client at 2x to 3x what I bring home hourly, and THEY are getting paid, but I am not. If the client dropped the contracting agency and brought me on full-time, they could save a lot in my hourly rate alone, and I could make a little bit more per-hour + get benefits and other perks.
So what should I do at this point, to recover almost $15k of back wages?
I've been up-front and clear in communicating my concerns and my urgency to the contracting agency, and they seem to think it's ok to completely ignore me every time.
I just started a new job in downtown Manhattan on 2/25/2008 as a contracted employee to a Fortune 500 financial firm. It took the contracting agency 6 weeks to pay me my first paycheck after I basically threatened to alert their client.
First they claimed they sent my paychecks to my post office box. I check that post-office box every day, because it is 2 blocks from the train station I use to commute into New York to the client site.
Then 2 weeks later when I asked where the paychecks were, they claimed they were returned by my post office with the words "Never picked up" written on it. First off, there's no way my post office is going to go through everybody's post office box, rifling through the items in each one, and pulling out the ones that were "not picked up". I've had mail in there for 2-3 weeks when I've been away on travel, and it is still there when I return.
So I had the contracting agency issue a stop-payment on those checks, and send paper checks to my physical mailing address (I just recently moved two towns over, and mail hasn't completely been rolled over yet, which is why I have the post-office box in the meantime).
Those paper checks that they claimed to have sent never arrived either.
I emailed them several times about this with no responses back.
(I should note that before I even started with this company, I gave them a voided check from my checking account so they could immediately start paying me with electronic deposits, because I knew it would be a nightmare with the p.o. box vs. physical mailing address, and the time delay between them mailing checks to me and me depositing them, and then waiting for them to clear, etc.)
I decided to contact the client directly about this issue to ask them if this was standard practice with new contractors. They assured me that it was not, and that any holdup was most-definitely NOT on their end.
I also emailed the recruiter handling this relationship letting her know that I now HAD to notify the client, because I could no longer afford to commute into the city on my own dime to work on-site (a 275-mile a day commute, round trip). I'd already spent $5k of my own savings to commute back and forth, none of which was going to be reimbursed by the client or my contracting company. I simply couldn't afford the $150/day commute anymore. I literally had to borrow money from friends to make my rent that month.
That morning, I received frantic phone calls from the recruiter telling me that they'd already wired my payroll into my account, and that I should check my bank. She was very concerned that I NOT contact the client about this issue. I checked my bank 30 minutes before I sent the email, and there were no new transactions or deposits.
I checked my account, and there were indeed two new payments wired into the account, dated AFTER the date of the email where I stated that I would contact the client about this, to let them know I could no longer be on-site, until I was paid. I can't pay for parking and trains with money I don't have.
The amounts of the wire transfers only covered 3.5 of the 6 weeks I'd already worked and both of these were dated with the pay date of 4/4/2008 for the pay period of 3/23. I emailed the contracting agency again on 4/11 to ask where the remainder of the "back wages" were, and asked them to confirm that there were 115 hours outstanding at this point for hours worked after that point. I copied in 3 people in this email. Not a single answer, call or reply.
Another week went by, another 40 hours on the client site, and still no answer, calls or replies from anyone at the contracting agency I addressed my emails to.
The documentation I received from the contracting agency states that 4/18 is a regular payroll day. On this day, I am supposed to receive the pay for the periods ending Sunday 3/30 and Sunday 4/6, and because the last deposits into my account were electronic, these should also be electronic.
On Friday morning (after checking my bank to make sure there were no deposits), I emailed the contracting agency asking them if they were going to intend on paying me per the contract terms (I included the same 3 people; recruiter, finance person who handles the timesheets and the person who manages the relationship between their company and the client). I also stated that to-date, they owed me 155 hours of back wages. If they are always 2 weeks behind on salary, then I am owed at least 75 hours of back wages.
I received no response, and no electronic deposits were made into my account at all on Friday.
Near the end of the day, I emailed them again, and asked them what they intended to do, and asked them to get back to me ASAP, because at this point, I need to involve the client again. Without being paid for 4 weeks, I'm again down to not being able to afford the commute into the city to work on-site. I keep telling them that I don't want to have to involve the client, but they've given me no choice.
Still no response. It is now Sunday at 3:17pm, and I've checked my bank and there are still no new deposits in my account for the missing wages.
To date, I have worked a total of 310 hours for this contracting company, and have been paid for 155 hours of this (which doesn't seem to directly map to any of my timesheets; it appears though they "guessed" at what my pay for the first few weeks should have been, and cut me deposits in those amounts). I keep meticulous records of my time, travel and expenses for exactly this purpose... hoping never to have to use them. I'm glad I did in this case.
I'm about to raise a big red flag with the client, and let them know that I can no longer work for free for this contracting agency. It's not the client's fault, and they love me and love my work... they've even said they can't afford to lose me, so... I want to stay working for them, but I obviously can't continue working without being paid for my work.
I think the next step is to talk to the client and let them know that it would be cheaper in the short term if they brought me on full-time as an employee, dropped the contracting agency and my work with them can continue, uninterrupted.
I'm sure the contracting agency is dutifully invoicing the client at 2x to 3x what I bring home hourly, and THEY are getting paid, but I am not. If the client dropped the contracting agency and brought me on full-time, they could save a lot in my hourly rate alone, and I could make a little bit more per-hour + get benefits and other perks.
So what should I do at this point, to recover almost $15k of back wages?
- Should I march into the main office of the contracting agency and demand to speak to someone?
- Should I alert the client that I'm now at an impasse, and need to either resign, or be brought on full-time?
- Should I just sit and wait for nothing to happen week after week?
- Should I file a claim for back wages against the contracting agency and/or sue them for this? (and could this hurt me, if I need to stay with the contracting agency in the short term?)
- Should I ask the contracting agency if I still work for them, and why they never notified me that I was no longer on their payroll?
I've been up-front and clear in communicating my concerns and my urgency to the contracting agency, and they seem to think it's ok to completely ignore me every time.