I've lurked on the antiwork/work reform subs for a while and some of the stories are sometimes shocking and kinda unbelievable bc my employer has always treated me fairly. But I've finally (indirectly) experienced it in real life and I'm grateful to you all for preparing me for this moment in which I was able to help my fiance get what she is owed.
My fiance runs a location of a small chain of gyms. She only has to go in “two days a week” (almost always 4ish w/ special events and short staffing) and basically has no days off. They're HUGE on that “we're all family” bs. They moved her to a further location with “lots of potential and room for growth”. They squashed all her ideas for realizing that potential and achieving their growth metrics. So she put in her two weeks before starting a 100% wfh job at her best friend's company. I know it's been said before, but if you're not required to give notice, DON'T. Just use your vacation/sick time and then quit.
She checked via email to confirm that they would pay out her remaining PTO and they agreed she would work the last two weeks instead of using PTO. You can guess what happened at the end of the two weeks. “Sorry for the misunderstanding, but it's actually not in our policy to pay employees for unused PTO. But your last check will have your pay for your last two weeks.” Thanks to your advice, I was able to show her where to file an unpaid wage claim with our state against her former “family”.
It has blown our minds that they're trying to pull that despite agreeing to it in writing! But from reading some of your stories, I know it's pretty commonplace.
Meanwhile, my civilian employer just gave me a generous COL raise despite working less than 40hrs for them total since my last raise before I was deployed. They've been great about covering my workload while I've been gone and checking up on me. After past deployments, they've also done a really good job about reintegrating me without having to fire anyone and getting me up to speed to continue my career growth.
I think they can see that happy employees are good for the company. So far the only people who have left in my 7yrs working there are people that had to move, started their own unrelated business, or quit to take care of family. And some of those people still choose to come back off on and on for projects they like. It's mindblowing to see the difference in how we're treated.
Anyway thank you guys for sharing your experiences and allowing others to benefit from them. We probably wouldn't have known what to do (besides getting lawyers involved) if it wasn't for these subs. And I also wanted to give you some hope that there are at least a few good employers out there.