I work at an international conglomerate that’s the most toxic poorly run place I’ve ever experienced. However, that’s a different story from this gripe. A couple weeks ago I was told I was getting a special bonus for handling several toxic projects that the precious people managing were all fired of quit. I was also told this would in no way impact my performance bonus that covers 2022, so I’d be getting two bonuses. Sounded amazing and desperately needed. Imagine my excitement that someone with the title VP decided my work needed to be specially rewarded.
Last week the special bonus became a retention bonus I had to sign paperwork committing to pay back if I quit. I would like to quit once I find something else, but not the worst thing in the world to agree to stay another year, plus I’d have my performance bonus coming too.
This past Friday when I asked what my performance bonus was I was informed it had actually been included in the retention bonus I had just agreed to pay all of back. I asked for the paperwork to be revised to indicate how much of it was a retention and how much was performance, since the performance bonus was for the work I already did over 2022 and no one else is required to pay theirs back if they decide to leave. That lead to a lot of non-answers and how I already got more than anyone else in my group, and they never ever enforce any of that paperwork I signed. I asked for them to at least acknowledge in writing they won’t enforce it, which I was told they couldn’t do.
Looks like they just fucked me out of what I earned….