I'll be rounding and changing dollar amounts for anonymity sake
My employer pays $20/hr and gives us a $5/hr health and wellness benefit for our benefits. When I signed up for health insurance, it said it would cost $100 per pay period. During orientation, it sounded like that $100 would come from the $5/hr health wellness benefit (effectively 20 hours). Any remainder would be paid out as lieu of benefits (so 60 hours) for a total of 80 hours, netting $300 (60*5) in lieu of benefits on top of the $20/hr (1600 + 300 = 1900).
On the webpage I had to do benefit elections, it says
EMPLOYEE PAYS PRE TAX COST $100.00 for Health Insurance
EMPLOYER PAYS $250.00 for Health Insurance
I reached out to the HR department and they explained that the 250 is taken out of the $5/hr health benefit
$250 / 80 hours = $3.13
$5 – $3.13 = $1.87/hr
$1.87 * 80 hours = $149 cash in lieu of benefits out of what I expected would be $400 (-$100 for what I thought would the insurance cost)
and then I also have to pay the $100 off the top from my $20/hr, effectively costing me $350 (100 from me, and 250 from them, but really from me) a check for something that was advertised as $100 a check.
When I was switched to this company (my employer was bought out), they touted it as us receiving a $5 raise, but I'm effectively making the exact same amount. The extra money I was anticipating was going to be so huge and I was planning on setting a large portion of that towards my son's college fund, and I got my first check and it was almost exactly the same, and I may have gotten a 5c raise at the end of the day. I emailed them back in a very professional manner asking for more details in how by their own example, the employer liabilities were being taken out as employee liabilities, on top of the actual employee liabilities. It took them 3 months to finally respond to my email, and that's after calling every other week to just follow up.
Really like this job so I don't want to quit, but I was pretty devastated after seeing I got nothing from the touted raise. If they would have just said “were paying the same as the old company” I would have accepted it and been fine, but I really got my hopes up and now I'm seeking some answers. It really feels criminal