Before you read this, forget everything you know about employment. In our third world country most non-governmental jobs have no contracts, no paperwork. Just verbal agreements. No insurances, paid vacation, medical leave, etc. You just… work. And yes it leads to as much troubles as you think.
So I was doing freelance work for a small company for a while until they wanted to hire me full time. This meant they send me tasks, I give a deadline, and deliver on time. If there is any need for meetings or anything that requires me to come to the office I should be there.
This was mostly fine. Until I was informally asked last month to come to the office for two hours everyday till the end of that month. I honestly needed more routine during that time so I agreed. The month ends and a one week national holiday takes place (one of two holidays we take per year). I get back to my regular work from home. A week goes by (we're mid month now) and I stop by the office to realize they have a problem with me. They expected me to keep showing up everyday even after the holidays. The manager didn't like the fact that “whenever he needs me he has to call/text” and wants me “right by his side”. So I tell the lady (who's basically HR, sales manager, social media manager, marketer, one of the partners, and some other roles) that this wasn't part of the initial deal. She's been explicitly honest with me from the beginning so she tells me how she disagrees with him and she's been trying to handle his request for 2 months now but she can't find a way out anymore.
So we agree that I show up everyday or every other day so the manager “sees me around”. I agreed cause this was still a good job opportunity, salary wise, that I wouldn't find again here. So I was fine compromising a bit. I realized my mistake later on.
A week goes by where I had to not show up (but still work from home) for a couple of days due to medical reasons. Next time I'm in the office the lady secretly tells me that there are a lot of troubles going on in the company, one of which that the manager wants to deduct any days that I don't show up. I tell her that is unacceptable and if my salary is missing anything by the end of the month we'll have a problem.
A couple of days go by and we talk again. She notices my different attitude and I tell her that I'm obviously on edge due to our last conversation. She tells me that they're having financial troubles with the partners and can't afford my salary anymore, so next month they wanna go back to freelancing with me. I tell her that it's okay if they wanna go back to freelancing but I need to get my full salary this month. So she tells me that the manager had instructed finances to give me 40% of my paycheck this month. I barely held my curse words before she told me she'll talk with him and get me my full paycheck by the end of the month before we go back to freelancing.
So that's the beauty of the verbal agreements here. No laws. Changes to agreements that, and I can't stress this enough, I was NOT directly informed about, and deductions based on what I can only assume was a roll of dice.
TL;DR: I need another nationality.