This company lays off its entire workforce, late at night, the Monday before Thanksgiving, via a text message, telling them their employment is terminated immediately. They also claim that their employees' COBRA is not provided. This is hideous on so many levels. Right offhand:
1.) They lack the dignity and courage to tell these workers they are fired to their faces. Instead they choose to hide behind a text message.
2.) The text message itself is written in corporatese and legalese.
3.) This was sent out less than 72 hours prior to the Thanksgiving holiday
4.) There was absolutely no mention of severance, not even for a short time. Zero.
5.) There was absolutely no advance notice so employees could begin to figure out a way to make income elsewhere.
6.) This is through no fault of the employees'. Often these types of actions happen due to management incompetence or greed or both. See the other problems above. It's very likely that many of these employees gave their all for years and got stabbed in the back for doing so.
7.) I originally said I believed their statement that there is no provision for COBRA was wildly inaccurate according to federal law. Another poster mentioned that there may be a loophole. If that's the case that's yet another disgraceful thing here (not to mention the disgrace that such a loophole is allowed to exist in the United States).
8.) The report also indicates that workers who attempted to file for unemployment were given the runaround because the employer had not bothered to report this to the state unemployment agency.
9.) There was not even a minimalistic corporate message on “we are saddened that our operations did not allow us to continue these workers' employees. We are diligently working to help them secure alternative employment.”
The fact that the bulk of these jobs are being lost in two at-will, very anti-union states (MS and NC) is telling in that such attitudes and legislation will attract the absolute bottom of the barrel employers. In fact, to their own detriment, as a North Carolinian, I have seen anti-union rhetoric being brainwashed into people here. They seriously need to wake up. The very same people who engage in these tactics are the very same people who bitch and moan about how “no one wants to work anymore.”