Getting Paid on Time
Sunday, April 15th, 2007 -- J. DoeOne thing I never worried about while living in the United States before I moved to Italy was getting paid by my employers my salary when I was supposed to, be it weekly paychecks or a bi-weekly direct deposit into the bank.
Sure I kept records of when I did actually work, but this was more for the accidental errors the employers might make in my paychecks rather than the intentional ones that are common in Italy.
Most of the jobs I had in Italy simply did not pay me on time.
These were legal jobs with only one being a nero or under the table.
I had to send E-mail after E-mail begging fto be paid my salary.
I had to do numerous telephone calls only to listen to the same excuses about how my information is wrong in the computer, the computers are down, the banks are slow…all reasons why I could not be paid.
There were bills to pay, and it’s not as if the bill collectors will wait not for their bills to be paid.
If I weren’t married while I was in Italy with a working husband I would probably be in jail somewhere because I couldn’t pay my bills..
How could a country even function like this, I often thought to myself.
Needless to say after my stay in Italy, when I returned to the United States I really began to appreciate the fact of timely paychecks in the US.
I remember after my first temporary job in the US I proudly said to Buzzurro: “Look! my paycheck arrived IN THE MAIL one week after I worked!”
He smiled, but my mother was in the same room and thought I was nuts for saying that.
Americans who have not lived in Italy cannot comprehend how a person can have a legal job for a relatively large employer and not get paid on time.
Yesterday I received an Email from a friend still in Italy.
After months of searching for a job in December 2006 she found one.
It was with a large department store in Italy.
She was very happy.
She liked it and got along well with the customers.
Now she isn’t so happy with it.
Why ?
She hasn’t been paid since day one of her job.
That was four months ago.
She’s been working for 4 months without any financial reimbursement.
What is the reason for an Italian employer to not pay it’s employees their salaries when they state by contract that they will ?
Are they hoping the employees will simply forget that they are owed tens or hundred of dollars ?
Are they hoping to get rich on the few cents of interest they get by not paying the salaries ?
Do they want their employees to miss time from work while they are in court doing a bankruptcy hearing ?
What is the reason ? I never understood this, and I still don’t.
My husband went through a period of several months without getting paid a few years ago, but he was warned before it happened. His company was failing and he fired almost everyone, and let people stay on only if they agreed not to be paid for a while. He’s still paying off the debt he incurred from doing that. My husband really needed the job and he was much younger then, living with his family, so he agreed to it. That’s bad enough, but it’s completely ridiculous that there are employers who withhold pay for no good reason. Sometimes I’m amazed that this country continues to function at all.
Oops, I meant to say that my husband’s boss fired almost everyone, etc. Proofreading is a good thing!
Wow, so much red tape in Italy. Roberto talks about it all the time, and I used to think he was over-exaggerating - I mean I do it about the BS in the US, but I am reading lots of blogs that talk about similar things….I guess he must be point on! WOW!
JennDZ:
I confirm, it’s all true (I’ve seen J.Doe paid months or weeks late in Italy). Not only employers in financial trouble do this, but also some of the major Italian companies pay late. What if you live paycheck to paycheck and have to pay the bills ?
Buzzurro … try to post your response once more. It must have been a glitch. I’d like what you said to show up in the comment fied, if you could please.
this new template of mine has to go. I just haven’t had time to make the changes
I’ve heard of people in Italy not getting paid, not in too many cases though. Thank god it’s never happened to me, it would be just a few days late when I worked for a McLanguage school. To go months without being paid is terrible!
the wages are bad enough without having to deal with not being paid. it’s all very broken.
the reason people liked Mussolini was that he made the trains run on time.
billfry:
what is your point ? Can you elaborate that ?
Oh my god! I worked for a VERY large multinational in Italy 5 years ago and had that problem constantly the whole time I was there. It nearly got me evicted more than once… to make matters worse, it was a student internship, so the fact that I was getting paid at all was provoking not a small amount of jealousy. Never mind the fact that I was living on it, and not on my family’s money… and yes, no one in the States understood! They just could not comprehend it. Meanwhile, the guy in accounting rolled his eyes every time he saw me coming, having to deal with the pain-in-the-ass American yet again. Everyone else was waiting at least 6 months to get paid…