Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Zion is at jury duty today, doesn't that sound like a good time to one and all?? hehe Poor guy, he's having a rough couple weeks! He was still employed at TEP when he got the summons to appear and he was actually excited about it because his company would have been paying him, plus he would have gotten juror pay, plus, he wouldn't have had to be at work. Win win win- unfortunately, the timing wasn't great and now he's stuck doing jury duty instead of being able to use that time growing his business, looking for another job, or going and getting government assistance. Isn't life just jolly?! ;)
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23 comments:
furthermore, I found out that If I am not called, they don't pay me anything except for some measley mileage. I don't even think that will cover the parking which of course is not free.
I love doing public service for free!
Oh, yeah, I get to be on the internet for 30 minutes and that's why I'm here. Woohoo!
Hope I don't have to do this tomorrow too!
I've been in the federal pool before, and was only going to get $40 and mileage if I was to serve.
At least in federal court, they wouldn't even dish out the $40 if my work was going to pay me for the time.
I'm pretty sure one of the lawyers nixed me from the pool because I exercise my 2nd Amendment rights They asked all of us in the box about our gun ownership status. It was relevant because the defendant was in on a drug charge and felony possession of a firearm. I'm not sure if that was viewed as a disadvantage for the prosecution or the defense.
Maybe they fired him b/c they didn't wanna pay him Jury duty.
That's against the law you know.
Or because he was related to an employee that quit.
Or because... work with me... people...
... because he got a white woman pregnant?
Because they didn't wanna pay increased health care costs for mother and baby?
Fat (perceived disability) discrimination?
Mexican discrimination?
Gender discrimination?
Height discrimination?
Yea, I agree with Israel. The whole thing smacks of wrongful termination. My guess is with Jariah leaving, they figured you were a short timer and could treat you badly.
Zion was sent home because they didn't feel he could be impartial... it was a DUI case where the woman already has a breathalyzer on her car. He told them that that would lead him to suspect she was guilty since she had obviously been convicted before in order to get that installed on her vehicle. He was dismissed. LOL
maybe they figured they missed their chance to fire Jariah so Zion was the next best thing.
But why did jariah leave? If I'm gonna make a case for retaliation I gotta know that...
Because we were ready to move back to Ohio. Jariah was put on probation, like many others in the call center, and around that time, he just felt like it was time to go back home. He was told when he gave them his month notice that he would not get fired, if that's what he was worried about. He was also told that if he came back to Tucson, they would gladly hire him back.
I still think them firing Zion has something to do with Jariah leaving. They called Jariah 'Zion' half of the time and vice-verca. Everybody assumed that since Jariah was leaving Zion would too.
Jariah had called me,very upset, and announced that he thought he was going to be fired! He sounded shocked, he had never been close to being fired before in his life, and he hated the thought. He said maybe they would move up their plans for moving back to Ohio by several months to avoid being fired. He turned in his notice shortly thereafter. Then he was told they were planning to move him into another department or something. Then when he actually was leaving I guess they said they were not planning to fire him at all and he would still be welcome back. The really crazy part is then they fired Zion who had consistently got better reveiws and even awards.
Just my opinion, but coming from a Management & Human Resouces background, Zion's termination could be one of two things.
(1) They assumed that he would be leaving right behind Jariah, and as all companies are looking to streamline right now - he was an easy target... OR
(2) Because of Jariah's conversation about the "program", the company wanted Zion out of there quickly, so that they didn't have to deal with any potential issues with either one of them asking for compensation, etc. Companies assume & hope that employees won't come back on them once they are no longer employed, because without a job they might not have the resources to fight the termination.
Zion,
Did you have to sign anything stating that you would not discuss the company's actions in a negative light, or did you receive any compensation for severance pay, such as an extra two weeks (in addition to vacation pay)?
I had not thought about the program...that could be it.
Well if it's true that Zion got better reviews than Jariah and they assured Jariah that he would not be fired, then why did they fire Zion?
I see it as retaliatory. They could not hurt Jariah for leaving but they could hurt his family and his pregnant sister.
I think Cyndi is on to something. The main reason Jariah and Zion were so tied together there in everyone's minds is probably because of the program they developed that the whole company was talking about and many of the employees started using. All the I.T. guys no doubt hated the duo for making them look bad for not having come up with the idea before, there was quite a bit of buzz about it among the management about the increased produtivity it created, I'm sure the names Jariah and Zion were on a lot of tongues and tied together.
They promised them the letter of recognition and then never came through. When Jariah quit, he asked for it again, and was put off with stall tactics, then they got rid of Zion. Jariah said that program increased productivity about 400% and was being used by about 30 people when he left.
I think they didn't want to pay for the program.
WHAT!!??? Yikes!
Did the guys just donate their time and efforts to develop the program or did the company pay for the time they spent? If not, that program is Zion and Jariah's intellectual property and as such should (and by rights) be compensated for it if the company uses it.
(this topic is very near and dear to my heart, being in the software industry myself)
So by making the company more productive they made themselves expendable?
I think some hay could be made w/ the intellectual property argument.
What about the Union?
Lemme guess, they weren't members because they didn't wanna pay dues...
They were not members of the union. (Zion doesn't believe in them, and I don't know why Jariah didn't join. Probably the dues...)
Zion doesn't want to fight the termination thing because they will be able to prove that he made mistakes. That would be harder to prove.
However, the program that Zion and Jariah created, he does want to go after them for that. Jariah started working on it before he even got hired at TEP!!! (Zion worked there for a week before Jariah got hired and came home really early on and said that he had an idea for a program that would make his job alot easier/ faster/ more productive. He described to Jariah what he had in mind and Jariah started building it while Zion was at work everyday.)
Zion at first thought that he would just use it himself to help HIS life be easier. Eventually, however, because of the usefulness of the program, the majority of the credit department was using it. The managers loved it! Now, if TEP stopped using the program, alot of the employees in the credit department would have to be retrained!!
The only thing that Jariah or Zion asked for for the use of it was a letter from TEP just stating how productive the program made the department. They never provided the letter. Plus, they took Jariah and Zion's names off of the program, which really upset both of them.
Jariah did mention it when he was leaving, and Zion brought it up again when he was being fired. They said that they "would try and figure something out..." They obviously haven't figured anything out.
Zion would like to go after them, and I'm pretty sure Jariah would too. (Jariah wasn't going to as long as Zion was employed there because he didn't want to jeopardize Zion's job.... lol)
They did it all on there own time at the hovel... the only thing they did to it on TEP time was installing it and I guess they did some tweaking for specific users or something. (I don't really understand it all....) =)
Get an attorney Zion, IMMEDIATELY!!!! And rule NOTHING out. Who cares if he made mistakes. If his attorney can show that others routinely made similar mistakes without repercussion that would eliminate it as a possible argument by the defense.
Correct me if I'm wrong, Israel.
I can't over-emphasize how huge the intelectual property rights angle could be.
Rights, ownership and profit sharing for just ideas are big issues at my company. Our employee contracts even have verbiage to help clarify it.
Definitely seek professional advice on intellectual property rights law and licensing and your unique situation.
I agree with John and PMB.
^^^
Woah! *ducks*
I almost got beaned by avian swine.
If you're thinking you can't afford to hire an attorney, the truth is you can't afford not to.
We are going to look into it about the program... We have prepaid legal, I don't know if they can help us with something like this or not.
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