Sunday, July 5, 2015

Job Hunting


I am job hunting at the moment. One advantage of being laid off is that job hunting is much easier when you are out of work. Job hunting these days is much different than it was even 5 -10 years ago. There are tons of jobs posted online everyday on sites like Workopolis, Monster and Indeed. Indeed seems to be a little better than the other sites, because it tends to pull job ads from those sites and publish them on Indeed. The other advantage of Indeed is that it has a very easy to use resume posting portal. Posting your resume on Indeed is a good way to get noticed by recruiters.

The challenge with applying to online ads whether through Indeed or elsewhere is that you are competing with dozens or sometimes hundreds of other applicants for one ad! In my next post I will explain my strategy to get around this problem.

Wednesday, June 10, 2015

Not worth the fight

After consulting with my lawyer and doing some hard thinking, I decided that it was not worth the  fight. I signed my termination agreement and sent it to my now ex employer. The return for the risk was just not worth it. At least I can collect EI if I burn through the severance I did get.

Here is an itemized list of the severance that I received.

I was at my employer for just over 3 years. This is what they gave me:

  • 10 weeks pay
  • $4000 YTD profit sharing (Lawyer told me that many times he fights for this)
  • 2 weeks unused vacation

All in all it works out to just over 3 months total pay. Is this fair? Well, my Lawyer told me it's on the low end of common law or common packages given for someone of my age and job title. It turns out my ex employer crafted the letter and package perfectly. Just enough not to bother going to court over, but on the lean side. Oh well, time to move on to the job search....




Sunday, June 7, 2015

Unemployment Insurance and my Termination Package

I applied for Unemployment Insurance today.

Even though my employer graciously "cough" gave me 10 weeks termination pay, I applied for unemployment insurance today just in case. This is my first time ever applying for unemployment insurance in my 20 years of working for the man. It's a bizarre feeling to say the least. It was a fairly simple online process, I guess they will be sending me a confirmation in the mail. Hopefully I will not need to receive it once my 10 weeks termination pay runs out....down to almost 9 at the time of writing this.

Termination Package

I was with my employer for just over 3 years. They gave me 10 weeks plus a portion of profit sharing. If we live frugally, this should sustain us for 6 months of living expenses or so.

Is this amount of Termination pay fair?
The minimum they could have paid me by law here in Ontario is 3 weeks pay, however as a manager, it's not uncommon to receive more than that. Honestly, I expected to receive 6 months pay, not the 10 weeks that they gave me. I did review the "package" with my lawyer last week. He said I had a 50/50 chance of getting 20 weeks instead, less estimated legal fees of $3000 if it went to court. Still pondering this, not sure its worth it to pursue further. I do feel kinda cheated by the whole thing though. More to come......

I would love to hear if you went through the process of receiving a package, and pursuing it further with legal action. How did it work out for you?





Friday, June 5, 2015

Jobless in the Hammer

Welcome to this new blog about life and money. I recently got laid off from my job as a Sales Manager. I am a dad of 3 girls living life in Hamilton Ontario. I lost my job June 2 2015 from one of the largest companies in Canada. This blog will chronicle my thoughts and progress as I tread my way through this experience. I hope that if you are in the same position as I am, reading my posts will help. This blog is about us, the recently unemployed. No matter what part of the globe you reside - welcome, I am glad you are here!