Gents! Back to real issues-Curiosities of the day

Did anyone noticed that on the "Day of Protest" in the Dominican Republic, where the entire population was on a silent strike against the economic policies of Hipolito Mejia and his PRD party, our flaming President Hipolito took the day off to go shopping for $19,000 suit at the exclusive boutique Faconnable, an exclusive emporium located inside Plaza Bolera, Piantini?

Just a week ago Hipolito had just signed a lease for an office for his wife in chic "El Vergel" for $12,000,000 a year in a residence that would probably rent for $750,000 a year.(For those of you who doubt the prices I quote for real estate)

While Hipolito was shopping for the suit, matching ties and socks, on the other side in the Gulf of Mexico, our most recent addition to neoliberal generalissimos President Vicente Fox of Mexico was equally shopping for embroidered towels at US$435.00 each, bedsheets at US$1000 each,and electronic curtains for US$19,000 for his Los Pinos presidential mansion.

And the last curiosity is that we now have a gringo as a member of La Coordinadora de Organizaciones Populares, the group responsible for the Day of Protest. In case anyone didnt notice a tall, muscular, blonde protestor shown on CDN news all day long was identified as Daniel Shaw, a US national. Now how is that for international brotherhood? No hoods please Daniel. People now are supposed to use their real names and show their face even in Internet, regardless of your personal security.

Re: Gents! Back to real issues-s

A real issue here is getting liquidation for people who have earned it.....the labour Tribunal voted in the employees favour and a lawyer is searching for property title....(so they say)...now < I have asked for help in the past. As an update, we are no further ahead and it is 9 months in the courts.
If you really want to do something constructive on this site. Here is a decent cause. Or you can ban me also from this forum

Re: Gents! Back to real issues-Curiosities of the

Who is Daniel Shaw, any ideas? I guess Hipolito is a "sin vergueza" just like the others.

Re: Gents! Back to real issues-s

Sandra, I was always told that all connected Dominicans have a lawyer, doctor and a high ranking miliary person in the family that can protect them from these sort of tactics. That is why I tried to be very careful about who we hired and we still got stuck a few times. One employee would curse out and treat customers like crap so we let him go, sent the letter to the labor department and we still ended up having to liquidate him. We always liquidated every Jan. 1 so employees don't accumulate huge sums.

Re: Tom f & Daniel Shaw

Tom is doing the right thing to avoid employee compensation problems. Monthly liquidations are the way to go. Some people go the wrong way, however, that is hiring employees for only three months before they qualify for fixed status(After four months). That is not the fair way to deal with employees.

Now, I know that the Labor Relations Board here tilts heavily towards the employee, just like tenants in a landlord-tenant dispute. Some employees try to get a job just for six months, work very hard at it, and then start goofing off so they could get fired and collect. Then they go on, get another job and can buy themselves some nice furniture or go partying for a few weeks with the liquidation money.

I know guys who worked for five years and became star players in their company and then used the same trick and collected $500,000 cool pesos and had another job already lined up, bought themselves a nice jeepeta and got themselves a brand new job. That is the way here.

On the other hand, most major employers are not propperly recognizing tenure as a value to their organization, so employee loyalty has never been lower in this country, and it will get worse. Companies are spending millions training new people constantly because the turn over is very high.

Re: Tom f & Daniel Shaw

Forgot to mention, Daniel Shaw appeared in all news reports branding a bandana in his head and showing his fist chantinf anti-government slogans in the rally held at Independence Park yesterday afternoon. He joined the Coordinadora leaders in support of the Day of Protest.

Daniel is a native American or was called a Gringo by the Free Press today. He was very visual in the news reports because he stood out like a sore thumb. He is tall, muscular and of course blonde and white like a Scandinavian. Most of the people around him were shorter dark skin Dominicans.

Re: Tom f & Daniel Shaw

Keep our ears and eyes open on this Daniel guy. He will get his ass in jail if he doesn't watch out.

Good info about the liquidations or severence pay. It makes it very hard to manage a business with this being only one of a number of things the government can do to you and is not applied fairly or with consistency. This give employers more reasons to keep wages low. It is like the general consensus about government bribes at the low level being considered the only way for these people to make ends meet so that is the way it is. Didn't Balaguer say this one time. This will not bring the DR on the road to sustainable development.

Re: Just an example

A major hardware retailer had a parking lot for their executives and employees in a roof top for about 200 cars. A guy who used to wash one the executives car there realized he could make a buck offering his car washing services to the other employees. Soon he began to get more clients, and pretty soon he established himself as the car washer for everyone, with the blessings of the Company, but on an informal basis. He was not a formal employee.

Two years later, the company decided for security reasons to install an electronic gate and get everyone out of the lot, except a uniform watchman. They told the guy he could not wash any more cars there. He should pack his bucket and towels and go..not quite.

Well, he went to the Labor Department Claims Board and asked to get help in the matter. The Board certified him as a full time employee, even though he was never in the payroll, and stated that he had an implied contract regardless of his situation as an informal car washer. Just the fact that they allowed him in the grounds to do this work merited back vacation pay,back Christmas double-salary,bonification from Company profits,unemployment pay and full compensation. The net result $100,000 pesos not bad for a car washer!

Cement Bag informal loaders who were always on the sidewalk called "chiriperos" or piece loaders, who loaded each cement bag into trucks for .50 cents each heard about the situation and went to the Labor Department too. They got a nice settlement just as juicy as the car washman.

Re: No, was the manager nt

this is definately a case of employees being shafted...they all worked hard for 2 years...never a problem. The new "owner" came and fired the whole staff. No renumeration.