Have you ever gone backwards in the hobby?

[jefferyepayne]

Originally Posted by zljones

Have you ever hit a bad point in your collecting where you had to sell a good portion of your cards due to certain issues? Maybe have you ever had cards stolen or damaged?
I am asking because I recently am taking a huge, giant step backwards, I am forced to sell the majority of my collection due to a massive paycut at work, that was 20% of my salary, and also lost of student loan debt. The owner told me I was getting paid too much for the past 1 and 1/4, and they made a payroll error, which is true but I think he should honor his mistake since it has been over 1 year of this pay. I did not notice I was getting paid too much because my salary was part expense report and salary (confusing), but it was the only way he could afford to pay me a good amount. He set me ans others up this way so he could compensate for the fact that this company moved over 30 miles from our houses when it used to be 7 miles away. I never worked payroll, nor got paid this way so I trusted what they came up with. I felt there was maybe an error but when I asked over a year ago they said I was getting paid what I was supposed to be paid and it was not too much. So I took their word for it. Now they finally discovered the error all this time later. I need to sell most of my babies off to keep my head above water. I now have listings up on Ebay and it sucks.
Maybe if I hear other stories I won't feel too crushed and it could show hope that maybe I can return to the hobby one day soon after I get a new job. Right now I feel discouraged at the thought of rebuilding all my subsets back up in the future. It sucks to sell cards that I just bought a few weeks ago too right before I got notice they were slicing my pay to an unreasonable amount.

Have you talked to an employment lawyer? It would be worth one hour of your time to chat with someone about this. You likely DO owe them the $$$ but, depending upon your state, may have the ability to negotiate a repayment plan which would allow you to pay this back over a period of time and perhaps not have to liquidate so much of your collection. I would also have this individual look at your compensation package to determine whether what your employer did was actually legal or not. I don't know enough to have an opinion but it smells odd and might not be something they were allowed to do. That could help your case.

Check it out asap.

jeff

[zljones]

Originally Posted by jefferyepayne

Have you talked to an employment lawyer? It would be worth one hour of your time to chat with someone about this. You likely DO owe them the $$$ but, depending upon your state, may have the ability to negotiate a repayment plan which would allow you to pay this back over a period of time and perhaps not have to liquidate so much of your collection. I would also have this individual look at your compensation package to determine whether what your employer did was actually legal or not. I don't know enough to have an opinion but it smells odd and might not be something they were allowed to do. That could help your case.

Check it out asap.

jeff

I do not have to pay the state back, yet, and hopefully not, but who knows now, since they were coming down on him, they may hit the employees next. I am liquidating to pay other debts because I can't afford the payments on those other debts. And believe me Jeff I have thought of fighting legal battles alot LOL, they do alot of crooked things. If the state comes after me then I may have to.

[jefferyepayne]

Originally Posted by zljones

I do not have to pay the state back, yet, and hopefully not, but who knows now, since they were coming down on him, they may hit the employees next. I am liquidating to pay other debts because I can't afford the payments on those other debts. And believe me Jeff I have thought of fighting legal battles alot LOL, they do alot of crooked things. If the state comes after me then I may have to.

Hey Zach. Just to be clear, I am NOT advocating a legal battle. I AM advocating that you get professional advice from an employment attorney as to what your rights are in this situation and what the law says. What you do with that information depends upon where this all goes but I would make sure you understand what you are and are not entitled to before signing any piece of paper telling anyone you are paying them back anything.

Good luck and I hope it all works out for the best.

jeff

[Leon]

Originally Posted by jefferyepayne

Hey Zach. Just to be clear, I am NOT advocating a legal battle. I AM advocating that you get professional advice from an employment attorney as to what your rights are in this situation and what the law says. What you do with that information depends upon where this all goes but I would make sure you understand what you are and are not entitled to before signing any piece of paper telling anyone you are paying them back anything.

Good luck and I hope it all works out for the best.

jeff

I would make sure not to win the fight and lose the war. Nowadays jobs can be difficult to come by.

If your employer likes you, and wants to keep you, they should work with you on repaying THEIR error.

[chaddurbin]

am i reading this right--zach has been overpaid for over a year due to an accounting problem at his workplace. they just found out so he's back at his normal wage. he doesn't have to pay back any back wages. if this is correct, what's the problem?

[bobbyw8469]

He took a downgrade in the style of living he had grown accustomed to.

[zljones]

Originally Posted by bobbyw8469

He took a downgrade in the style of living he had grown accustomed to.

Exactly

[rainier2004]

Zach - Sorry to hear the news. This is not the first time we have heard about your employer and it sounds like a new job is just the thing you need. Also, I have seen the damage a divorce can do to a collection and it wasn't pretty. I have had cards stolen and it blows. Good luck and hopefully the fiancé is hanging in there with ya!

[zljones]

Originally Posted by chaddurbin

am i reading this right--zach has been overpaid for over a year due to an accounting problem at his workplace. they just found out so he's back at his normal wage. he doesn't have to pay back any back wages. if this is correct, what's the problem?

No I do not have to pay back back wages. I was paid a certain amount before May 2011 then our company moved far away which i expressed to the owner that the gas and toll costs would be a major financial burden, others expressed this too. In order to prevent employees from walking out he decided to pay pay 1/3rd of our salary as expense reports instead of salary so not as much taxes were to be paid. Of course we ended with more pay but not at the companies expense. The owner got in trouble with the IRS recently so he had to cut off expense reports.
When I was first set up on expense report system back in May 2011 he was going to pay me $25,000 a year plus $10,000 a year in expenses because I was making $35,000 when we were at the location close to home. Making $25,000 a year plus $10,000 in expenses is much more money than $35,000 a year straight salary; therefore, compensating for the extra gas used to drive all the way up there every day. When we arrived here they somehow entered me in as $29,000 a year plus $10,000 in expenses instead of $25,000 a year and $10,000 in expenses. None of us knew about this error, I did think it was strange so I asked about over a year ago and they told me I was getting $25,000 plus $10,000. I did not think I was getting $29,000 and $10,000.
Recently it was discovered that I was getting $29,000 and $10,000 all this time, I was surprised but it was right. We now submit to a payroll company and they showed that I was getting $29,000 on the books. My company then adjusted me back to 35,000 a year which was the same as I made at the old location. The reason why I am in a worse situation is because I have spend tons of money on gas that I did not need to spend on when I was going closer to home. I hated sharing my salary but I think it is the only way this could be understood. they are not making me pay anything back but I worry about the IRS making me pay.

[zljones]

Originally Posted by jefferyepayne

Hey Zach. Just to be clear, I am NOT advocating a legal battle. I AM advocating that you get professional advice from an employment attorney as to what your rights are in this situation and what the law says. What you do with that information depends upon where this all goes but I would make sure you understand what you are and are not entitled to before signing any piece of paper telling anyone you are paying them back anything.

Good luck and I hope it all works out for the best.

jeff

Actually you had good advice, right now I am just going to hang in there until I get a new job and if things come around on me then I will probably have to see someone about it, so I do not have to pay anything. I do not think the law can help me with how much I got paid because on record it looks like I get paid almost 6 grand more a year, it's pretty confusing, but what happened was he cut expense reports, which was a $4,000 a year loss for me, and then it was discovered that my base that was not expenses was also $4,000 too high came to about a $8,000 a year pay cut. Hopefully I can just find a new job and be happier. This company is hurting for money real bad and could close within a year.