Home › Blogs › Shawn's blog

Still Not Paid

Fri, 09/21/2007 - 23:15 — Shawn

If you've been following the massive "End of Nova" thread in the forums, you will have read that titled instructors have yet to be paid and were told to wait until Tuesday. How much more BS can teachers take? If there are problems paying teachers, can we expect the staff to paid next week? Will they continue to put up with pay being late again? I imagine teachers and staff feel like this right now:

Never fear, Nova has a plan. A new memo says not to worry.

Edit: A English version of the fax has been posted.

Memo says not to worry

I would like to inform you that the prospects look clearer for the refunds of cancellations that have accumulated until now and that a schedule has been established for refunding this money from the end of this month.

I fully understand the very harsh business environment in the branches. I am grateful to all of you who have made strong efforts under difficult circumstances.

The dark clouds that have been hanging heavily over us will be aside. I said previously 'the darkest time is before the dawn', and finally the first light of dawn can be seen.

With this there will be no concern regarding salaries from next month onwards. I cannot announce further details at the moment but would like you to feel reassured and concentrate on business as usual.

Nozom Sahashi

ShareThis

Comments

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 00:34 — Anonymous (not verified)

I can confirm this fax as

I can confirm this fax as being true.
TI info as well, it was on Education Online today.
(how i know, i work for them)

Good Luck guys, I need it as well ;)

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 00:34 — Anonymous (not verified)

I am an AT in Kyushu that

I am an AT in Kyushu that has not been paid and is crossing her fingers that Tuesday I will find money in my bank account. However, the final blow for me came today Friday Sept. 22 that for the last two months NOVA has not been paying my rent on the apartment. I now have 1 week to find a new place to live. The person that told me this lovely information did not have a solution for me or the other 200 teachers that he gave the same news to today. That's right 200 people are homeless at the end of the month.

I have also been told from a coworker that he is scheduled to get a new teacher in his apartment in two weeks. They don't have money but they have the guts to send over new teachers. They have also still scheduled On the Job Training for teachers that arrived last week.

I am lucky that i have a large network of friends Nova and non-nova. I was able to line up a new job and apartment in the last week. But those that have just come here without knowing the truth are stuck. My best advice is to go home. Call it quits. You have family at home that will support you and help you out. If you are one of the lucky ones like myself and can find a new place to live and work then stay enjoy Japan because despite NOVA Japan is a great place.

To those who are stuck best of luck. Lets all stick together and help each other out. But at the same time look out for yourself.

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 01:28 — Anonymous (not verified)

DAWN?

I think he is confused

Its the darkest just before you enter the gates....

The Heavy thick clouds of black smoke have started to dissapate

What he is witnessing are the rays of light eminating from the intense flames
of the fire that burns forever

Welcome to hell..........

Ha Ha Ha Ha Haaa
Now its your turn for an oral check!

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 01:48 — Anonymous (not verified)

"Starting next month, you will not have to worry..."

"Starting next month, you will not have to worry about being paid your salary."

Yeah, probably because we'll be busy looking for jobs. I do like how (the translation at least) has an ironic tone to it. Nothing to worry about since there'll be no salaries!

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 07:56 — Shawn

Evicted

So you're really going to have to look for a place on your own? Holy shit. Looking for an apartment is not easy and pretty pricey. It's disgusting that you are being thrown out into the street.

The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them. -Albert Einstein

—

Shawn

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 08:41 — Anonymous (not verified)

evicted

Thanx to a bunch of friends i have a place to live but that all depends on whether i get paid on tuesday. Keep your fingers crossed.

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 09:13 — Anonymous (not verified)

Even if Sahashi stumbles on

Even if Sahashi stumbles on a large pile of cash it will only delay Nova's close. It has been his inability to manage the company and total disregard for instructors and students that put him in this mess. At least it will give the remaining teachers the time and money needed to organize exits from the company.

I wonder if they really expect people to stick around after what he has done to them?

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 09:21 — Ronin (not verified)

Looking for private students

Well I didn't get paid too and lost any hope and believe that I will see any money from NOVA next week. I went home early yesterday and will take a day off on Monday. But on Tuesday I will be back at work looking for some private students.
I still wonder where the NOVA Union is these days.Anybody seen them??

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 11:03 — Anonymous (not verified)

Evicted

Does anyone have any further information about our salary deductions for rent and health insurance? I also just want to state the obvious and that is that a lot of real people are basing their real life decisions on the contents of this site so please be careful what you post. I know management should be shot for their abysmal communication skills and as a result we are required to speculate but please make sure to label it as such. We can do just as much harm to ourselves and each other by exaggerating and labeling speculation as fact. Having said that, the reliability of the information so far has been fantastic and I thank all those who have taken their time to contribute.

Sat, 09/22/2007 - 14:35 — Anonymous (not verified)

how long have you been an AT?

How long have you been at Nova and been an AT? If more than 6 months.. you should have been out of Nova housing loooong ago. Sorry for for hardship... best of luck.

Sun, 09/23/2007 - 00:17 — Anonymous (not verified)

Evicted

I posted the last comment this morning and can now confirm that the evictions are occuring in Chiba as well. The ations of Nova's upper management is criminal even though it wll no doubt be considered a civil dispute. I knew the company was mismanaged but I never really believed they could do something as terible as leaving their teachers homeless in a foreign country.

Sun, 09/23/2007 - 00:30 — Anonymous (not verified)

Phil!Open that bloody

Phil!Open that bloody door.
I need money for cat food and underpants.I cant count how many complaints i have had for lewd conduct but i cant help if no-one can pay me.I suggest we have a fund where we receive 1,000 yen for every student we have shagged.Any pregnancies is an automatic 10,000 so certain ATs will be rolling in it.
Eat the body of Christ and drink his blood and most importantly spare a dollar for a poor altar boy

Sun, 09/23/2007 - 18:22 — Anonymous (not verified)

I wish you luck.. my

I wish you luck..
my boyfriend will be in the same boat..unfortunately.

Tue, 09/25/2007 - 19:19 — Anonymous (not verified)

STILL HAVEN'T BEEN PAID

I am the AT at Higashi Kishiwada NOVA. I still have not been paid. I have been promised my pay four times and each time the promise was broken. Today again they promised me that my pay will arrive tomorrow. Why should I believe that when I have been lied to so many times!?

At this point bankruptcy is best for NOVA's staff and teachers. If the company declares bankruptcy we can all receive unemployment benefits now. If Sahashi stubbornly beats the dead horse and pushes onward without paying teachers it will be an even greater hardship to all of us. Sahashi: quit or declare bankruptcy NOW!

Tue, 09/25/2007 - 19:50 — David21 (not verified)

For anyone who is interested

For anyone who is interested this is an article about ABC, an school that went bankrupted in Osaka last year:
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20070724a7.html

Tue, 09/25/2007 - 20:02 — David21 (not verified)

Claiming unemployment insurance

last weblink: interesting article on what needs to be done to get unemployment insurance.
However, as far as I know, the majority of Nova instructors would not have Koyo Hoken.
As someone who worked for Nova for 5 years, at many levels, my sympathies to all the English teachers and Japanese staff caught up in this situation. People getting evicted even after a rent deduction from their salary is particularly disgraceful

Wed, 09/26/2007 - 17:16 — Osakadave (not verified)

You do not have to leave (yet)

Yesterday's Japan times ran some advice for teachers that applies to your situation:

"Accommodation

"Even if the owner/the landlord/the agency is screaming at you to get out, you don't have to leave — just keep paying your rent. If the company was supposed to be paying the rent and they haven't, sue the company for fraud or tell the agency: 'Look, the company's supposed to be paying, and I've already paid the company.' You have a right of residency, and anyone who wanted to get you out is going to have to get a court order to do it."
(Bob Tench, Nova union vice president)"
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20070925a1.html

Fri, 09/28/2007 - 18:22 — backtobed (not verified)

Nova pay up - finally!

I was up until recently a NOVA trainer and today we got paid...after being given the 14th,19th,21st,25th and 26th as dates when the money would "definitely" arrive in our accounts. Myself and many others are breathing a sigh of relief - that salary will pay for us to get to our job interviews. I don't believe for a second that the fact that we've been paid today means everyone will be paid on time next month, or at all, but I just thought I'd let you all know - BTs and ATs were paid today. Good luck to everyone, whether you stick it out or walk.

Fri, 09/28/2007 - 21:56 — Anonymous (not verified)

J-Staff Paid As Well

J-staff was also paid today...rumor is investor is putting 10 billion yen into nova and sahashi is stepping down...but i'm still looking for a different job. i don't believe anything anymore.

Mon, 10/01/2007 - 15:50 — novaholic (not verified)

"j-staff paid as well"

hi but only some of the j-staff at our branch have been paid. the ones that have only been working for a short time (3-6 months) have been paid but the ones who have been working longer havent. this was as of yesterday (sun 30th).

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.

Post new comment

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <p> <em> <strong> <blockquote> <ul> <ol> <li>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Pairs of<blockquote> tags will be styled as a block that indicates a quotation.

More information about formatting options

LJ is currently using a spam filter, which may eat legitimate comments, particularly those containing URLs. If you are having trouble posting a comment, email LJ.