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Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

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Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#361

Post by manigandham »

jomamaxx wrote: post #242
elithrar wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can invoice the company. It's not a big deal. Nonononono. You're hired as an employee. There is a legal and ethical agreement for them to pay you at the intervals agreed upon in your contract. There are no ifs or buts about it, no invoicing them, no excuses for 'just started'. Payroll is NOT hard.

"Nonononono. You're hired as an employee. There is a legal and ethical agreement for them to pay you at the intervals agreed upon in your contract. There are no ifs or buts about it, no invoicing them, no excuses for 'just started'. Payroll is NOT hard." No - you are completely wrong. There is absolutely nothing wrong - or even remotely immoral - about paying using invoicing while a company gets going. It's common an…

YOU are completely wrong.

Employees cannot invoice their earnings, they must be paid according to the law and the employment agreement you signed with them.

Yes payroll is complex but this is exactly why it needs to be done correctly and timely. The earnings, taxes, insurance, and other liabilities must match up along with all the reporting requirements. There is no way around this. You cannot just skip the complexity by telling them to invoice you.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#362

Post by TechieKid »

pascalmemories wrote: post #357
TechieKid wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the reply! This isn't very clear to me. I actually opened the link in a new tab with Firefox for Android, had Firefox ask me for permission to access my camera and mike(?), denied those and closed the tab as I read pascalmemories' comment i.e. I never actually saw the content, so "you would have to download the app they spammed with vibrates" doesn't mean anything to me. Perhaps that's a good thing? :) I'v…

I was browsing in Chrome with a brand new phone which thankfully did not have anything on it. Despite clearing all the app data (which normally cleans out browse-by if it's just annoying page javascript in my experience) the damn vibrate, play noises and throw multiple pop-ups just kept on coming and would not let me close them. I had to resort to a factory wipe to clean it; it was not a great deal since it was a pho…

So, if I start my phone and browse normally, and don't see, hear, or feel any popups, noises, or vibrations, I'm good? And perhaps I should clear out my Firefox app data? I shut it down because you mentioned root and malware, and if the malware can root a device, it probably can hide itself pretty well and make it impossible to get it out.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#363

Post by manigandham »

jomamaxx wrote: post #313
dalke wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you enlighten me as to the mechanics? If my contract says I'll be paid monthly on the 15th, when do I send in the invoice? Are the payment terms net-10, net-30, or longer? Do I need to break out sick or vacation days as its own line item? What about the deductions? Who is responsible for figuring out and paying the payroll tax? Because it sounds like asking for an invoice is a way for the company to avoid payin…

"Could you enlighten me as to the mechanics? If my contract says I'll be paid monthly on the 15th, when do I send in the invoice? Are the payment terms net-10, net-30, or longer? Do I need to break out sick or vacation days as its own line item? What about the deductions?" If you are having difficulty grasping this - you should not work for an early stage startup that is pre-funding. You are expecting very standard '…

Actually it seems you're confused. You don't need a payroll system but you do need payroll done correctly by the company. There is no such thing as a "standard employeeship" - either you are an employee or you're not. Laws do not discriminate between a serious business or a sloppy startup that doesn't have it together.

You should really talk to an HR/tax attorney before you continue to spread misinformation.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#364

Post by manigandham »

jomamaxx wrote: post #205
einhverfr wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay people in regular ways through regular channels. Seriously, though, ADP delivers paystubs. If they were using ADP, they would have gotten paystubs.

When a company has just started, they may have not set this up. You can invoice the company. It's not a big deal. Again - of all flags - lack of pay stubs is the least of them if it's just a garage startup with 3-ish people. The actual exchange of money is 100x a stronger indicator of health than the presence of a stub.

It is a big deal, running a business requires following the law. There is no special "startup" case where you're allowed to be loose on your obligations.

Accurate payroll costs somewhere between $50-100 per month per employee with dozens of great vendors available. This is an incredibly trivial cost (especially compared to the fines for breaking these laws) and means there's no excuse to not have things in order. If you can afford a salary, you can afford accurate payroll and bookkeeping - otherwise you have no business being in business.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#365

Post by clapinton »

d0100 wrote: post #201

"About a month in, our interim leader returned to Korea, and a woman was brought in who had worked at several video game companies. She used to know our CEO’s in college. She was kind, thoughtful, and attentive. I knew the company would eat her alive. After our boss departed, I took over a few of his duties. One of them was “viral marketer.” I was now creating ad campaigns on Facebook in an attempt to bring monthly a…

Thought so too, but the timelines don't match, since she mentions stuff about Xmas. Still, my jaw dropped a few more cm after reading those sentences, and believe me, it was already on the floor after reading the medium piece.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#366

Post by dalke »

jomamaxx wrote: post #313
dalke wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you enlighten me as to the mechanics? If my contract says I'll be paid monthly on the 15th, when do I send in the invoice? Are the payment terms net-10, net-30, or longer? Do I need to break out sick or vacation days as its own line item? What about the deductions? Who is responsible for figuring out and paying the payroll tax? Because it sounds like asking for an invoice is a way for the company to avoid payin…

"Could you enlighten me as to the mechanics? If my contract says I'll be paid monthly on the 15th, when do I send in the invoice? Are the payment terms net-10, net-30, or longer? Do I need to break out sick or vacation days as its own line item? What about the deductions?" If you are having difficulty grasping this - you should not work for an early stage startup that is pre-funding. You are expecting very standard '…

Everyone is downvoting you because the conversation is about an employee relationship. Quoting atria, "You don't understand the difference between a statutory employee and independent contractor."

There is no special exception for startups where employee salaries are exempt from payroll taxes. It is also illegal for a company to pay you as a contractor when you are really an employee. What you propose sounds exactly like breaking the law.

Also, a company which proposes this arrangement takes on the liability that the 1099 contractor could come back in the future and sue for the taxes and benefits that a W2 employee would have received. That happened to Microsoft a few years ago.

I was giving you a chance to demonstrate that this practice is common and that you know what you are talking about.

However, given your posting history I should have expected continued blustering where you demean others for lack of knowledge. Why, just the other day you said that I, spouse of an Army vet who did two tours in Iraq, didn't have exposure to family members in the military. Now you say that I, employee of two startups and founder of two more, have no startup experience.

No one in this thread says a startup company needs a payroll system. The question is about paystubs for employees, which the employer can even do by hand.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#367

Post by ChristopherE »

atria wrote: post #325
jomamaxx wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Nonononono. You're hired as an employee. There is a legal and ethical agreement for them to pay you at the intervals agreed upon in your contract. There are no ifs or buts about it, no invoicing them, no excuses for 'just started'. Payroll is NOT hard." No - you are completely wrong. There is absolutely nothing wrong - or even remotely immoral - about paying using invoicing while a company gets going. It's common an…

Just wow. This is terrible. You don't understand the difference between a statutory employee and independant contractor. If you are an employee, the company is required by law to withhold taxes and pay you regularly. Every state in the U.S. has an agency that will take and prosecute wage claims. People have gone to jail for messing with witholding taxes. If you just invoice, you are effectively an independant contrac…

You also are unable to avail yourself of worker's compensation if you get hurt and unemployment compensation when you are laid off.

It astonishes me that anyone could be so ignorant as to say there is nothing wrong with making people invoice you. As you've correctly stated, it's a completely different relationship. Even the liability is different.

If you're a contractor and the guy who signs your checks says "nice ass! Now shut up and do your work" He's pretty much just pissed you off and as a self-employed contractor, you're free to decline and move on to another "client". If that same person is your employer, he's broken several civil laws and in most jurisdictions, committed an actual crime.

We could both go on for hours on the differences which is why this whole thing amazes me.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#368

Post by ChristopherE »

ramblenode wrote: post #160
lemonghost wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think 1for.one is the old name, then they changed it to jobsonic and, more recently, to wrkriot.com.

Wow, the author's description "anti-SEO name" doesn't quite do these justice. "1for.one" is cringey but "wrkriot.com" is just straight VC repellent.

Not disputing you, but why is WrkRiot so repellent? It's unique and recognizable. I'll admit that "Riot" is just weird, but is that the main reason?

(not trolling, I'm serious)

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#369

Post by e28eta »

snowwrestler wrote: post #254
jomamaxx wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not a huge flag. When a company starts up, it's difficult for them to get the money operating as per regular. He got paid - that's what matters. The paystub is a minor thing/

If a company can't produce a paystub with a paycheck, I doubt that they are handling accounting and taxes properly. Paystubs don't need to come from ADP. They can be typed up or even hand-written if you want. But they demonstrate, and record, that the company is fulfilling its legal obligations as an employer, and give the employee the information the employee needs to fulfill their legal obligations as a taxpayer.

I wonder how this will play out in April. I seriously doubt the company is properly withholding & paying the payroll taxes. I guess it's not even clear whether or not they'll be filing a W2 for her.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#370

Post by jsprogrammer »

cperciva wrote: post #131
h4nkoslo wrote: post #34

Has there ever been an instance of late payroll (as opposed to eg sales commission checks being calculated wrong) where the company actually pulled out of the nosedive? It seems like it's almost always the death knell.

I remember reading a couple years ago about a company where the CEO came in and announced that they weren't going to be able to make payroll so he was going to have to lay everybody off; some of the employees left, but others stuck around working "for free", and the company turned around within a few months. A couple years later they exited and the CEO gave large gifts to the employees who stuck around because they d…

An honest CEO would have awarded stock in lieu of pay.
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