Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

jzhwu.blogspot.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 391 posts

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#231

Post by backspace »

mikeash wrote: post #196
backspace wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. Handling things professionally and keeping people honest are two different things. There is no "service to the SV community" that this guy is doing by airing dirty laundry. If you've been wronged by your former company, handle it on your own. Shaming the company is not going to help you, the company, or anyone else. What you're effectively suggesting is that your "service" is to warn everyone to stay away…

> Once you leave, you're not entitled to anything more from the company. Can you explain how this works, exactly? How does quitting one's job wipe clean any debt from the company to the now-former employee? Can they refuse to send him his last paycheck too?

No they cannot refuse to send him his last paycheck.

I can't speak for the paperwork involved when leaving Miso, but most companies make you sign an agreement (often in the exit interview) that you are not entitled to/owed anything more than X, Y, Z items that are explicitly stated (which usually included the last paycheck and any unpaid vacation days).

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#233

Post by backspace »

cconroy wrote: post #219
backspace wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. Handling things professionally and keeping people honest are two different things. There is no "service to the SV community" that this guy is doing by airing dirty laundry. If you've been wronged by your former company, handle it on your own. Shaming the company is not going to help you, the company, or anyone else. What you're effectively suggesting is that your "service" is to warn everyone to stay away…

I argue that if he didn't do it -- it would be a dis -service to the community. I look at it like if it were simple assault involving you and an assailant. Since you were not really injured you decide not to press charges against them. Let's say the assailant does this again in the future -- hurting somebody marginally. And they do press charges. To the court this looks like a first offense and they let the assailant…

I agree with your central theme that more data is better. That's why as I suggested, he should have handled it on his own and taken legal action against them, so that there was a clear legal record of such behavior by Miso.

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#234

Post by ajross »

backspace wrote: post #226
ajross wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find the reactions here fascinating. There's a hugely bimodal distribution here between people who sympathize with the employee (I'm in that set: the guy's out ten thousand dollars, who cares about feelings or "employers being human" at that scale?) and the employer. I'd guess the latter are mostly founders, or people lurking here in the hope of someday being founders. And that makes me sad that so many of you thin…

Your stance is very black or white - either you're for the employee or you're a founder. I don't think it's quite that clear. As an employee, I wholeheartedly agree that he should have been paid if he had some written form of agreement (email counts). As a sensible logical person, I think he should have gotten paid when he was an employee especially since this was an employee perk. I don't need to be a founder to kno…

I assure you I'm not being one sided here; jzhwu and Miso clearly didn't part on good terms. It seems he's at least mildly incompetant. And he's clearly profane and confrontational. It's entirely plausible that the leadership team at Miso hates this guys guts for valid reasons and doesn't want to pay him a cent they don't have to.

And if this was a forgotten poster from his office or a lost book, no one would care. But it's ten thousand dollars. What do their feelings have to do with an obligation of that magnitude? Either they have to pay it or they don't. Who cares about whether he "deserves" it or not?

Also: you realize your intuition makes no legal sense, right? If you "agree that he should have been paid" then you are agreeing that Miso has a debt to jshwu. Debts don't disappear like that because of technicalities (or rather, not unless such technicalities are described in a contract that everyone seems to agree doesn't exist in this case).

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#235

Post by mikeash »

backspace wrote: post #231
mikeash wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Once you leave, you're not entitled to anything more from the company. Can you explain how this works, exactly? How does quitting one's job wipe clean any debt from the company to the now-former employee? Can they refuse to send him his last paycheck too?

No they cannot refuse to send him his last paycheck. I can't speak for the paperwork involved when leaving Miso, but most companies make you sign an agreement (often in the exit interview) that you are not entitled to/owed anything more than X, Y, Z items that are explicitly stated (which usually included the last paycheck and any unpaid vacation days).

Huh. Why would anyone sign such a thing?

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#236

Post by kaybe »

patio11 wrote: post #150
ajross wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point about illegal retribution is really good. Notice how email #3 walked it right back and came up with an entirely different argument. They knew they screwed up.

Yep. More to the point, when a letter from a lawyer comes in, they're going to ask their lawyer for his opinion, and he is going to say "#$()! Why did you send that!?! That drastically complicates things for me. Just pay the kid or we're going to run up quite the bill fighting him and may yet lose ." (If you don't understand why that email is radioactive, here is a joking-but-not-really exhaustive list of things US c…

Did you forget a link?

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#237

Post by dsl »

veyron wrote: post #5

"I was entitled to a $10k referral bonus offered by the CEO through internal emails." Can you produce this email? (IANAL)If so you may actually have legal grounds for taking action against Miso ...

Email is the property of his employer, the courts would not expect him to be able to produce it. His lawyer could however ask the court to obtain the email on his behalf, and the company would be compeled to provide it.

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#238

Post by adgar »

nknight wrote: post #224
davidu wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At my company, it's a perk. And I love paying it out. And my loyalty is to my employees. I would bleed for them. But it's not to my former employees. As I approach 100 employees, many who have been with me for 4+ years, I find my stance to be entirely in their favor.

Your loyalty to your employees should include respect for contracts and the law. This man satisfied the conditions for payment of the bonus before he left the company, he is entitled to the money. That you would not give it to him makes you little better than a thief. Fortunately, we all now know that OpenDNS and anything else David Ulevitch is involved with in the future is a company to avoid.

> Fortunately, we all now know that OpenDNS and anything else David Ulevitch is involved with in the future is a company to avoid.

It seems that's true only if you value treating people with respect when you aren't legally obligated to.

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#239

Post by backspace »

ajross wrote: post #234
backspace wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your stance is very black or white - either you're for the employee or you're a founder. I don't think it's quite that clear. As an employee, I wholeheartedly agree that he should have been paid if he had some written form of agreement (email counts). As a sensible logical person, I think he should have gotten paid when he was an employee especially since this was an employee perk. I don't need to be a founder to kno…

I assure you I'm not being one sided here; jzhwu and Miso clearly didn't part on good terms. It seems he's at least mildly incompetant. And he's clearly profane and confrontational. It's entirely plausible that the leadership team at Miso hates this guys guts for valid reasons and doesn't want to pay him a cent they don't have to. And if this was a forgotten poster from his office or a lost book, no one would care. B…

Yes, debt can be (and usually is) zeroed out when you leave a company.

As I explained in another comment, most companies (don't know about Miso) make you sign an agreement during your exit interview that the company does not owe you anything except X, Y, Z items that are enumerated clearly (these usually include your last paycheck and check for unpaid vacation days).

Re: I'm a former Miso engineer and the founders screwed me out of 10k

#240

Post by cheald »

kaybe wrote: post #236
patio11 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. More to the point, when a letter from a lawyer comes in, they're going to ask their lawyer for his opinion, and he is going to say "#$()! Why did you send that!?! That drastically complicates things for me. Just pay the kid or we're going to run up quite the bill fighting him and may yet lose ." (If you don't understand why that email is radioactive, here is a joking-but-not-really exhaustive list of things US c…

Did you forget a link?

His point is that there are no valid reasons to deny an employee earned wages.
Post reply on HN