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Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

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Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#191
post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a great idea, there's far too many businesses that exploit employees by labelling them contractors. Of course, idea and execution are two very different things. In NZ, it's often found in courier companies and telecommunications, where you're an owner-operator! Except you have to do what the company you work for says, when they say, and you have to provide all your own equipment, and of course, pay for y…

> At one point our tax department started cracking down on this, then stopped, I'm not sure why. But it needs to be done. Around here (Poland) they tried to focus the crackdown on... contractors, planning on requiring a contractor to have at least 25% of their income from a second client to be considered self-employed and not an employee. The local IT lobbyists had a hearty laugh about this idea and that was the end…

We have a similar rule in Australia that unfortunately was introduced, so called 'personal services income' if you make over 80% of your money from a single source you effectively can't make tax deductions like a business.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#192

> Equifax is now receiving records every pay period from 2.5 million companies. Information in the reports comes from employers and payroll processors. But why do employers and payroll processors give any data to Equifax? I can understand that credit card issuers, and mortgage and auto lenders want to know the credit worthiness of people they'll give credit to, and those types of businesses are likely required to sha…

Because Equifax pays for it.

Do you have a source? Because companies generally care little for a tiny bit of extra cash like that. I assume the companies probably get paid in something, e.g. data as some other commenters suggested, rather than cash. While your comment suggests at least to mr that the payment is on cash.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#193

I think there should be a law preventing companies from restricting their employees from having second jobs. As long as it doesn't affect their performance in their primary job and as they are not working at a direct competitor, it should be none of their stupid business (and should be illegal) to check for an employee's other jobs.

> "teammates" were fired for having "a second full-time job while maintaining their full-time role at EFX,"

Except that having a second FULL-TIME job does affect the first one.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#194
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's already a service. "The Work Number" is their employment verification service available to anyone https://theworknumber.com

There are at least 2 big problems with this. 1. Does this have any external accountability or oversight? Closest I see is being able view your report but first thing it asks for is an employer instead of asking for information for identifying an individual: https://employees.theworknumber.com/employment-data-report Somewhere out there is an unemployed person being rejected from jobs or not getting interviews because…

> Closest I see is being able view your report but first thing it asks for is an employer instead of asking for information for identifying an individual

Yeah, this was extremely frustrating. I'm trying to find my current and previous employer, and neither is even coming up on the search, so I can't verify my data.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#195
post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a great idea, there's far too many businesses that exploit employees by labelling them contractors. Of course, idea and execution are two very different things. In NZ, it's often found in courier companies and telecommunications, where you're an owner-operator! Except you have to do what the company you work for says, when they say, and you have to provide all your own equipment, and of course, pay for y…

> At one point our tax department started cracking down on this, then stopped, I'm not sure why. But it needs to be done. Around here (Poland) they tried to focus the crackdown on... contractors, planning on requiring a contractor to have at least 25% of their income from a second client to be considered self-employed and not an employee. The local IT lobbyists had a hearty laugh about this idea and that was the end…

Yeah, that's definitely the wrong place to focus - focus on the employers, as they're the ones who reap the benefits of treating employees as contractors.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#196
post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a great idea, there's far too many businesses that exploit employees by labelling them contractors. Of course, idea and execution are two very different things. In NZ, it's often found in courier companies and telecommunications, where you're an owner-operator! Except you have to do what the company you work for says, when they say, and you have to provide all your own equipment, and of course, pay for y…

> At one point our tax department started cracking down on this, then stopped, I'm not sure why. But it needs to be done. Around here (Poland) they tried to focus the crackdown on... contractors, planning on requiring a contractor to have at least 25% of their income from a second client to be considered self-employed and not an employee. The local IT lobbyists had a hearty laugh about this idea and that was the end…

And thank God that this idea was abandoned. I won't sign another employment contract in my life, even if you put a gun to my head.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#197
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are at least 2 big problems with this. 1. Does this have any external accountability or oversight? Closest I see is being able view your report but first thing it asks for is an employer instead of asking for information for identifying an individual: https://employees.theworknumber.com/employment-data-report Somewhere out there is an unemployed person being rejected from jobs or not getting interviews because…

>Somewhere out there is an unemployed person being rejected from jobs or not getting interviews because this service is providing an incomplete or erroneous employment history. Relax, you can give them any employer you ever had, not just your current one. To get my record I put in a previous employer who doesn't even exist as a company anymore.

I've put in my last four employers and they say "No employers were found."

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#198

I think there should be a law preventing companies from restricting their employees from having second jobs. As long as it doesn't affect their performance in their primary job and as they are not working at a direct competitor, it should be none of their stupid business (and should be illegal) to check for an employee's other jobs.

I think there are legitimate reasons why a business might need to restrict employees from having second jobs. However, if those circumstances apply, they should include it in the contract and it should impact salary negotiations.

For instance, if an employee is working from home at two jobs at once, and makes an invention which they introduce in both jobs, then both companies might rely on this 'trade secret' to protect market share (including suing people whos 'steal' it. Some engineers are employed to come up with inventions, and if a business can't rely on their output to create competitive advantage then they are not providing the service they were hired for.

Similarly, a sales rep working for 2 businesses, or working in procurement at a government customer and sales at a vendor, could create a very nasty corruption lawsuit.

Finally, some jobs are responsive - for instance a site engineer or some cyber security roles. A lot of sitting around punctuated by sudden urgent work. I know a guy who repairs offshore wind turbines and he plays xbox all day then occasionally jumps in a helicopter and rides to the rescue. It would be a great job to do alongside another role, but if they company has chosen to pay you to be present in between assignments then they are very much paying you not to do that instead of just having you on call at a cheaper rate. It would be legitimate for them to contractually require you to give them what they paid for, and enforce.

I think it comes down to, are you providing what you are actually being paid for - in the first case pristine inventions, in the final case literally your time.

The other side of this is - in engineering we are trusted to tell the employer how much work we are able to do in a period. At sprint planning I tell my team I can get these 3 tasks done this week and that goes unchallenged.

You could say that it is legitimate for employees to quote less than a full weeks work to their first job to leave room for some work from their second job, because if they aren't getting enough work done they will be fired.

Honestly that assumes a much more aggressive, KPI driven environment than most of us are lucky enough to work in. Would you like to work for a company where your productivity is measured according to some arbitrary KPI like "lines of code" or "supervisor assigned work volume points" or "team agreed scrum points"* and if you aren't in the top 2/3rds in a quarter you get fired? This is normal in sales but generally not in our comfy software roles. Be careful what you wish for.

* A lot of places do stack ranking but it is about getting rid of the negative outliers. Stack ranking to force average performance would be a lot worse.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#199

I think there should be a law preventing companies from restricting their employees from having second jobs. As long as it doesn't affect their performance in their primary job and as they are not working at a direct competitor, it should be none of their stupid business (and should be illegal) to check for an employee's other jobs.

The issue is tech workers in most decent companies get a lot of leeway in terms of hours worked and how flexible things are because of the implicit agreement that whatever workable hours the employees have are dedicated to their org only.

If this assumption is made impractical im afraid companies will react by putting stricter measures like clock in and out times and crap like that.

At the same time, if an employee wants to work two jobs, all the power to them. Go get it buddy, screw the companies, you owe them nothing.

Re: Equifax used records it collects from companies to fire employees with 2nd jobs

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the changes to it are going away, not the legislation. It'll be back on contractors to make the determination of IR35 status again

Which means it’s essentially going away. I first encountered it in 2005 when I first contracted & it has never affected me. It nearly affected me with my previous contract a couple of years ago as the business really didn’t understand it and was “playing safe” by trying to go “inside IR35” for the role, but that’s utter nonsense for a 3 month engagement such as the one I was doing. I’ve always paid employers NI etc.…

Even with the current tax rates, it's not clear to me that it's a net tax gain for HMRC to push contractors to being permanent. A contractor typically charges VAT - which can more than make up for other taxes - especially if their day rate is higher than it would be on an employee salary.
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