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What are some of the offers and deals your company has offered?
What were you offered? Did you take it? or Pass?
Do you find that the offers aren't really THAT good?
Do you know how companies decide, factors they use to figure how to STRUCTURE the offer, based on how many people they'd like to accept it?
How many companies in your experience make several rounds of offers -- versus just once?
My company offered an early retirement offer about 7 years ago (to reduce the workforce, duh)
You had to have a certain combination of years and age to qualify.
We're a multinational corp (about 3-thousand workers) and in my immediate division of about 100 people, I know of only 3 people who took it. But I heard that 2 people in a department of about 50 also took it.
Clearly one factor whether you had the time and age to qualify. And then one's financial factors came into consideration.
I think the company's offer included a one time bonus payment (based on salary), and a boost to the pension I think it was 5%. Some people said it wasn't that good. Only those who were close enough to retirement anyway, took it.
My brother (a gov't worker) got an ER offer -- but he really wasn't in the financial position to take it.
Two 15K payments, plus some kind of supplemental payment until 60 or 62 …something like that.
I know two people who got lucky and had their company offer ER deals….months before they were going to leave anyway. Needless to say they made out like bandits. Lucky dogs.
I don't think my company will offer ER deals again. But I'm not retiring for another 9 years…so MAYBE by then it will. OMG if it would offer a deal right before I leave that would be sweet….right now 00 with the previous reduction accomplished -- it's content to work the remaining staffers like dogs, and hope people leave of their own accord.
I'll let you know in about 1 month. I can retire early July with 28 years, BUT, my company is about to be taken over 100% by one of the two joint owners. At that point, maybe as much as 3,000 jobs (25%) are going to get cut. Some are going to stay for a while and provide training for the counterparts in the merger. You can speculate the companies involved, but I can't name them.
RUMORS say: "two weeks pay per 1 year of service". Also, they typically pay out unused vacation pay. It's also possible that we might also get 1 years paid medical insurance.
Now, me being so close to the possibility of retirement, I do not yet know how that might change things for any separation payment I might be eligible for. I would love at least 56 weeks of pay, and 1 year paid insurance, along with the tiny pension I would get for retirement. My 401k isn't as full as I'd like (2008 hurt, and I didn't get back into equities soon enough to ride the market back up), but there's enough to last for quite some time.
If not for this merger, were you previously thinking about coming out at 28 years?
As it happens the people I know who got ER offers were NOT in danger of being let go later. (no merger, or anything like that). So they didn't have to worry about being laid off -- and missing out/being let go if they DIDN"T take the ER offer they'd passed up. They were going to retire anyway, and damn if they didn't get lucky that the ER offer came….which was for them a bonus on the way out the door they were going to walk through anyway.
It will be interesting to see if anyone has stories of companies doing multiple ER offers over time. I have heard that it happens.
I wanted to go a full 30 years, (2 more) and hoped to pack a lot more money into my 401k. I seriously doubt that I'll survive the RIF though.
The crazy thing (to me anyway) is a bunch of people are quitting and going to other jobs now, (a month or more early) forgoing any separation pay. Then again, as many people as are likely to get cut locally, the local market can't possibly absorb them all for their particular job field(s). So maybe they are smart anyway to leave earlier.
Oh, and by the way, these aren't lump-sum type payouts. The person would get paid out every month or every two weeks depending on what their job normally paid. So, if they are entitled to 6 months say, they receive their check every two weeks as normal, until it runs out.
I wanted to go a full 30 years, (2 more) and hoped to pack a lot more money into my 401k. I seriously doubt that I'll survive the RIF though.
The crazy thing (to me anyway) is a bunch of people are quitting and going to other jobs now, (a month or more early) forgoing any separation pay. Then again, as many people as are likely to get cut locally, the local market can't possibly absorb them all for their particular job field(s). So maybe they are smart anyway to leave earlier.
Oh, and by the way, these aren't lump-sum type payouts. The person would get paid out every month or every two weeks depending on what their job normally paid. So, if they are entitled to 6 months say, they receive their check every two weeks as normal, until it runs out.
MikeBear I hope you will try to ride it out. Let them make the formal offer to you first before making the decision and ask if they think that your position will be cut in the near term future (2 years). That is a very short period of time and it maybe that you are not on the chopping block anyway. Until they make the offer it is pure speculation on your part for yourself. My hunch is you are a valuable member and when the merger happens you might be pleasantly surprised, but I might be all wrong and you are gone. Just know I am a glass is half full type of person.
PMJI, but I wonder about the typical provisions. We were acquired but a large company that, maybe someday, will do something like this (I don't know). Our vacation time (for example) is determined based on our entire length of service, i.e., including our time working for the acquired company. Do workforce reduction offers generally count length of service that way? (My instinct is that the answer is 'no', but perhaps other have actual knowledge about it.)
For practically my whole career there were great buyouts on the table. I lusted after all of them but was eligible for none of them. Darn it! And when I became retirement eligible, I did wait around for a while to see if something happened for me but no luck!
The best I saw was 5+5, 6+6, and 7+7. You would get severance, vacation pay, and X years added to your age + X years added to your years of service for pension calculation. I wanted one of these buyouts so bad!
Had there been an offer right after I left I would have been beside myself! But I left in 2008 and no offers since well before I walked out the door. I had a deal with my H, I was planning to take the first offer I was eligible for. But it never happened.
^^ Yellowsnow, I'm soooo sorry the timing never work for you to take advantage of an offer. But "it's like that, sometimes."
I'm not retiring for 9 years yet -- but am praying already for an offer at that time.
One friend getting a RIF offer (not her specifically, she is just lucky enough to qualify) -- has only been with the damn gov't for six years. And she's already getting paid more to leave early than if she'd stayed through August, when she was going to leave anyway.
As for whether to take an offer or wait to see if you're cut…..I truly believe management will lie, you can't trust them. They'll say you're not in danger of begin cut, and then you are. I was young and a change taker in my 20s. Now at 55, I'm a bird-in-the hand kind of person. But any ER offer I'd imagine also has to work for the person. The issue is what if you stay are are then cut. Will you still get some severance, just not as much -- or nothing.
A lot of people where I work said the ER offer just wasn't good enough to take. (We're union so we would get a severance no matter what, the ER offer was just something the company did to reduce the workforce -- and give incentives on top of our contracted severance) Also, if you're not at the right age or in a financial position to take it -- you're just not. A lot of people did say -- "boy if I were just three years older, or five years older…" They just weren't' close enough to retirement to take it.
^^ Yellowsnow, I'm soooo sorry the timing never work for you to take advantage of an offer. But "it's like that, sometimes."
I'm not retiring for 9 years yet -- but am praying already for an offer at that time.
One friend getting a RIF offer (not her specifically, she is just lucky enough to qualify) -- has only been with the damn gov't for six years. And she's already getting paid more to leave early than if she'd stayed through August, when she was going to leave anyway.
Yep! Sometimes it just all works out. Other times, not so much! You have to be in the right place at the right time. It hurts to know a boatload of people got the same pension I did and they worked 7 years less. But it was never in my control. I just had to do the best I could.
Don't get me wrong, I am very happy to have what I have! And thrilled to just wake up every morning and still get to be retired!
1. There’s a target on your back
2. The first offer is likely as good as it’s going to get
3. Sweetened terms and incentives
4. This could be a great opportunity
Reasons 1 & 2 applied to my sisters, one worked for CT state and one worked for a big oil company.
Reasons 3 & 4 applied to me. 2 was not the reason at the time but I believe that the next company buyout would not be as generous (a much bigger company in the area had recently reduced their layoff benefit from a max of 6 months to 1 month!).
Regarding the terms of buyouts. My sister who worked for the state got lifetime health insurance coverage (this was the main reason she took the offer fearing that it would not be offered at the next buyout). I don't know the term of her other compensations.
My other sister got 6 months of pay after something like 8 years of service. She also got 6 months of free health insurance.
My company gave a minimum of 4 weeks of severance pay and max of 6 months depending on the number of years of service in addition to 4 months of free Cobra health coverage.
The trend has been of reducing benefits instead of a company offering the same buyout benefits year after year.
It's up to the individual to evaluate each offer when the opportunity comes.
In past years, I have several friends who took early retirement buyouts then came back to work as consultants or contractors. The double dipping opportunity exists when you have specific skills which the company needs.
I knew several people close to retirement were even luckier when their company was taken over with offer to retain prior company years of service. First they retired from the first company with full retirement benefit while drawing a full salary with the new company. Later, they take the buyout offer from the new company. So in effect these lucky people had triple dippings!
Last edited by BellaDL; 05-06-2016 at 11:46 AM..
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