(Bangeojin Branch)
I notice that you already have a posting for an OSS in Ulsan, but I would like to add a different branch that I have just left. It is OSS English Club, Bangeojin Campus, and the Director's/Owners are a husband and wife duo, Mr and Mrs Kim. I am the fourth teacher to leave before the contract was finished...3 of the teachers quit with no notice and the 4th successfully took the school to the Korean Labor Courts.
A brief list of major problems in the school....
-Unsatisfactory housing - no kitchen plumbing (I was told to wash the dishes in the bathroom sink), no stove, or even a kettle to boil water (I was also told I didn't need to cook!) etc.
-Forced to renegotiate a new contract after arrival..thus losing vacation time etc.
-Consistently late pay...every second pay was late by about 5 days.
-Refusal to pay overtime in situations such as having to cover teachers classes when they quit, having to work on day's off etc. when hours exceeded the 30 hours standard hours in our contract. It was stated in the contract overtime must be paid for work over 30 hours a week.,
-Refusal to allow sick leave, even though this was also in the contract, and being threatened to be fired if I didn't turn up when sick.
-Illegal tax practices. This was bought to our attention when we discovered we were being overtaxed by 4%. Through investigations we also found that our school was taxing us but had no intention of passing our payments on to the tax office. In other words, they were pocketing what they were taxing us. We were told by the school that if we were registerd with the tax office it "would only cause more problems for us as teachers".
-Insufficient resources for foreign teachers. The school offered nothing but 'Gogo' textbooks and 'Bingo' to the foreign teachers.
-Very hostile treatment from the Director's when issues were bought to their attention. This treatment could go on for days.
The list goes on and on so please email me if you would like more information.
Anon 12/02