Workplace reviews and discussion: 耀際實業有限公司

The work basically consists of riding a company scooter or driving a company car to various restaurants or establishments to carry out cockroach and rodent control.

Working hours are 8:30 to 17:00, with a 1.5-hour lunch break), and you clock in and out at the company office.

You visit approximately 5–8 clients a day. This is not difficult for people with pest-control experience, but because employee turnover is so high,

you often end up taking over messes left behind by others (cockroach infestations or severe rodent problems). When the previous pest-control efforts at a business were ineffective, the person taking over

may get severely chewed out for problems left by their predecessor. Reporting the issue to management often gets you a response that you should figure out how to solve it yourself,

or they may send a team leader or someone else to accompany you (although upper management usually just makes a superficial visit and does not genuinely devote the effort needed to help resolve the problem).

“Night work” is defined as work after 5 p.m. For example, leaving at 5 p.m. to perform pest control until 8 p.m. counts as overtime.

If you finish at 5 p.m., rest for 2–3 hours, and return to the company to do pesticide spraying at 10 p.m., that counts as a night shift.

Whether night shifts stay under seven days depends on your luck; when staff are short, plenty of people end up doing more than ten days.

After night work, you must take compensatory time off the following morning, meaning you only need to report to work at noon the next day.

At present, the company generally implements a five-day workweek with two days off (public holidays marked in red on the calendar are also days off), using flexible-hour scheduling.

In other words, you get two or three days off per week (three when a public holiday happens to fall in the schedule), but three consecutive days off cannot be scheduled.

Overtime is currently calculated according to the Labor Standards Act, but only based on the insured salary used for labor insurance calculations.

For example, if your insured salary is 22,500: 22,500/240 × 1.33 or 1.66 (after two hours).

Because the “one regular day off and one flexible rest day” system and public holidays are shifted around, there is essentially no overtime pay for working on days off to claim.

Time off still has to be arranged according to the work at hand—in other words, based on the schedules of clients, coworkers, and the company.

For example, a supervisor may suddenly instruct you not to take the day off, a client may suddenly ask to change the appointment time,

or a team leader or coworker may ask you to swap shifts. Often, if you do not show up, the work simply goes uncovered.

Pay consists of the basic salary + meal allowance + unexplained bonuses + overtime pay (if applicable; I heard they may change to a responsibility-based system),

minus employee-paid portions of labor and health insurance. Since the insured salary is low, the deductions are generally just over 1,000.

The actual calculation is 22,500 + 1,500 + 8,000 + 1,236 − 800 = 32,436 (for reference only).

Monthly pay is generally between 30,000 and 40,000. Only a few people earn more than 40,000; you only get more money if you are promoted or take on a supervisory role.

There is absolutely no system for promotions, taking on management roles, or salary increases; it all depends on the boss’s mood. Of course, on the surface, they will say there is a system.

The year-end bonus is also calculated based on the basic salary, multiplied by a performance percentage (also determined by the boss, between 0.5 and 1).

The actual year-end bonus received is approximately 11,250–22,500 (calculated using a basic salary of 22,500); if you have worked for less than a year, it is further prorated by month.

Bonuses for the three major holidays are not guaranteed. They could be just one box of cookies for everyone to share, or cash ranging from 600 to 1,000.

Employee trips basically do not exist. If it is impossible to take three consecutive days off, could there really be an employee trip?

Department dinners only happen occasionally. If people eat too much, the boss may complain again, so some employees do not attend the dinners.

What I find most laughable about this company is that it claims on 104 Job Bank to provide “comprehensive training.”

The “comprehensive training” consists of joining the company and being casually handed over to a senior employee or a coworker who is about to leave,

who trains you for 3–5 days and then sends you out to deal with clients and perform pest control on your own (because turnover is so high, no one is available to take over the territory).

Then, inside the company, they claim that they tell people outside that you have three years of experience. Three days equals three years of experience—is this a time chamber?

In my view, vector-control work may seem easy to enter, but without one or two years of training, it is difficult to become fully qualified.

The work basically consists of riding a company scooter or driving a company car to various restaurants or establishments to carry out cockroach and rodent control.

Working hours are 8:30 to 17:00, with a 1.5-hour lunch break), and you clock in and out at the company office.

You visit approximately 5–8 clients a day. This is not difficult for people with pest-control experience, but because employee turnover is so high,

you often end up taking over messes left behind by others (cockroach infestations or severe rodent problems). When the previous pest-control efforts at a business were ineffective, the person taking over

may get severely chewed out for problems left by their predecessor. Reporting the issue to management often gets you a response that you should figure out how to solve it yourself,

or they may send a team leader or someone else to accompany you (although upper management usually just makes a superficial visit and does not genuinely devote the effort needed to help resolve the problem).

“Night work” is defined as work after 5 p.m. For example, leaving at 5 p.m. to perform pest control until 8 p.m. counts as overtime.

If you finish at 5 p.m., rest for 2–3 hours, and return to the company to do pesticide spraying at 10 p.m., that counts as a night shift.

Whether night shifts stay under seven days depends on your luck; when staff are short, plenty of people end up doing more than ten days.

After night work, you must take compensatory time off the following morning, meaning you only need to report to work at noon the next day.

At present, the company generally implements a five-day workweek with two days off (public holidays marked in red on the calendar are also days off), using flexible-hour scheduling.

In other words, you get two or three days off per week (three when a public holiday happens to fall in the schedule), but three consecutive days off cannot be scheduled.

Overtime is currently calculated according to the Labor Standards Act, but only based on the insured salary used for labor insurance calculations.

For example, if your insured salary is 22,500: 22,500/240 × 1.33 or 1.66 (after two hours).

Because the “one regular day off and one flexible rest day” system and public holidays are shifted around, there is essentially no overtime pay for working on days off to claim.

Time off still has to be arranged according to the work at hand—in other words, based on the schedules of clients, coworkers, and the company.

For example, a supervisor may suddenly instruct you not to take the day off, a client may suddenly ask to change the appointment time,

or a team leader or coworker may ask you to swap shifts. Often, if you do not show up, the work simply goes uncovered.

Pay consists of the basic salary + meal allowance + unexplained bonuses + overtime pay (if applicable; I heard they may change to a responsibility-based system),

minus employee-paid portions of labor and health insurance. Since the insured salary is low, the deductions are generally just over 1,000.

The actual calculation is 22,500 + 1,500 + 8,000 + 1,236 − 800 = 32,436 (for reference only).

Monthly pay is generally between 30,000 and 40,000. Only a few people earn more than 40,000; you only get more money if you are promoted or take on a supervisory role.

There is absolutely no system for promotions, taking on management roles, or salary increases; it all depends on the boss’s mood. Of course, on the surface, they will say there is a system.

The year-end bonus is also calculated based on the basic salary, multiplied by a performance percentage (also determined by the boss, between 0.5 and 1).

The actual year-end bonus received is approximately 11,250–22,500 (calculated using a basic salary of 22,500); if you have worked for less than a year, it is further prorated by month.

Bonuses for the three major holidays are not guaranteed. They could be just one box of cookies for everyone to share, or cash ranging from 600 to 1,000.

Employee trips basically do not exist. If it is impossible to take three consecutive days off, could there really be an employee trip?

Department dinners only happen occasionally. If people eat too much, the boss may complain again, so some employees do not attend the dinners.

What I find most laughable about this company is that it claims on 104 Job Bank to provide “comprehensive training.”

The “comprehensive training” consists of joining the company and being casually handed over to a senior employee or a coworker who is about to leave,

who trains you for 3–5 days and then sends you out to deal with clients and perform pest control on your own (because turnover is so high, no one is available to take over the territory).

Then, inside the company, they claim that they tell people outside that you have three years of experience. Three days equals three years of experience—is this a time chamber?

In my view, vector-control work may seem easy to enter, but without one or two years of training, it is difficult to become fully qualified.