Sources and scope
This page collects workplace experiences, questions and discussions submitted by users. Dates shown are submission dates, not periods of employment. Individual reports do not describe the entire company.
Read the community guidelinesEasy to take time off. If you do not mind the salary and benefits, happen to live nearby, and can tolerate overtime and pressure, this company is somewhere you can stay until retirement. You will not be encouraged to leave or laid off simply because you are older, so it can be considered a stable job.
1. The company's poor employee benefits are notorious.
Example 1: Lunch is always from the same boxed-lunch shop. Currently, a lunch box costs NT$60, and the company only covers approximately half; the rest must be paid out of pocket.
Example 2: There is no place where employees can properly rest. For example, the sixth floor is where employees eat, but the company is unwilling to install air conditioning. Everyone is unbearably hot, and they only open the doors for ventilation. During lunch breaks, employees can only find somewhere else to rest on their own.
Example 3: The prizes at the spring banquet are poor. It would be bad enough if they were merely poor, but you might not even win anything.
Example 4: The year-end bonus is not high, the bonuses are small, and there is no additional profit sharing.
Example 5: It is unbearably hot in summer. Not only is there no ice machine, but the company is even unwilling to install more water coolers. We often can only drink lukewarm water, and there is only one refrigerator for all employees to use.
Example 6: Domestic employee trips basically consist of visiting free attractions. Employees who have been with the company for less than a few months even have to pay their own expenses. Few people go, and whether or not you participate, you have to take unpaid leave at your own expense. For overseas employee trips, you have to work there for several years before becoming eligible, and the company only subsidizes part of the cost rather than fully sponsoring an overseas trip.
Example 7: If you do not participate in the opening ceremony on the first workday of the year—which starts earlier than normal working hours—you cannot receive the opening red envelope. In other words, you have to come to work early to receive what is essentially overtime pay.
Example 8: The salary is not high and is even on the low side.
Example 9: Overtime is counted from a minimum of one hour. If your shift ends at 5 p.m., for example, you must work until 6 p.m. before you can claim overtime; you cannot claim 30 minutes from 5:00 to 5:30. After 6 p.m., overtime is calculated in half-hour increments, such as 6:30, 7:00, and so on. (All I can say is that they should be thankful the company is in Yunlin. Everyone feels that it is better to leave some goodwill for future encounters; otherwise, people would not let the company get away with this so easily.)
Example 10: The current monthly employee-purchase allowance is only NT$500. (It is rather amusing: I previously heard from people who had bought things that the prices were indeed cheaper, but this allowance cannot buy much. The company is even reluctant to provide a meaningful employee-purchase benefit.)
2. The company was established quite a long time ago. Many machines are older than the new employees, and even the aging infrastructure outside the production equipment is not replaced. The company is also unwilling to purchase new equipment to reduce the workload.
3. Employees seem to be disposable in the company's eyes. Turnover is fairly high in every department (almost always because people cannot take it anymore and resign). Basically, every department is constantly understaffed, but the company apparently never reflects on this or considers how to improve it, relying entirely on veteran employees and a steady stream of new hires to keep things going.
4. In recent years, overtime has been required during the busy season (although it is not mandatory, seeing others work overtime inevitably creates pressure). If there are no orders during the off-season, employees may even be put on unpaid leave.
5. Perhaps because the work pressure is high and everyone is rushing to get things done, people in some departments sometimes speak harshly. Some seem to have developed actual mental health problems from the work (although most employees are still very nice).
6. Many supervisors are selected mainly based on whether the boss likes them; ability is secondary. People with experience in other fields are sometimes parachuted in as supervisors, make a complete mess of things, and then leave.
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If the company's senior management sees this, I hope you will review and improve these issues. It is your business if your family-owned company wants to endure hardship and cut costs, but other people's children are people too. Do not cut costs at other people's expense, and pay more attention to employees' families and physical and mental well-being. Otherwise, as an employee who works hard and devotes themselves to the company, it is truly heartbreaking, and choosing to leave becomes inevitable.
I would also like to offer one more suggestion: “Please respect professional expertise and confidently entrust tasks to people with the corresponding abilities.”
I am posting this partly to help young people avoid a bad employer, and also to see whether I can help the employees who are still struggling at the company. If the company improves later, please feel free to leave a comment below and let us know.