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Vince Cable Gets His Way On Intra-Company Transfers


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HOLA441

At my company we have trying to recruit people in IT for a while. The majority of CVs coming in are from Indians on highly skilled migrant visas, where are all the UK workers supposedly looking for work?

You are getting mainly Indian C.V.s because not many UK IT workers will even bother sending their c.v.s to jobs advertised at a fraction of the market rate.

We all know who these 'jobs' are aimed at.

I guess you would get the same response if you advertised for Doctors at £20K or "£15 to a limited company".

I wish someone could find an elderly Indian national to replace that old fart traitor Vincent Cable.

In fact, at the next election we should find Indian Nationals to stand in all the constituencies as 'The Outsource Party' and get rid of the lot of them. We would probably get better government as well.

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HOLA442

You are getting mainly Indian C.V.s because not many UK IT workers will even bother sending their c.v.s to jobs advertised at a fraction of the market rate.

We all know who these 'jobs' are aimed at.

Not necessarily, I have been told by a number of IT recruitment agents over the years that for most roles they will get over 100 CV's either direct from India or from ICT's working here looking to "trade up", after all a lot of them know they can get way more money getting a "proper" job with a UK company (I've heard the work permit covers 5 years) and if they are getting near the end of the year or two year NI free period they will either get rotated out by the outsourcer, or they will have to pay NI which obviously reduces their income, and therefore we not only get undercut by ICT's we also get increased competition for roles from they same ICT staff and people applying directly from India.

Ten years ago I was working on an outsourcing project to the Czech Republic, and we had a Czech developer come over here, we were talking about money and we were discussing salaries and contract rates, he thought for a moment and said "If I came over here and worked contract for a year I could go home and buy my entire village" I suspect the same things at work here.

Most agent's I know usually filter these CV's out, unless they are outstanding, however I've become extremely skeptical of outstanding cv's and qualifications, the interview usually finishes after the deafening silence following the "whats TCP/IP" question :lol:

With Indian candidates there are frequently problems with " degrees" they have bought, and cv's written by knowledgeable friends, (don't tell me I'm racist, I have lots of British friends and workmates with Asian backgrounds who have been able to have friendly chats with these guys, and manged to get all the dirty tricks out of them )

Edited by madpenguin
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HOLA443

Ten years ago I was working on an outsourcing project to the Czech Republic, and we had a Czech developer come over here, we were talking about money and we were discussing salaries and contract rates, he thought for a moment and said "If I came over here and worked contract for a year I could go home and buy my entire village" I suspect the same things at work here.

Yes, indeed. However this only works when they go to the U.K. and displace a UK worker with vast overheads compared to (then) eastern europe.

Conventional outsourcing doesn't pan out so well, either.

I remember when HP laid off all their tape unit staff at Bristol and moved lock stock barrel to Zala, Hungary. They paid sh1t poor wages, used highly technical and skilled Hungarians and the odd HPer from UK went out, treated the Hungarians like sh1t and had a jolly.

5 years down the line they moved to Ukraine where it was even cheaper.

Now they are in china.

These multinational companies want us all to be slaves. No matter how cheap and good you are they can always point out someone who is cheaper.

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HOLA444

Yes, indeed. However this only works when they go to the U.K. and displace a UK worker with vast overheads compared to (then) eastern europe.

Conventional outsourcing doesn't pan out so well, either.

I remember when HP laid off all their tape unit staff at Bristol and moved lock stock barrel to Zala, Hungary. They paid sh1t poor wages, used highly technical and skilled Hungarians and the odd HPer from UK went out, treated the Hungarians like sh1t and had a jolly.

5 years down the line they moved to Ukraine where it was even cheaper.

Now they are in china.

These multinational companies want us all to be slaves. No matter how cheap and good you are they can always point out someone who is cheaper.

Indeed, I often imagine these guys in canoes down the Amazon looking for tribes who can use a keyboard and be willing to work for beads :D

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HOLA445

madpenguin - you have very got this 100% correct as you know of course. It is disheartening to hear some of the rubbish spouted on here about wages being too high and that IT workers have had it easy for too long. It is refreshing to hear your sane voice patiently explain the issue again and again. This is nothing to do with racism or wage levels being too high and everything to do with having to compete on unequal terms on an unfair playing field. Abuse of ICTs is decimating the country's IT sector and I fear we have already reached a tipping point where it is too late because the industry is now so distorted thanks to our open door policy for foreign IT workers. It is very depressing and as you have said will quickly spread to other sectors. Short term gain at the cost of long term survival is pure madness and if any party had a policy to stop the abuse, they would win a lot more votes than they think. madpenguin, please continue to do what you do and do not be put off by the posters on here who just can't seem to understand the very obvious issue at hand.

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HOLA446

If you mean my posts Bear Monger then you are misrepresenting what I've said. I have also agreed with madpenguin on the issue of tax. I have not said IT workers have had it easy for too long. I have said that mediocre IT workers whose jobs can be done for a fraction of the price by cheap Indian workers cannot expect to command high salaries. Either their work will be outsourced to India or they will be replaced by ICT. The examples people have given confirm that more complex IT roles cannot be successfully transferred to cheaper workers because they lack the requisite skills. British IT workers need to constantly update their skills to remain competitive in a fast-paced and global market place. Answer me this (this isn't a rhetorical question): What % of ICT jobs would be outsourced directly to India if it was not possible to transfer the staff to the UK?

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HOLA447

madpenguin - you have very got this 100% correct as you know of course. It is disheartening to hear some of the rubbish spouted on here about wages being too high and that IT workers have had it easy for too long. It is refreshing to hear your sane voice patiently explain the issue again and again. This is nothing to do with racism or wage levels being too high and everything to do with having to compete on unequal terms on an unfair playing field. Abuse of ICTs is decimating the country's IT sector and I fear we have already reached a tipping point where it is too late because the industry is now so distorted thanks to our open door policy for foreign IT workers. It is very depressing and as you have said will quickly spread to other sectors. Short term gain at the cost of long term survival is pure madness and if any party had a policy to stop the abuse, they would win a lot more votes than they think. madpenguin, please continue to do what you do and do not be put off by the posters on here who just can't seem to understand the very obvious issue at hand.

+1

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HOLA448

If you mean my posts Bear Monger then you are misrepresenting what I've said. I have also agreed with madpenguin on the issue of tax. I have not said IT workers have had it easy for too long. I have said that mediocre IT workers whose jobs can be done for a fraction of the price by cheap Indian workers cannot expect to command high salaries. Either their work will be outsourced to India or they will be replaced by ICT. The examples people have given confirm that more complex IT roles cannot be successfully transferred to cheaper workers because they lack the requisite skills. British IT workers need to constantly update their skills to remain competitive in a fast-paced and global market place. Answer me this (this isn't a rhetorical question): What % of ICT jobs would be outsourced directly to India if it was not possible to transfer the staff to the UK?

I think you have misunderstood ICT. In the context that I am talking about it (abuse by companies like TCS), it is being used because it is essential to have some of their Indian workers in the UK to communicate with the client in face to face meetings and to work the same hours as UK staff. On my teams, I typically have about 2-4 ICTs onshore who are usually technical leads and managers and about 20-30 offshore staff. We communicate with the ICT guys who in turn coordinate the work with their offshore counterparts. Believe me, if they could get rid of us and the ICTs, they wouldn't hesitate but the nature of the job means some onshore activity is required otherwise it comes to a standstill. So in answer to your question, the answer is probably close to zero.

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HOLA449

If you mean my posts Bear Monger then you are misrepresenting what I've said. I have also agreed with madpenguin on the issue of tax. I have not said IT workers have had it easy for too long. I have said that mediocre IT workers whose jobs can be done for a fraction of the price by cheap Indian workers cannot expect to command high salaries. Either their work will be outsourced to India or they will be replaced by ICT. The examples people have given confirm that more complex IT roles cannot be successfully transferred to cheaper workers because they lack the requisite skills. British IT workers need to constantly update their skills to remain competitive in a fast-paced and global market place. Answer me this (this isn't a rhetorical question): What % of ICT jobs would be outsourced directly to India if it was not possible to transfer the staff to the UK?

While I agree with much of your post, aren't you contradicting yourself here? ICTs for "average" workers make sense only because they are basically a tax fiddle.

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HOLA4410

madpenguin - you have very got this 100% correct as you know of course. It is disheartening to hear some of the rubbish spouted on here about wages being too high and that IT workers have had it easy for too long. It is refreshing to hear your sane voice patiently explain the issue again and again. This is nothing to do with racism or wage levels being too high and everything to do with having to compete on unequal terms on an unfair playing field. Abuse of ICTs is decimating the country's IT sector and I fear we have already reached a tipping point where it is too late because the industry is now so distorted thanks to our open door policy for foreign IT workers. It is very depressing and as you have said will quickly spread to other sectors. Short term gain at the cost of long term survival is pure madness and if any party had a policy to stop the abuse, they would win a lot more votes than they think. madpenguin, please continue to do what you do and do not be put off by the posters on here who just can't seem to understand the very obvious issue at hand.

Thanks, I think the thing that really depresses me most is that none of this would be happening without Government connivance, this sort of thing happens because they allow it not because of globalisation which actually only works with Government consent.

When I gradually learnt the full facts about how this scam operated I, like many on here, was horrified, I contacted the Home office Migration advisory committee myself and got to speak face to face with Professor David Metcalf their head to discuss this and tell him what I had personally seen over 10 years in a half a dozen big multinationals.

That was the point I knew it was all over, that was the point when I knew I either left the country, or faced either very low paid jobs constantly under threat, or worse long term unemployment.

When your own Government tells you that Intra Company transfers are a "vital component in ensuring UK businesses competitiveness" and "while a small number of businesses may be abusing the system most do not" it's time to leave.

:angry:

Edited by madpenguin
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HOLA4411

I think you have misunderstood ICT. In the context that I am talking about it (abuse by companies like TCS), it is being used because it is essential to have some of their Indian workers in the UK to communicate with the client in face to face meetings and to work the same hours as UK staff. On my teams, I typically have about 2-4 ICTs onshore who are usually technical leads and managers and about 20-30 offshore staff. We communicate with the ICT guys who in turn coordinate the work with their offshore counterparts. Believe me, if they could get rid of us and the ICTs, they wouldn't hesitate but the nature of the job means some onshore activity is required otherwise it comes to a standstill. So in answer to your question, the answer is probably close to zero.

I think in this case it's not something I would have deep objections to, provided the managers were paid market rates.

What I really take issue with is wholesale workforce replacement which is happening constantly now, I have worked at one site where the network staff, sysadmins (who also built new servers from a hardware installation point of view) and many other day to day IT staff who were ICT's, no real overseas component, and never will be.

Outsourcing did remove a lot of IT jobs but you could still make a reasonable living.

Using ICT's for workforce replacement in the UK is what has really killed the IT job market for UK citizens, as it has artificially depressed wages and means we now have to compete with the Indian IT work population for UK jobs, and as mentioned most of these jobs aren't even advertised, companies just go straight to their offshore provider, or have exclusive contracts.

To those who say "good, IT staff were overpaid for ages", take a look at the "at or near minimum wage" IT jobs advertised on the jobcentre website in one case for a software architect in another for an experienced Oracle DBA (they now have to advertise for a month in the UK before they can get an ICT in), do you seriously think this is a good thing? (consider if this goes unchecked your profession will be next)

Edited by madpenguin
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HOLA4412

If you mean my posts Bear Monger then you are misrepresenting what I've said. I have also agreed with madpenguin on the issue of tax. I have not said IT workers have had it easy for too long. I have said that mediocre IT workers whose jobs can be done for a fraction of the price by cheap Indian workers cannot expect to command high salaries. Either their work will be outsourced to India or they will be replaced by ICT. The examples people have given confirm that more complex IT roles cannot be successfully transferred to cheaper workers because they lack the requisite skills. British IT workers need to constantly update their skills to remain competitive in a fast-paced and global market place. Answer me this (this isn't a rhetorical question): What % of ICT jobs would be outsourced directly to India if it was not possible to transfer the staff to the UK?

Even "mediocre" IT workers add value. You don't seem to realise that paying people peanuts for adding value is just a transfer mechanism for more money into the pockets of fewer people. The comparison between this and jobs like those on a supermarket checkout cannot be made. If you destroy the salaries of people that create wealth what do you have left. The country complains that it can't get enough people into sciences/maths/engineering, well, how is this going to help? The disdain you have for people who are "mediocre" at a job that creates more than they get paid for is unbelievably ignorant. Shall we all just become property developers?

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HOLA4413

Even "mediocre" IT workers add value. You don't seem to realise that paying people peanuts for adding value is just a transfer mechanism for more money into the pockets of fewer people. The comparison between this and jobs like those on a supermarket checkout cannot be made. If you destroy the salaries of people that create wealth what do you have left. The country complains that it can't get enough people into sciences/maths/engineering, well, how is this going to help? The disdain you have for people who are "mediocre" at a job that creates more than they get paid for is unbelievably ignorant. Shall we all just become property developers?

A mediocre, or even downright useless UK employee at least pays tax, a mediocre or useless ICT employee, or even a brilliant one doesn't.

As for Science, maths and engineering, for some people I've met there's no point on-shoring their jobs away, they are already poorly paid (Which is just as great a scandal)

I'd be interested to know which jobs or professions people think should deserve a high salary?, (their own presumably) <_<

Edited by madpenguin
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HOLA4414

Just out of interest are those Indian CV's from people in the UK already or based in India looking to get over here?

And are they sent direct by the applicant themselves or is it agencies sending in the Indian CV's?

agencies

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HOLA4415

You are getting mainly Indian C.V.s because not many UK IT workers will even bother sending their c.v.s to jobs advertised at a fraction of the market rate.

We all know who these 'jobs' are aimed at.

I guess you would get the same response if you advertised for Doctors at £20K or "£15 to a limited company".

I wish someone could find an elderly Indian national to replace that old fart traitor Vincent Cable.

In fact, at the next election we should find Indian Nationals to stand in all the constituencies as 'The Outsource Party' and get rid of the lot of them. We would probably get better government as well.

i think you find will in my original i didnt say how much we were offering to pay - but thanks for assuming we are not paying market rate

we are paying the market rate btw not a "fraction" of the market rate

Edited by boo
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HOLA4416

What's a 'profession'? Oh, I know - it's a job where people get together and create a cartel by, somehow, either managing to get the law changed so that only a member of the cartel can practice as a 'professional' or by forming an 'Institute' and convincing the world at large that members of the Institute will do a 'professional' job for them.

All nonsense of course. I have met plenty of professionals in my life I wouldn't trust to tie my shoe laces - all they did was swot and pass the exams - doesn't make them any good.

The best IT 'professional' I know left a crummy comprehensive when he was 16 having told by his headmaster he would never amount to anything. What the headmaster didn't know was that he was already writing games and had a thriving computer repair business. He now runs a networking consultancy with a host of blue chip clients and, I know, earns pretty eye-watering money at it.

Good for him. I'd bet he couldn't do that if he left school at 16 now though.

Writing games is much, much harder to make a living from as a lone 'bedroom coder' - there is too much piracy and competition. $0.99 iPhone games don't bring in a liveable wage unless you have a massive breakout hit, and that's before someone cracks it and makes it available for free to anyone who has jailbroken their iPhone.

He'd find it hard to set up his own networking consultancy now without first getting some sort of real-world experience. And that would mean either getting a degree, with the add-on debt, or an entry-level job, which are being affected by these ICT visas.

So I'd say your example is almost a perfect illustration of what used to be possible but isn't any more.

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HOLA4417

Some have given up and retired or are doing other work, many others have left the UK (myself included), speaking from personal experience in Germany and the Netherlands you bump into experienced UK IT guys all the time.

If you are unable to compete against people being paid minimum wage salaries, not paying tax, getting their accommodation effectively free and being given tax free allowances by your own Government you tend to look for other alternatives.

The UK Government and companies have only themselves to blame for producing this situation.

What is the size of your companies program for hiring and training new IT staff? (Graduate or not), how much training do staff get a year? (I mean practical skills not "time management").

Based on my experience the average British company expects others to do the training, and that highly qualified employees will just emerge out of thin air.

Never mind, at least UK companies are making "savings" for now, that's got to be good hasn't it? <_<

we dont employ graduates in our IT dept as we need experienced people and we pay the market rate. The training is based on the individual and their requirements but most go at least one course a year

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HOLA4418

This was vividly bought into sharp relief by Total employing Italians to work at an oil refinery in the UK, leaving many locals unemployed.

Although I broadly agree with your general sentiments, this is not a good example. The Italians were specialist oil industry construction contractors, working on a brown field installation, not maintenance workers, stealing jobs from local tradesmen.

North Lincolnshire has no standing pool of experienced or qualified oil bears, who could provide the services required for this project. This is just the same as when we go to Qatar and Kazakhstan to build new oil and gas installations that the locals lack the specialist expertise to achieve.

I laughed at the local guys at Lindsey Oil talking about protecting the future for the young men seeking work. This was a construction project that was due to finish within twelve months. It was for that reason that it was being carried out by an engineering firm from Holland, drawing expertise from wherever in the world they could find the best fit.

Some of that was UK expertise, because we have a good history of that, but none of it was based in the local area. These things never are.

Those Italians will travel to their next foreign location, to construct their next project. Specialists, carrying out a temporary task that the local economy cannot afford to skill up for. Imagine training a couple of thousand local techs, for a two year build, then paying them all off, as is customary at the end of the project. Future secured, son, on Sakhalin island, however. Bye bye.

I'm in that industry and cannot complain about foreign workers coming here to build oil plants, when I have done the same in India, Nigeria and Holland, for exactly the same reasons. The global market can only sustain a certain amount of plant construction resource, and when it has finished a project in one location, it moves on.

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HOLA4419

Writing games is much, much harder to make a living from as a lone 'bedroom coder' - there is too much piracy and competition. $0.99 iPhone games don't bring in a liveable wage unless you have a massive breakout hit, and that's before someone cracks it and makes it available for free to anyone who has jailbroken their iPhone.

Still possible though

http://www.minecraft.net/stats.jsp

575939 * €10=a nice living

and iphone developers have restarted the old school of individual developers. I disagree with your jailbreak comment, the vast majority of iphone users wouldn't have a clue on how to copy anything.

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HOLA4420

we dont employ graduates in our IT dept as we need experienced people and we pay the market rate. The training is based on the individual and their requirements but most go at least one course a year

Not having a go at you specifically boo, your place sounds mundanely normal for an IT department, but I think "we dont employ graduates in our IT dept as we need experienced people" cuts to the heart of the skills problem, there is an industry wide obsession with skilled employees and my favorite word the "Expert".

Years ago anyone coming into any job would expect to do the dull boring stuff, even making the tea, but at the end of the day they usually came out of a company with a reasonable skill level and some training (to anyone saying today's youth are all illiterate and would refuse to make the tea anyway I'd say shut up and go back to your Daily Mail the nurse will be round with your medication shortly) .

Over the years I have trained people with no IT skills from 16 year old's up to a lady in her mid 50's with no previous development experience who I managed to get developing HTML/CSS/VB.NET/ADO to a reasonable level for a large company.

I have as a contractor gone for roles with alarming skill lists, which when you actually start work there you find you need maybe three of them at most.

Would it really kill most IT departments to take on a grad or even (Shock Horror) a school leaver or someone retraining if they show reasonable aptitude?

My kids are currently both at University, from talking to them and their friends the interest in IT is there, the aptitude is definitely there, the desire to work in IT is there, all that is missing are job opportunities.

Edited by madpenguin
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HOLA4421

Still possible though

http://www.minecraft.net/stats.jsp

575939 * €10=a nice living

and iphone developers have restarted the old school of individual developers. I disagree with your jailbreak comment, the vast majority of iphone users wouldn't have a clue on how to copy anything.

Interesting game! Yep, it's still possible but only if you get a big hit like this one. There are some good download games on the consoles done by small teams as well.

I think you're being a bit harsh on iPhone users but maybe have a point. I'd bet there is a significant overlap between the group of people who would play games and those who are technically savvy enough to know how to jailbreak their phone though.

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HOLA4422

but thanks for assuming we are not paying market rate

You are either not paying anywhere near market rates or are asking for silly specs like;

ALL APPLY

TCP/IP stack in JAVA

VMWARE ESX

LAMP admin

Recent banking experience doing EXACTLY the same role for another bank

Oh and a 2:1 from a 'red brick' uni.

Yes and I am SAFE in my assumption. :lol:

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HOLA4423

With inflation in India stubbornly running around 9% mark, and I believe the average Indian programmer making from £5k to £10k per annum as of 2010 with large annual salary increases the norm (correct me if I'm wrong here!) does anybody know when it will not be worthwhile outsourcing to India or onshoring more expensive Indians? A thought unthinkable even a few years ago, must now surely be a dot on the horizon?

+1

Very important point made here.. India is boiling and soon it wont be cheap to outsource there..

if an Indian pgmer is earning £10K and the company needs 20% extra for employee liabilities and another 50% profit.. So cost to the company should be around £20K range which makes it roughly equal to an employee in the UK.

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HOLA4424

Not having a go at you specifically boo, your place sounds mundanely normal for an IT department, but I think "we dont employ graduates in our IT dept as we need experienced people" cuts to the heart of the skills problem, there is an industry wide obsession with skilled employees and my favorite word the "Expert".

Years ago anyone coming into any job would expect to do the dull boring stuff, even making the tea, but at the end of the day they usually came out of a company with a reasonable skill level and some training (to anyone saying today's youth are all illiterate and would refuse to make the tea anyway I'd say shut up and go back to your Daily Mail the nurse will be round with your medication shortly) .

Over the years I have trained people with no IT skills from 16 year old's up to a lady in her mid 50's with no previous development experience who I managed to get developing HTML/CSS/VB.NET/ADO to a reasonable level for a large company.

I have as a contractor gone for roles with alarming skill lists, which when you actually start work there you find you need maybe three of them at most.

Would it really kill most IT departments to take on a grad or even (Shock Horror) a school leaver or someone retraining if they show reasonable aptitude?

My kids are currently both at University, from talking to them and their friends the interest in IT is there, the aptitude is definitely there, the desire to work in IT is there, all that is missing are job opportunities.

+1.

I graduated in 2005 (2:1 in comp sci from a former poly) and everywhere I looked, employers were looking for graduates with at least 2 years' experience. Seems no-one wants to train anyone up these days, not even those qualified! I was eventually able to find work with a small, family-run company that decided the risk was worth it.

That said, I understand some employers' hesitance to hire 'unproven' people - a few years ago we took someone on who allegedly had a masters degree in a computing-related subject. After flailing about for 8 months (my employers really don't seem to like firing people) she eventually quit of her own accord. Apparently this kind of thing is not unusual.

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HOLA4425

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