Complaint Review: Paul Wojcieszak - chicago Illinois

this company ripped me off in so many ways.  here is a list of the things that happened and you decide for yourself if you want to work for or employee a company like this.  to understand the job scope i was in i worked at various job locations as a safety consultant.  this included different states and sometimes lengthy jobs.  usually i was the only employee for sheffield on the job and worked for the general contractor or the subcontractor that sheffield had the contract with.  therefore, it was common to only deal with the client and not see your bosses for weeks or months at a time and communicate via cell phone or email.  here are some facts;

1) the job they sent me to was in the middle of the mountains in a town with less than 200 people.  i immediately notified my employers that my cell phone which they provided to me (sprint was the service) did not get reception about 95% of the time.

2) they agreed to pay for the hotel, give me $50 a day per diem, mileage for using my own car & driving all they way from chicago & pay me 60k a year plus straight time (which came to $28.85 an your) for overtime.  

3) they provided me with a company cell phone, a company laptop, a short sleeved shirt with sheffield written on it & business cards.

4) they told me after i worked on wednesday June 26th that I be moving to Colorado to a job and had to be there by July 1st.

5) besides packing and driving well over 20 hrs they informed me that a job requirement (before monday july 1st) was that i take the osha 40 hr hazwoper class online.

Now let me explain what happened;

I arrived at the jobsite and a company called Anderson Engineering was the company that hired us.  They informed me that it was a site requirement that I take 142 defined practices tests and this needs to be down asap.  They said I would have to do majority of the tests on my own time.  Then they informed me the site is ran by BP and I could not charge more than 50 hours a week.  My schedule was Monday-Friday 10 hrs a day.  Therefore the OSHA 40 hr class I took and all these defined practices tests were unpaid and to be done on my own time.  Next they said I be in charge of security.  I never worked security and sheffield neglected to tell me anything about this.  One of the requirements to be in charge of security was that I was on call 24/7.  This was not starting off good.  When I asked if anyone else was on call they replied yes but we all live in the trailer park about 20 miles from the jobsite and their is absolutely no reception.  I told them I barely got reception but they said will hopefully they will leave you a voicemail & you can call back.  

So, here I am in the middle of nowhere beyond frustrated & things just kept getting better.  i turned in my time sheet.  my timesheet including the 96 miles a day i had to drive to work.  sheffield said you must have misunderstood us.  you do not get mileage to drive to and from work.  i asked other employees from different companies and everyone, including the security team i was in charge of & had to approve and turn in their timesheets got paid mileage.  now, this is partly my fault because sheffield was going to pay for me to fly out their and rent a car for me.  since i just got a brand new 2013 nissan versa i thought i would offer to drive out there and use my own car if i got mileage,  i figured i save the company money and be able to pay off my new car faster with the mileage reimbursement. but they lied and i got screwed.

things just kept getting better.  anderson gave me a key to the office cause i was frequently the first one there.  one morning, i was driving through the mountains with my brand new car and a deer ran in front of the car. i hit the deer causing significant damage to my car.  i kept driving to work and arrived.  once again i was the first one there.  when other employees arrived they immediately noticed the blood and damage to my car.  i was asked to say the accident happened over the weekend and not on the way to work because i guess bp considers that a big deal and a work related accident.  i said no problem.  anderson then informed me that some bp high ups were coming this week and i need to rent a car and get my car fixed.  i told him i could have the insurance adjuster come to the site so i don't have to miss work.  he said no way have them go to your hotel i do not want bp to see your vehicle and ask questions.  i told anderson (vp chris sanchez) that i can not afford to rent a car and pay for it out of my own pocket.  anderson said they talk to sheffield and i be reimbursed.  i also had to pick up drawings for anderson which i have receipts and i be reimbursed.  i let sheffield owners know about this.  dave cherven, who is paul wojcieszak's partner, said "john i guarantee you everything you pay out for anderson and can prove you will be reimbursed for".  i said what if anderson does not pay you?  dave replied then i will take care of that and still pay you & pull you off the project.

recap; so i am in the middle of nowhere, taking cabs to get a rental and drop my car at dealerships (really like ma & pa shops) trying to get it fixed.  i told anderson i had to take off work to meet with the adjuster and try to figure out how and where i could get the car fixed. anderson ws understanding.  i took off two days of work and communicated to anderson via email since their was no phone reception.  anderson had no problem with what i was doing that i am aware of.  anderson just did not want bp to find out it happened on the way to work.

about a week goes by.  i must have ate something bad cause i spent majority of the night on the bathroom floor throwing up.  i never called in sick with anderson ever but i did miss two days do to the car.  i call anderson employees throughout the night trying to tell them i could not make it to work.  i do not like doctors or hospitals but literally was going to call an ambulance.  i never felt so sick in my life.  no one at anderson answers their phones and i do not think anyone has cell reception.  so i call the office to leave a voicemail.  no answering machine was set up at the anderson office.  so i take nyquil and figured i call them in the morning.  i must have fallen asleep around 5-6am.  next thing i know is someone from the hotel opens my door and said "sorry id did not know you were here."  i roll over still feeling really sick.  i figure i call anderson in a little bit.

next thing that happens is the manager of the hotel comes up to me and said sorry mr. mcmanus your company wanted me to hand deliver this.  i still felt like i was going to throw up so i did not open it right away and assumed it was a wireless device i was waiting for weeks from them to send.  i try calling the anderson office and no one answers.  i open the letter and it said i was terminated immediately for not showing up to work & not to go back to the anderson site.  i was shocked.

furthermore, the letter said i need to return my business cards, company t-shirt, phone & computer immediately &  i would be repsonsible for the hotel from this point on.  asking for a t-shirt & business cards back?  shows you the type of company i was dealing with.  i tried calling dave & paul (the owners) & left numerous voicemails never receiving a call back. i figured that is fine i do not want to work for a company that treats their employees like that anyway.  but, i asked in a documented email how was i going to get my personal items from the jobsite, how was i going to get paid the 14 hrs i was owed, and how was i going to get paid for my expenses?  paul replied i am not going to even look into what is owed to you until we receive our items back.  i let paul know that they did not pay me the $750 they owed me either for my per diem on my last check that i got at the end of july.  paul did not respond.  i asked paul if he could pay the postage for his items to be returned?  again no repsonse.  i get an email finally saying that if all items were not returned within three days then the company would assume i want to keep the company items instead of getting paid.  who in their right mind would want a laptop, a phone (that they already deactivated), a t-shirt & some bsuiness cards instead of approximately $1700-1800 cash?  i spent $111.88 to mail their items.  

now was a waiting game.  paul did say in an email that he would pay me what is owed to me.  chris sanchez with anderson said in an email he would approve the rental car expense (which i have a receipt) and the drawings expense if paul sent a bill.  i wrote a detailed email telling paul exactly what is owed to me and being very professional saying sorry the way things turned out.  i did write unprofessional emails after this out of frustration of not being paid that i do regret.  i should never lower my integrity due to scumbags.  a month and a half goes by without me being reimbursed for my hours worked, expenses owed, or per diem.  this is illegal but i guess companies can get away with anything nowadays.  i think by law i am supopose to get paid time and a half for anything over 40 hrs which i worked.  i worked about 100 overtime hours since being employed by them but that is another story.  Finally I receive my long awaited final check.  this was a real shocker.  paul said that since i got a phone stolen (my girlfriend got her purse stolen & my phone was in it) on the 4th of july they would be deducting about $600 from what they owe me.  When i reported the phone stolen they said we have insurance and they acted sympathetic cause my wallet and ids were stolen also.  they said they would replace the phone.  they said do not worry about paying for it we will take care of it.  next, paul charged me about $80 he said it cost to mail the phone.  Once again, I worked there till the end of July and their was no mention of this.  Furthermore he charge me $80 for fedex to deliver the phone but did not reimburse me for the $111.88 i paid fedex to mail him his items.  That seems real fair and professional.  Next made up deduction was Paul said that I owed two days at the hotel since I took off two days to get things settled with my car costing around $170.  I even worked Saturday to make up one of these days and still average over 40 hrs a week.  i had to stay in town and pay an extra week in the hotel and an extra week of renting a car cause of waiting for my car to be repaired.  these guys are such great and ethical owners.  i would never do this to anyone but with the economy the way it is i should not be surprised about a business stealing from their employees.

I think I ranted long enough.  this is the cheapest and most shady company i have ever heard of or dealt with.  i strongly advise everyone to stay as far away from this company as possible.  i should have realized this was a shady company when i went to their office and it is ran out of the back of a house with no signage or anything indicating a business was there.  well, i got screwed out of thousands of dollars so i hope this saves potential employees or employers from dealing with this company.

thank you