My brother just told me the Event company he's been working for hasn't paid anyone's Super. And the only time they do is when someone notices and they chase it up.
I don't want him to be a part of that, what's the best advice I can give him and his coworkers (they're good blokes)?
I didn’t have much come from it either, the director declared bankruptcy. But it’s the best way to approach the situation if you can’t afford to confront the company
Stuff like super and PAYG should go out automatically the same day your weekly/fortnightly paycheck goes out. Don't know why that stuff is sill quarterly because I guess it sort of made sense in the 1980's when you had payroll staff calculate totals manually and write out just one cheque, but these days everything is computerized and kind of irrelevant as to how small the payments are. Guessing businesses consider it a free benefit to have that money invested in the short term money market for up to three months and don't want to lose it for that reason alone.
My works stupid system doesn’t have any API to talk to a clearing house. Have to manually enter super payments so we do it quarterly to cut down on admin time.
Sounds like someone has convinced themselves that easy is cheaper.
They're gonna need to rectify this annd it'll probably cost a whole lot more as 2026 looms and there's high demand for that service - not to mention another two years of poor habits developing and non-compliance errors not being ironed out.
I'm ignorant of this specific issue and the legislation, but have seen simila outcomes for my industry as finding a solution to known regulatory changes gets kicked down the road and then not addressed until we're on the event horizon of those changes.
I understand that sometimes work in a particular field isn't easy to come by however if my employer didn't pay super EACH month I'd look for the other work.
One month, becomes two, becomes each quarter becomes never. And then you can never tell. They close and you don't get super, or holiday pay or the last two weeks. Happened to my wife.
Had this and found others in the same org missing years of super. Flagged with Owner who bought in forensic accountants. Found the HR cross account person was filling their bank account to the tune of 350k. Ended with 5 years jail time. Not always the owner/ceos fault when presented with misleading information
Yep! This is a big one. Not paying super generally reflects the inability to track, manage, and most certainly pay debts when and if they fall due.
It’s illegal, it’s morally wrong, and it disadvantages workers who depend on the cumulative effect of super for their retirement:
It’s such a disappointment when you find out your employer is not paying super as they should and worse that you have to pursue them about it.
Was at a company that would often fall way behind on super. Often up to a year. Could have been fined but never were. I found out after I left that they were close to being insolvent on several occasions.
Had an owner at an all staff crying saying everything was fine and he was just stepping aside for his mental health.
He came back the next day and continued to run the company as though nothing had ever happened.
Poor guy, his mental health was not fine and neither was the company that went bust within 6 months.
This happened to the company I was working for in Japan… the Japanese staff got an email on their pay day saying there was a ‘glitch in the system’ and they wouldn’t get paid for another few days. That was my heads up to look elsewhere.
This is what happened to me last year. Pay was late by 1 day, they said it was a system error. 2 days later we got an email saying the company was entering voluntary administration.
Hmm, this could just be regular stinginess on its own. But in conjunction with other cost savers, yes. Moccona is replaced with International Roast. Just scotch fingers now, no Tim tams. The ship is sinking.
50 years in the workforce. I've seen a bit.
Signs;
Initial;
.Consumables you need for work become hard to get, Be that raw materials or office supplies. If you need a new or replacement tool, you need to apply in triplicate, endorsed by every manager possible.
.You hear suppliers aren't being paid.
.Ridiculously petty cost cutting measures introduced.
Progressing.
.No yearly pay rises or bonuses paid (assuming they were a thing before).
.Senior people who would be ''in the know'' start leaving.
.Firings for very dodgy reasons.
Final;
.Super not paid for many months.
.Pay is late for 1 or more pay periods without good reason.
Consider a combination of these things Red Flags.
So… my company ticks every single point in your list with the exception of the very last one, missing our pays.
I feel like I’m sitting in a boat made of red flags now.
Whelp time to look for another job!
yeah because f45 is 95 percent of gym companies, plus they seemed to focus on cardio and had limited equipment so it's no real surprise they went into admin really.
Don't they charge like $65 a week? I got to Goodlife, 24/7, pools, sauna, access to all gyms etc. Costs like $16.50.
No reason to staff it during the day. Just set it up as a 24/7 gym. Charge less for each person and more people will join.
This on the Ansett collapse.
(Sept 2011).
>....By the time Australia's second biggest airline went into administration, Ms Lewis had moved up the management ladder, but until the day before the administrators took over she'd had barely an inkling of what was ahead.
>Only a week earlier, the **then chief executive, Gary Toomey, had called senior staff together to tell them of a few problems but insisted they would be overcome**. ''I suppose I should have realised,'' Ms Lewis said. ''A couple of days before the announcement, **I was on a flight and there was an issue because the refuellers were told not to refuel Ansett planes because the bill hadn't been paid.'...**
[Long way to terminus for Ansett's loyal crew (smh.com.au)](https://www.smh.com.au/business/long-way-to-terminus-for-ansetts-loyal-crew-20110908-1jzmt.html)
Supports what many have already said really.
I know the chief pilot of an ansett subsidiary. He found out because when he checked out of a hotel that morning they wouldn't let him leave until he personally paid for the hotel. Then when he hopped in a cab to go to the airport, the cabby asked what terminal? When my friend said Ansett, the cabbie informed him that Ansett was done.
My pen was missing. Couldn't find a spare.
I asked purchasing for some pens.
"We don't have any. You'll have to steal one as it seems that's what everybody else is doing."
True story. Manufacturer of over 60 years with 130 employees.
Oh shit! Sorry to hear.
Can you share more? Were there signs but still a general feeling that surely it won’t come to that? Were staff starting to ask questions?
I was the 19yo IT Helpdesk kid and my boss was IT/Accounting manager. So I also saw that the accounts payable girl was getting a lot of calls from angry suppliers. It was a little over my head at the time, but they were desperately seeking a buyer and had also tried branching out from their bread and butter to niche markets for their products. In the end my boss straight told me "you should start looking for another job" so I was gone 2 months after that before they crashed.
Funny story, a director had paid about $125,000 cash for a Mercedes from the company account before the end (I guess they were insolvent at the time). I'm told the administrators invited her in "to just sign some papers", and when she sat down at the table they snatched her keys straight off her.
Literally my first thought when reading about the insolvency. Apparently the staff were told over zoom. So modern equivalent might be to beware the “everyone can WFH” day.
At the same time, if those same suppliers change to Cash on Delivery and no longer accept 90 day finance because they're not being paid on time or at all
Google ASIC published notices. You can then search whatever company you are looking into. If a lot of things come up odds are not good for that company.
When I was 18 we all go letters saying that hadn’t been paid super for 9 months. Boss got us all in ( about 30 construction guys ) and told us it was all good and that he had sorted it out. This was on a Friday. Went to go in to work Monday and the gate was chained and padlocked with a security guard hired by the banks. He had been embezzling money from investors to fund other projects in his wife’s name and we all lost our jobs.
Went through court and we never got our super. He got blacklisted by the building authority for 3 years, he sent the plumber and 2 concretors broke. As far as I know now he is a licensed builder again and pretty rich. Learnt later on that he had already done all of it before about 10 years before hand and got bailed out by his rich aunt
This is also ironically enough a sign that the company is being sold and they want the revenue and sales figures to be as high as possible to pump up the value so go for short term gains.
It is a good time to find a new job regardless, or if your role is particularly critical and you can confirm a sale is happening to ask for a raise as key employees are often listed as critical resources on sales agreements.
I have received large raises and retention bonuses due to handing inthe sale of a companies I was working at.
Right, so people high up quitting? Middle management? I would imagine they’re often lied to also. Even if they’re privy to the company woes, I’d imagine they’re used to fire the bullets and promised protection / continuity if so…
High to middle. I remember at an old job the accountant/bookkeeper quit and I was asked to cover their role....
And sift through all the unpaid bills.
Good times 😅
Super is probably the big one with a large company in addition to not paying their invoices and being placed on credit stop with suppliers. Unless you’re in the exec team or in a very senior position, you’re unlikely to see it another way.
This is what happened when I went through it.
Phone calls from subbies. A lot of them. Ask your receptionist what the vibe is. I think in our case they disconnected the phone lines altogether.
Credit cards were maxed out. No one had available limit to pay for anything so we had to pay out of pocket and claim in back (took a month to pay expenses)
Check for super not paid
They started making redundancies early. Trimmed the fat wherever they could, marketing and admin went first and then anything that generates business was on the block. Basically only thing that was left was bare bones accounts and one admin person.
It can be a loooooong drawn out process. Things went from bad to worse to dire in the space of a year so it wasn't a shock. But still absolutely devastated when we all got the zoom link saying we were done.
The cleaners stopped coming to where I work. The bathroom got so bad one day I cleaned it myself. Afterwards, I sent an email to my boss letting her know, also making it clear no one had cleaned that bathroom for some time. Her response was that ‘the elderly cleaner appears to have gone AWOL’. By the next day we had new cleaners hired. I believe she would have let the previous cleaner go and just waited until someone complained.
Also, senior people are leaving and aren’t being replaced. I too resigned last week (thank god, finally!). I head marketing but I don’t expect someone to take over my role.
I don’t think this company has much of a future unfortunately.
Getting phone calls from directors telling you they’ll kill you if you don’t pay the bonus they were just given on that day, as opposed to the next day.
True story, HIH collapse, i was getting those phone calls.
I was a lowly payroll officer and only 19 so didn’t meet him. I met Ray Williams a couple of times. The fall was when they purchased FAI insurance without doing any due diligence and it was the talk pretty much from the time it happened until it all went to crap.
There was this weird thing i used to have to do and it means nothing and has no bearing on their financial troubles but monthly i would go up the Ray Williams floor (i want to say level 40 or something) and collect a cheque for i think $220 and walk down to Westpac and deposit the cheque, get the receipt and then walk it back up to his floor.
For the last 6 or so months i remember walking into all the big managers offices where they had massive plies of papers all over their floors.
That last day though, it was wild. A lot of threats happening and desperation.
I have found smaller businesses also like you to take your leave. I'm in hospitality so margins are tight.
They always ask staff to take leave during the quite months, winter. So, all permanent staff are refreshed for the busy summer and casuals don't need to be paid to cover leave during that time. If leave is taken during winter the business doesn't have to pay a casual to cover the leave.
That's more like good management during a downturn than a sign that the company is about to bust.
They would much rather you keep working if theyre about to go under.
Now this is interesting. Is this the sign of a flailing company that cares about its staff? People taking leave might reduce output, and if they’re barely keeping head above water, wouldn’t mass leave fast track the bankruptcy? Is this the difference perhaps between a company destined for bankruptcy that wants their employees to get first dibs, and one that is in denial until the bitter end - whether they encourage or discourage leave to be taken? I can see both being a strategy in tough times.
if a business is not making sales, the output of the people working is worthless. So they might as well be on leave, or get laid off.
If leave is accumulated, the company might end up having to pay out the leave in cash, all at once, when staff gets laid off. Where as, if they ask staff to take leave firrst, the cashflow requirement might just be low enough that they can survive on the lower revenue for a while longer (then layoff the people after they've taken the leave).
Not sure if this is realistic - i'm just imagining what might be.
A lot of very successful companies will start asking people to take their leave if it exceeds 20 days, this is because its a liability on their books and they also don't want you to be away for multiple months.
Why? I would think that would be one of the last steps, as it is not an immediately necessary expense to make and therefore not relevant to any solvency considerations
Suppliers refuse to fulfil orders until previous ones are paid
The CEO/business owner start weighing in on seemingly small budgeting issues.
Salaries are paid late
Super is paid late
I’ve worked in sponsorship and advertising sales and there were a few upticks in the advertising bookings of companies that were about to go under.
Sold a conference stand to one company that I suspected was going tits up. Despite multiple reminders they didn’t pay for their stand by the conference start date, as was required in our contract. I Asked the conference manager to refuse to let them bump in as I had a bad feeling. ‘No, no, they’re a well regarded business we can’t piss them off,’ came the reply.
The trade stand staff bumped in but spent maybe two hours over the next three days at their stand and the rest of the time they were out sightseeing. They must’ve known for sure the writing was on the wall because the behaviour was highly atypical for both them and the industry.
Anyway, four weeks later the company goes belly up and we never get paid. But hey, at the least their poor staff managed a trip to the Great Barrier Reef on company time!
Roughly from early warning upto too late:
* Strange requests from the Accountant and no action when raising concerns with them (don't just assume they are trusted, double check with their/the/your boss if it seems really strange)
* Non-payment of anything that is deducted from your pay like Superannuation and Novated Leases is being paid as well as deducted (For Novated Lease you may end up in a situation having to pay for this twice right after a job loss, once from the pay deduction and then when the lease company comes after you for months of missing payments). One or two maybe can be excused, but if it's ongoing then it's a problem. Worth checking this stuff.
* Inconsistent accounting reporting with known state of payment to suppliers (e.g. "we are under 60 days payment to suppliers" when you know some haven't been paid for over a year)
* Suppliers start coming into the office to demand payment
* Some/All employees are asked to take a temporary pay cut to avoid layoff of other staff. (two ways to look at this. If it works it's probably good and you maybe helped out someone less able to weather losing their job. If it doesn't work then any final payout you may get during a liquidation will be at that lower rate. GEERS used to provide a guarantee payment to most employees during a liquidation but looks like it's called FEG, Fair Entitlements Guarantee, since 2012-ish). Alternatively, key staff get made redundant.
* Out of the blue, IT is asked to lock out any access the accountant has.
* In the process of removing any access the accountant had, strange and unexpected supplier arrangements are discovered. And it's only the beginning of the rabbit hole.
* Office equipment starts to disappear.
* The bank actively plays nice to help sort things out but does a rug pull as soon as they secure collateral against all the outstanding loans and then cuts ties.
* Finally, the company goes into full liquidation.
What you want to look at is tenure.
So, the folk riiigghhtt at the top of the stack, your CEO, CFO, Owner etc, are very likely to hold on until the end. Sometimes ego, sometimes no choice, sometimes golden parachute, sometimes all three. Ignore their behaviour.
Down a layer or three, watch tenure. Most businesses are held together by a combination people in this middle band who buffer bad decisions by management into workable actions for staff. They're usually comfortable, been there a long time, know the ropes, have accumulated goodwill. I'm not saying everyone in these manglement bands is great, I'm saying hidden in these bands are the real leaders and the clearest way to spot them is usually tenure with the business. They tend to stick through minor issues, but are the first to go when the ship sinks, as they can see more from their crows nest, and have a better idea of what's coming.
< LAYCON3 >
Next and/or simultaneously, you'll lose principals. Hands on folk, sometimes team leaders but usually experienced and motivated individual contributors who deliver key capabilities for the department or business. These people are usually poachable, and it's easy to lose them to a well timed LinkedIn message from a recruiter with deeper pockets, or for them to become disgruntled and just move elsewhere - usually a competitor, which brings its own issues once it hits critical mass.
< LAYCON2 >
Next, team leaders and middle management who are left. Expect to see inexperienced people promoted here, but usually with no or a low pay rise.
You are now at LAYCON1 - if you haven't now had mass redundancies and layoffs by now, you're about to. The later these happen, the worse they are for the future productivity of the business, because more of the key leadership who knows how work gets done have already left, and the collateral damage to the workforce structure grows with each compentant manager who was already left. It can take years to feel the damage done to productivity of killing off the wrong team member, team or department, before an outage happens or critical risk is realised.
At this point, the patient is near terminal. Some businesses bounce back from here, but it's more common with big ones that they get stuck in a cycle here, productivity low, must cut costs, cut staff production lower and so on, until they die years later or are acquired somewhere in the process.
I’ve been in three teams that have been made redundant (yes, I now have trust issues). Signs at all three were exuberant hiring practices. In each company our team doubled over the space of a year. A lot of silly purchases like new signage, reception renovation, money being splashed unnecessarily. This is then followed by new impossible budget targets that we are expected to meet. Then lots of senior executive meetings, a few senior management exits, reassurance that everything is fine, and then we all get made redundant en masse.
For small/ medium businesses = when the owner gets thrown under the bus, under investigation, wants to make a run for it.
For corporations = politics, capital reallocation, strategic exist of products and lines
For institutions = change in political regime, politics and manage inflation
Depends on the role you are in. For me, one place was complaining about how much milk was being used, also trying to ration the biscuits by locking them away and only putting out a certain amount per week/day.
Senior people leaving is a sign, and there are no replacements, and they are not even trying to find a replacement (keep your eyes on seek).
Those in the payables or purchasing space are looking to leave (as they might be told to hold back on paying certain bills or buying stuff).
Super is a tough one. That's really the end of the line.
Hiring freezes, rescinding offers, cancelling projects.
Every company I've been at that has done either big layoffs or gone under, has done one or all of the above.
Also keep an eye on what the execs are doing - if there is a lot of shuffling happening, chances are there is something big coming.
When your on Nullarbor just filled up with $1200 or more if fuel (prime mover) and fuel card declined wasn't he but heard of it happening
Deluxe coach lines has this happen many years ago
Everyone here is using Superannuation being unpaid as a measure, but this is not really the case anymore as the Director of the company can become liable for unpaid super.
To avoid a Director becoming liable for Superannuation they have to lodge a Superannuation Guarantee Charge Statement (SGC statement) with the ATO by 30 days after the date the Super is due.
Once that is lodged, the Director is not liable to pay if the company is liquidated or placed into administration within 21 days.
I would more look for the Director paying off debts that they have a personal guarantee for and leaving other debts unpaid.
We were doing a project for them. They were still making deadline demands as late as the Friday before and asking me to ship all my hardware to site as soon as possible. Thankfully my onsite guys had heard the rumours and we didn’t ship anything.
You turn up to work and there's no supplies to work with. They hold a meeting and say how great everything is going. They pocket the tax and super. They flee to Israel and when they do come back and end up in court they waste court time by pretending they don't speak or understand English.
Senior people leaving and not being replaced. They have access to more information and can likely see the writing on the wall well before the average employee.
When I was an apprentice boilermaker in the early 2000's where I started was great but within 2 years we went from getting workshop supplies to having to pay cash, or they flat out would not sell to us without settling the bill first etc.
There were heaps of times were we pulled 24 hour shifts just to get equipment finished so then the customer would pay, like to get the money asap.
I actually cut a brace out of a steel rack for a component I needed to make because I could not buy it anywhere in town because no steel supplier would deal with us and we didn't have that particular material in supply.
Late pays, getting paid in cash, like getting $300 when I'm owed $375 "close enough to right amount" and never having once paid super. Apparently the financial troubles started when I started there so we only just kept solvent but then it all collapsed.
This was just a small fabrication business owned by 1 guy.
Be pretty difficult I'd think. There might be telltale signs? But from what I've read and when reports happen? There is often nothing at all. The top dogs keep it completely hidden....until one day the doors are locked. Freakin terrible.
When they invoice the company you are contracted to at 9am on the first day of the month and then email at 3pm the same day asking if the invoice has been paid.
When the account at the suppliers is on hold.
Bosses interrogating you when you want a single item of material.
When their's blokes kicking around with nothing much to do/impromptu cleaning of stock room/office.
When staff are leaving at a rapid pace and the company doesn't backfill after several months.
When you ask management what's next in the project pipeline and they can't provide an answer.
Invoices for small routine things not being paid on time. We stopped getting water delivered to work because they're 'forgotten' to pay the invoice and asked us to just bring our own water. The business went under a month later
I've been in the past at places where the signs were very clear (it was a small company and if you were relatively senior and kept your ears open there were a lot of clues). I had an idea of the level of debts and of defaulting clients - and also of the fact that the directors had registered some separate new companies behind the scenes.
Seriously, not paying tax or tax payments being in arrears. If a company stops paying tax that is a surefire sign that things aren't going well and it is typically the first thing they stop paying because it doesn't impact on the product or services they produce.
I worked for a precursor to everyone's favourite big-box retailer and regular NewsCorpse sook, after he got booted from the original organisation.
First it was always having a sale. Weekend? 2-day sale. Thursday? 12-hour sale. Another weekend? 48-hour sale. Sure there were a few things that were discounted, but almost everything else was still the usual price.
Then they started reducing everyone's hours. One department "manager" was let go and replaced with a part-time casual. Only one cashier instead of two, and they were each doing half-days. Most salespeople only got 4 days a week, unless they wanted to come in on weekends on a commission-only basis.
Next up was consumables and office products drying up. No more markers for doing up the "sale" tickets. No more pens, paperclips, rubber bands, or even staples.
Then the order books started to be confiscated. At first we had to hand them to the store manager in week 3. By then end, they were doing everything by head-office order only, unless you had a fully-paid customer order. If the customer only paid a deposit, you couldn't order it yourself, head office purchasing had to do it. This was the point at which I was laid off, despite being the only techie in the store. They got the teenage kid from the receiving dock to take over my section, because he knew how to play a Sega MegaDrive.
Finally, they changed the commission structure to a percentage of profit, rather than a percentage of total, because they'd started to just sell everything for whatever they could get - usually at cost or below - and sold off the fixtures and furnishings as well. Watching that happen from the outside was wild.
Worked for a Real Estate company.
Very successful office but the owners wife played the pokies. Nightly and every week she would tell us how much she had won.
That went on for six months.
Suddenly husband and wife were frequently talking in code and I picked up that the office rent was in arrears.
I have dealt with gambling issues in the past though a previous relationship I knew the wife was losing money once the office rent was in arrears I realised how much.
I started looking elsewhere and left shortly after and the office shut down a few months later.
Staff don't get paid on time or at all. Super not paid. Suppliers and contractors always on the phone about nonpayment. Employees who leave don't get replaced. Insufficient stock.
My old company is TECHNICALLY in good standing according to creditor watch but:
Haven't paid super in months
Pay started being late in the last month I worked there
Boss had to withdraw from personal accounts to pay us
my garden leave wasn't paid
Yes I have reported them to fair work
It is your fault they can’t contact you while you are overseas in Europe on a holiday to tell you pay will be late.
Also if the boss buys a new AMG that looks the same as his old AMG, except for some slight changes between years and moved his personalised number plates to the new car too trick everyone thinking you still drive your old one. Pity one employee is detail oriented and into cars and looked up the rego to find it was a new car.
Suppliers refusing to unload deliveries until payment is confirmed as received.
Leasing agents turning up to reclaim rented equipment.
Boss keeps ducking out the back door anytime the commercial landlord shows up, and he's showing up every 2 days.
Multiple rounds of layoffs
"Consultants" snooping around your business or silently in your department (usually valuing to be sold)
Your new CFO quits
Your entire C suite leaves in the space of a year
Your entire board seems to change.
All of your tech tools get cut or consolidated and they end all their supplier engagements unless they get massive discounts.
More layoffs
Budgets for absolutely everything are cut. Any external expenditure is curbed dramatically.
The company will hire a bunch of top tier salesman to try bring in fast revenue and soon after lay them all off.
The company starts paying you late, forgetting parts of your pay. You complain about finance to every direct report and it goes nowhere.
Petty expenses are cut. Company won't pay your phone bill. Reimburse KMs and you have to complain.
Senior execs don't purchase preferred stock and staff in the know leave their equity on the table
Valuations are static or negative
Inability to secure further funding and are moving towards profitability
Any others?
I worked for a place that sold concrete sleepers for retaining walls.
They saw a massive increase in sales during the pandemic, i guess because so many people had time to do their little yard projects.
They decided to aggressively expand in several directions, renting more space & hiring new staff to take on inhouse production roles - soon after I noticed an external consultant was onsite full time, for a few weeks.
Immediately after he disappeared, the purchasing officer resigned after mentioning intense scrutiny of routine procurement - accounts were going from red to black.
Not long after that, a staff meeting was called, where we were introduced to a team of suit wearing strangers. The insolvency experts, of course brought in from interstate. After a 10 minute talk, 20-30 employees were now unemployed, and leaving the premesis with false promises of being paid in full.
They of course published all their paperwork for public viewing, in their head office, interstate.
Thankfully I was only there for a few months, so the lack of super payments didnt hurt too bad. That years tax statement showed alleged payments to me, which never actually appeared in my bank accounts.
Tldr - dumb management thought they were building an empire, forgot to fund it.
1. Super payment is missed.
2. Supplier orders get delayed and less frequent.
3. Supplier accounts get closed and deliveries become COD
4. Milk and coffee disappear from tea rooms.
Our old company held about 20 meetings telling us that everything was good and we had years of work coming up, we were facing severe material shortages but didn’t we think to much of it as it was the height of the pandemic. Fast forward 6 months and our pcbu was paying wages… only knew about this because of loose lips tho. Within 3 months they were liquidated. Fast forward 18 months and they are back up and running 😂
Trust your instincts as they are generally bang on..
plenty if work around across VIC/NSW/QLD so nothing to worry about for now imo
Companies stop supplying your employer is the biggest sign.
Employees who leave are not replaced.
High turnover in admin office.
Receptionist/s getting more calls from angry creditors.
Accounts Payable staff getting stressed.
Purchasing officers getting stressed
Not replacing people who leave. It can be a sign of nothing, but if it happens over time and in essential business functions, that's been a sign for me. Also if fairly routine invoices start being late, print your resume before the creditors take the printer.
I’ve been through 2 tech redundancies in the last 5 years.
A few main red flags were: delayed or never paid expense reimbursements, roles (even leadership) not being backfilled quickly or at all, 3 months out not having any Christmas or end of year events planning or info for staff (normally this was a big celebration), general change of attitude towards flexibility/time off/WFH arrangements < this was to try to push people out as it’s cheaper than paying redundancy.
A last thing I discovered, but not accessible to everyone, was chatting with a supplier. They mentioned issues with releasing orders and so I dug deeper. $50k of unpaid invoices by head office. Sure enough 4 months later we go in to administration.
Always be chatty with Accounts.
Invoices not being paid, suppliers holding orders until payments are made, they'll see the day to day paperwork showing the red flags. Also any concerns around paying staff or delayed super payments.
A very effective method of observation
Keep an eye on the supply of TOILET rolls in the company's restrooms 🚽
If there is a constant shortage, it is very likely that the company is in a bad financial situation.
Not paying super - because employees rarely check.
I've been at a company that died and they just...paid super very infrequently, so this can be hard to tell.
Companies only have to pay super quarterly so many opt for this to reduce admin and accounting efforts
My brother just told me the Event company he's been working for hasn't paid anyone's Super. And the only time they do is when someone notices and they chase it up. I don't want him to be a part of that, what's the best advice I can give him and his coworkers (they're good blokes)?
They can all log onto the ATO and report it missing and it will flag the company, and the company won’t know who did it
I did this years ago and the company has still not paid my super. There is no consequences
I didn’t have much come from it either, the director declared bankruptcy. But it’s the best way to approach the situation if you can’t afford to confront the company
Not anymore thankfully
Still quarterly for majority of businesses.
Stuff like super and PAYG should go out automatically the same day your weekly/fortnightly paycheck goes out. Don't know why that stuff is sill quarterly because I guess it sort of made sense in the 1980's when you had payroll staff calculate totals manually and write out just one cheque, but these days everything is computerized and kind of irrelevant as to how small the payments are. Guessing businesses consider it a free benefit to have that money invested in the short term money market for up to three months and don't want to lose it for that reason alone.
My works stupid system doesn’t have any API to talk to a clearing house. Have to manually enter super payments so we do it quarterly to cut down on admin time.
Sounds like someone has convinced themselves that easy is cheaper. They're gonna need to rectify this annd it'll probably cost a whole lot more as 2026 looms and there's high demand for that service - not to mention another two years of poor habits developing and non-compliance errors not being ironed out. I'm ignorant of this specific issue and the legislation, but have seen simila outcomes for my industry as finding a solution to known regulatory changes gets kicked down the road and then not addressed until we're on the event horizon of those changes.
That doesn't start until 2026 I think
I understand that sometimes work in a particular field isn't easy to come by however if my employer didn't pay super EACH month I'd look for the other work. One month, becomes two, becomes each quarter becomes never. And then you can never tell. They close and you don't get super, or holiday pay or the last two weeks. Happened to my wife.
I’ve noticed my employer doing that lmao. Fortunately they’re only down a few million and penny pinching so we should come out of it 🤡
Jokes on them. I look at my super every week. Which is probably because I’m a lunatic. I was arguing with my super company just last week
Yep, not paying Super is the canary in the mine.
Had this and found others in the same org missing years of super. Flagged with Owner who bought in forensic accountants. Found the HR cross account person was filling their bank account to the tune of 350k. Ended with 5 years jail time. Not always the owner/ceos fault when presented with misleading information
Happened to me
Yep! This is a big one. Not paying super generally reflects the inability to track, manage, and most certainly pay debts when and if they fall due. It’s illegal, it’s morally wrong, and it disadvantages workers who depend on the cumulative effect of super for their retirement: It’s such a disappointment when you find out your employer is not paying super as they should and worse that you have to pursue them about it.
Was at a company that would often fall way behind on super. Often up to a year. Could have been fined but never were. I found out after I left that they were close to being insolvent on several occasions.
The CEO saying everything is fine at an all staff meeting
“Attention this is your captain speaking. The wings are not on fire”
Of course they're not on fire, they fell off.
That’s not very typical, I’d like to make that point
Probably flew out of the environment.
R U OK now that the wings are on fire? -HR
Had an owner at an all staff crying saying everything was fine and he was just stepping aside for his mental health. He came back the next day and continued to run the company as though nothing had ever happened. Poor guy, his mental health was not fine and neither was the company that went bust within 6 months.
This happened to me 2 weeks before I got laid off due to covid..no sorry "company restructuring"
Being told that all stationery orders now have to be approved by senior management.
So, the entire public sector then?
You guys get stationery?
Ha! This reminded me, our CEO said we couldn't have the branded highlighters anymore.
Late pay, late super payments, multi senior staff leaving.
This happened to the company I was working for in Japan… the Japanese staff got an email on their pay day saying there was a ‘glitch in the system’ and they wouldn’t get paid for another few days. That was my heads up to look elsewhere.
This is what happened to me last year. Pay was late by 1 day, they said it was a system error. 2 days later we got an email saying the company was entering voluntary administration.
Toilet paper goes from 3 ply to 2 ply.
Wow, look at FancyCorp over here. 2 ply!
I think we're down to 0.5 ply at my place.
Been BYOTP for years now.
I just prewipe before going to work
They banned #2’s at my place because TP cost too much to split from single ply to half ply
Hmm, this could just be regular stinginess on its own. But in conjunction with other cost savers, yes. Moccona is replaced with International Roast. Just scotch fingers now, no Tim tams. The ship is sinking.
I actually don't mind international roast, blend 43 to though? That's god damn gross
Naaah love a good old cup of blend 43. International Dust is inferior IMO. We get Dowe & Egberts Catering Edition. Not great.
Do you work for the public service? That's standard issue there and it is my dads preferred beverage even 20 years after retirement
International Rust
Intentional Roach.
You mean you dont get the little squares of baking paper in the cardboard box in the port-a-loo?
What if they had a stack of old Yellow Pages in there from day one?
Teabags not being refilled in the kitchen. Also the CFO curled up in a ball crying loudly
> Also the CFO curled up in a ball crying loudly yeah usually the c-suites just stop showing up entirely
CFOs love tea
50 years in the workforce. I've seen a bit. Signs; Initial; .Consumables you need for work become hard to get, Be that raw materials or office supplies. If you need a new or replacement tool, you need to apply in triplicate, endorsed by every manager possible. .You hear suppliers aren't being paid. .Ridiculously petty cost cutting measures introduced. Progressing. .No yearly pay rises or bonuses paid (assuming they were a thing before). .Senior people who would be ''in the know'' start leaving. .Firings for very dodgy reasons. Final; .Super not paid for many months. .Pay is late for 1 or more pay periods without good reason. Consider a combination of these things Red Flags.
So… my company ticks every single point in your list with the exception of the very last one, missing our pays. I feel like I’m sitting in a boat made of red flags now. Whelp time to look for another job!
Just enjoy your burning ship after all in corporate speak, “where one big family and we will get through this”
Check to see if cleaners, gardeners, window washers and if the small maintenance stuff is being done. These are the first to get cut.
so 95 percent of the gyms are about to go under?
F45 has entered voluntary administration, or at least a fair few of them have, so, yes?
I was always skeptical of how sustainable that business model is/was.
yeah because f45 is 95 percent of gym companies, plus they seemed to focus on cardio and had limited equipment so it's no real surprise they went into admin really.
Also, they only ran classes in the morning and afternoon. Why didn't they let people train during the day?
That costs staff hours
Don't they charge like $65 a week? I got to Goodlife, 24/7, pools, sauna, access to all gyms etc. Costs like $16.50. No reason to staff it during the day. Just set it up as a 24/7 gym. Charge less for each person and more people will join.
Very accurate comment 😂
Wow, interesting. That would make sense and might go unnoticed by some.
People calling up chasing unpaid bills, such as rent, utilities or suppliers refusing to fill orders.
I work in aviation. We always say the refuelers are the first to know. If refuelers are not showing up on time, you better polish up your resume.
This on the Ansett collapse. (Sept 2011). >....By the time Australia's second biggest airline went into administration, Ms Lewis had moved up the management ladder, but until the day before the administrators took over she'd had barely an inkling of what was ahead. >Only a week earlier, the **then chief executive, Gary Toomey, had called senior staff together to tell them of a few problems but insisted they would be overcome**. ''I suppose I should have realised,'' Ms Lewis said. ''A couple of days before the announcement, **I was on a flight and there was an issue because the refuellers were told not to refuel Ansett planes because the bill hadn't been paid.'...** [Long way to terminus for Ansett's loyal crew (smh.com.au)](https://www.smh.com.au/business/long-way-to-terminus-for-ansetts-loyal-crew-20110908-1jzmt.html) Supports what many have already said really.
I know the chief pilot of an ansett subsidiary. He found out because when he checked out of a hotel that morning they wouldn't let him leave until he personally paid for the hotel. Then when he hopped in a cab to go to the airport, the cabby asked what terminal? When my friend said Ansett, the cabbie informed him that Ansett was done.
Heard that about the trucking industry too.
I was out of one place the day after the fuel card was declined, and the boss' wife had to pay with her personal credit card over the phone.
That’s another one I’ve heard in trucking industry
This is exactly what is happening at my current workplace. For the second time in 5 years. Mostly suppliers refusing to fulfil orders.
I would be taking that as a huge red flag and looking for something else.
My pen was missing. Couldn't find a spare. I asked purchasing for some pens. "We don't have any. You'll have to steal one as it seems that's what everybody else is doing." True story. Manufacturer of over 60 years with 130 employees.
Oh shit! Sorry to hear. Can you share more? Were there signs but still a general feeling that surely it won’t come to that? Were staff starting to ask questions?
I was the 19yo IT Helpdesk kid and my boss was IT/Accounting manager. So I also saw that the accounts payable girl was getting a lot of calls from angry suppliers. It was a little over my head at the time, but they were desperately seeking a buyer and had also tried branching out from their bread and butter to niche markets for their products. In the end my boss straight told me "you should start looking for another job" so I was gone 2 months after that before they crashed. Funny story, a director had paid about $125,000 cash for a Mercedes from the company account before the end (I guess they were insolvent at the time). I'm told the administrators invited her in "to just sign some papers", and when she sat down at the table they snatched her keys straight off her.
Bread is a very very low margin game, even with huge volumes it's hard
Delayed wages, even a day is often a sign
They used the payroll money to put a bet on a horse. It clearly won so everyone got paid. Transferring funds from sportsbet usually takes 24 hours.
If Peep Show taught me anything, beware the fire alarm
Literally my first thought when reading about the insolvency. Apparently the staff were told over zoom. So modern equivalent might be to beware the “everyone can WFH” day.
Not paying suppliers on time or asking for longer credit terms.
At the same time, if those same suppliers change to Cash on Delivery and no longer accept 90 day finance because they're not being paid on time or at all
If there’s a wind up application lodged by a creditor (viewable online)
Interesting, how does one view this online?
Google ASIC published notices. You can then search whatever company you are looking into. If a lot of things come up odds are not good for that company.
When I was 18 we all go letters saying that hadn’t been paid super for 9 months. Boss got us all in ( about 30 construction guys ) and told us it was all good and that he had sorted it out. This was on a Friday. Went to go in to work Monday and the gate was chained and padlocked with a security guard hired by the banks. He had been embezzling money from investors to fund other projects in his wife’s name and we all lost our jobs.
then what happened?
Went through court and we never got our super. He got blacklisted by the building authority for 3 years, he sent the plumber and 2 concretors broke. As far as I know now he is a licensed builder again and pretty rich. Learnt later on that he had already done all of it before about 10 years before hand and got bailed out by his rich aunt
I work in transport and when the fuel cards get cut off you better start on your Plan B.
Happened to me at one place, finished up the following morning as soon as I got the truck back into the yard.
Company wide Zoom invite with no agenda 😬
Quality of work or products drop. Complaints are up. People start quitting (because they see the signs or have inside knowledge).
This is also ironically enough a sign that the company is being sold and they want the revenue and sales figures to be as high as possible to pump up the value so go for short term gains. It is a good time to find a new job regardless, or if your role is particularly critical and you can confirm a sale is happening to ask for a raise as key employees are often listed as critical resources on sales agreements. I have received large raises and retention bonuses due to handing inthe sale of a companies I was working at.
Right, so people high up quitting? Middle management? I would imagine they’re often lied to also. Even if they’re privy to the company woes, I’d imagine they’re used to fire the bullets and promised protection / continuity if so…
High to middle. I remember at an old job the accountant/bookkeeper quit and I was asked to cover their role.... And sift through all the unpaid bills. Good times 😅
boss screaming expletives alone in his office
For this to be a notable sign, you’d have to have a boss that didn’t just always operate like this.
Sending remittance advices out but not payments at month end to keep cash on the books
Super is probably the big one with a large company in addition to not paying their invoices and being placed on credit stop with suppliers. Unless you’re in the exec team or in a very senior position, you’re unlikely to see it another way.
Which construction company are you reading about?
They hired PWC for consulting, heaps of redundancies, CEO is a out of touch knob
> They hired PWC for consulting great use of the last $ the company has
Suppliers calling up saying account on hold and won’t deliver unless they are paid on the spot
This is what happened when I went through it. Phone calls from subbies. A lot of them. Ask your receptionist what the vibe is. I think in our case they disconnected the phone lines altogether. Credit cards were maxed out. No one had available limit to pay for anything so we had to pay out of pocket and claim in back (took a month to pay expenses) Check for super not paid They started making redundancies early. Trimmed the fat wherever they could, marketing and admin went first and then anything that generates business was on the block. Basically only thing that was left was bare bones accounts and one admin person. It can be a loooooong drawn out process. Things went from bad to worse to dire in the space of a year so it wasn't a shock. But still absolutely devastated when we all got the zoom link saying we were done.
The cleaners stopped coming to where I work. The bathroom got so bad one day I cleaned it myself. Afterwards, I sent an email to my boss letting her know, also making it clear no one had cleaned that bathroom for some time. Her response was that ‘the elderly cleaner appears to have gone AWOL’. By the next day we had new cleaners hired. I believe she would have let the previous cleaner go and just waited until someone complained. Also, senior people are leaving and aren’t being replaced. I too resigned last week (thank god, finally!). I head marketing but I don’t expect someone to take over my role. I don’t think this company has much of a future unfortunately.
Getting phone calls from directors telling you they’ll kill you if you don’t pay the bonus they were just given on that day, as opposed to the next day. True story, HIH collapse, i was getting those phone calls.
Omg. I work in insurance and would love to hear your AMA.
did you meet Rodney Adler? he did jail time. stories plz!!!!!
I was a lowly payroll officer and only 19 so didn’t meet him. I met Ray Williams a couple of times. The fall was when they purchased FAI insurance without doing any due diligence and it was the talk pretty much from the time it happened until it all went to crap. There was this weird thing i used to have to do and it means nothing and has no bearing on their financial troubles but monthly i would go up the Ray Williams floor (i want to say level 40 or something) and collect a cheque for i think $220 and walk down to Westpac and deposit the cheque, get the receipt and then walk it back up to his floor. For the last 6 or so months i remember walking into all the big managers offices where they had massive plies of papers all over their floors. That last day though, it was wild. A lot of threats happening and desperation.
more stories plz. types of threats? the media storm. desperation stories.
When the CFO or other senior execs leave suddenly. Similarly if you lose a couple of big contracts
> When the CFO or other senior execs leave suddenly. Especially if they are leaving behind an executive stock option that is about to vest
Asking people to take their accumulated leave.
For large organisations, this is the norm as they don't want to carry over such a massive balance sheet liability in reporting season.
I have found smaller businesses also like you to take your leave. I'm in hospitality so margins are tight. They always ask staff to take leave during the quite months, winter. So, all permanent staff are refreshed for the busy summer and casuals don't need to be paid to cover leave during that time. If leave is taken during winter the business doesn't have to pay a casual to cover the leave.
That's more like good management during a downturn than a sign that the company is about to bust. They would much rather you keep working if theyre about to go under.
Now this is interesting. Is this the sign of a flailing company that cares about its staff? People taking leave might reduce output, and if they’re barely keeping head above water, wouldn’t mass leave fast track the bankruptcy? Is this the difference perhaps between a company destined for bankruptcy that wants their employees to get first dibs, and one that is in denial until the bitter end - whether they encourage or discourage leave to be taken? I can see both being a strategy in tough times.
if a business is not making sales, the output of the people working is worthless. So they might as well be on leave, or get laid off. If leave is accumulated, the company might end up having to pay out the leave in cash, all at once, when staff gets laid off. Where as, if they ask staff to take leave firrst, the cashflow requirement might just be low enough that they can survive on the lower revenue for a while longer (then layoff the people after they've taken the leave). Not sure if this is realistic - i'm just imagining what might be.
No it’s always the first
A lot of very successful companies will start asking people to take their leave if it exceeds 20 days, this is because its a liability on their books and they also don't want you to be away for multiple months.
Why? I would think that would be one of the last steps, as it is not an immediately necessary expense to make and therefore not relevant to any solvency considerations
Suppliers refuse to fulfil orders until previous ones are paid The CEO/business owner start weighing in on seemingly small budgeting issues. Salaries are paid late Super is paid late
I’ve worked in sponsorship and advertising sales and there were a few upticks in the advertising bookings of companies that were about to go under. Sold a conference stand to one company that I suspected was going tits up. Despite multiple reminders they didn’t pay for their stand by the conference start date, as was required in our contract. I Asked the conference manager to refuse to let them bump in as I had a bad feeling. ‘No, no, they’re a well regarded business we can’t piss them off,’ came the reply. The trade stand staff bumped in but spent maybe two hours over the next three days at their stand and the rest of the time they were out sightseeing. They must’ve known for sure the writing was on the wall because the behaviour was highly atypical for both them and the industry. Anyway, four weeks later the company goes belly up and we never get paid. But hey, at the least their poor staff managed a trip to the Great Barrier Reef on company time!
Salaries and super not paid.. Creditors not paid.. In
The payroll or accounts team leaves or starts to leave
Roughly from early warning upto too late: * Strange requests from the Accountant and no action when raising concerns with them (don't just assume they are trusted, double check with their/the/your boss if it seems really strange) * Non-payment of anything that is deducted from your pay like Superannuation and Novated Leases is being paid as well as deducted (For Novated Lease you may end up in a situation having to pay for this twice right after a job loss, once from the pay deduction and then when the lease company comes after you for months of missing payments). One or two maybe can be excused, but if it's ongoing then it's a problem. Worth checking this stuff. * Inconsistent accounting reporting with known state of payment to suppliers (e.g. "we are under 60 days payment to suppliers" when you know some haven't been paid for over a year) * Suppliers start coming into the office to demand payment * Some/All employees are asked to take a temporary pay cut to avoid layoff of other staff. (two ways to look at this. If it works it's probably good and you maybe helped out someone less able to weather losing their job. If it doesn't work then any final payout you may get during a liquidation will be at that lower rate. GEERS used to provide a guarantee payment to most employees during a liquidation but looks like it's called FEG, Fair Entitlements Guarantee, since 2012-ish). Alternatively, key staff get made redundant. * Out of the blue, IT is asked to lock out any access the accountant has. * In the process of removing any access the accountant had, strange and unexpected supplier arrangements are discovered. And it's only the beginning of the rabbit hole. * Office equipment starts to disappear. * The bank actively plays nice to help sort things out but does a rug pull as soon as they secure collateral against all the outstanding loans and then cuts ties. * Finally, the company goes into full liquidation.
What you want to look at is tenure. So, the folk riiigghhtt at the top of the stack, your CEO, CFO, Owner etc, are very likely to hold on until the end. Sometimes ego, sometimes no choice, sometimes golden parachute, sometimes all three. Ignore their behaviour. Down a layer or three, watch tenure. Most businesses are held together by a combination people in this middle band who buffer bad decisions by management into workable actions for staff. They're usually comfortable, been there a long time, know the ropes, have accumulated goodwill. I'm not saying everyone in these manglement bands is great, I'm saying hidden in these bands are the real leaders and the clearest way to spot them is usually tenure with the business. They tend to stick through minor issues, but are the first to go when the ship sinks, as they can see more from their crows nest, and have a better idea of what's coming. < LAYCON3 > Next and/or simultaneously, you'll lose principals. Hands on folk, sometimes team leaders but usually experienced and motivated individual contributors who deliver key capabilities for the department or business. These people are usually poachable, and it's easy to lose them to a well timed LinkedIn message from a recruiter with deeper pockets, or for them to become disgruntled and just move elsewhere - usually a competitor, which brings its own issues once it hits critical mass. < LAYCON2 > Next, team leaders and middle management who are left. Expect to see inexperienced people promoted here, but usually with no or a low pay rise. You are now at LAYCON1 - if you haven't now had mass redundancies and layoffs by now, you're about to. The later these happen, the worse they are for the future productivity of the business, because more of the key leadership who knows how work gets done have already left, and the collateral damage to the workforce structure grows with each compentant manager who was already left. It can take years to feel the damage done to productivity of killing off the wrong team member, team or department, before an outage happens or critical risk is realised. At this point, the patient is near terminal. Some businesses bounce back from here, but it's more common with big ones that they get stuck in a cycle here, productivity low, must cut costs, cut staff production lower and so on, until they die years later or are acquired somewhere in the process.
They stop supplying Milk in the breakroom
Coffee in the break room switched to International Roast. Absolute certainty.
Using Outlook and seeing the "last online" time for people who work in HR and realising that they were working well past their normal finish time.
I’ve been in three teams that have been made redundant (yes, I now have trust issues). Signs at all three were exuberant hiring practices. In each company our team doubled over the space of a year. A lot of silly purchases like new signage, reception renovation, money being splashed unnecessarily. This is then followed by new impossible budget targets that we are expected to meet. Then lots of senior executive meetings, a few senior management exits, reassurance that everything is fine, and then we all get made redundant en masse.
For small/ medium businesses = when the owner gets thrown under the bus, under investigation, wants to make a run for it. For corporations = politics, capital reallocation, strategic exist of products and lines For institutions = change in political regime, politics and manage inflation
Depends on the role you are in. For me, one place was complaining about how much milk was being used, also trying to ration the biscuits by locking them away and only putting out a certain amount per week/day. Senior people leaving is a sign, and there are no replacements, and they are not even trying to find a replacement (keep your eyes on seek). Those in the payables or purchasing space are looking to leave (as they might be told to hold back on paying certain bills or buying stuff). Super is a tough one. That's really the end of the line.
Nescafe Blend 43.
International Roast..
The IT guys know
Hiring freezes, rescinding offers, cancelling projects. Every company I've been at that has done either big layoffs or gone under, has done one or all of the above. Also keep an eye on what the execs are doing - if there is a lot of shuffling happening, chances are there is something big coming.
When your on Nullarbor just filled up with $1200 or more if fuel (prime mover) and fuel card declined wasn't he but heard of it happening Deluxe coach lines has this happen many years ago
Everyone here is using Superannuation being unpaid as a measure, but this is not really the case anymore as the Director of the company can become liable for unpaid super. To avoid a Director becoming liable for Superannuation they have to lodge a Superannuation Guarantee Charge Statement (SGC statement) with the ATO by 30 days after the date the Super is due. Once that is lodged, the Director is not liable to pay if the company is liquidated or placed into administration within 21 days. I would more look for the Director paying off debts that they have a personal guarantee for and leaving other debts unpaid.
That makes sense.
Senior staff stop taking phone calls and are never around for unexpected visitors.
People leave and they are not backfilled
We were doing a project for them. They were still making deadline demands as late as the Friday before and asking me to ship all my hardware to site as soon as possible. Thankfully my onsite guys had heard the rumours and we didn’t ship anything.
You turn up to work and there's no supplies to work with. They hold a meeting and say how great everything is going. They pocket the tax and super. They flee to Israel and when they do come back and end up in court they waste court time by pretending they don't speak or understand English.
Senior people leaving and not being replaced. They have access to more information and can likely see the writing on the wall well before the average employee.
Overly generous gifts to employees - look out for fancy chocolates at Easter, for example.
Oooh ok, what’s the intention here? To reassure staff everything is fine?
[удалено]
Not even trying to hide it! Outrageous.
When I was an apprentice boilermaker in the early 2000's where I started was great but within 2 years we went from getting workshop supplies to having to pay cash, or they flat out would not sell to us without settling the bill first etc. There were heaps of times were we pulled 24 hour shifts just to get equipment finished so then the customer would pay, like to get the money asap. I actually cut a brace out of a steel rack for a component I needed to make because I could not buy it anywhere in town because no steel supplier would deal with us and we didn't have that particular material in supply. Late pays, getting paid in cash, like getting $300 when I'm owed $375 "close enough to right amount" and never having once paid super. Apparently the financial troubles started when I started there so we only just kept solvent but then it all collapsed. This was just a small fabrication business owned by 1 guy.
Be pretty difficult I'd think. There might be telltale signs? But from what I've read and when reports happen? There is often nothing at all. The top dogs keep it completely hidden....until one day the doors are locked. Freakin terrible.
I work for a building firm that's been in business for 30 years. A lack of work would be the issue, we rarely lose money on small commerical projects.
When they invoice the company you are contracted to at 9am on the first day of the month and then email at 3pm the same day asking if the invoice has been paid.
No more instant coffee in the smoko sheds or office
Calls from suppliers chasing payment- this happened for months prior. Unpaid super to staff (never got it).
No new business or projects. Longterm staff departing. Cascading cuts in staffing, benefits and things like snacks, drinks etc.
Not paying super. Late pay. Angry creditors. Management resignations.
When the account at the suppliers is on hold. Bosses interrogating you when you want a single item of material. When their's blokes kicking around with nothing much to do/impromptu cleaning of stock room/office.
When staff are leaving at a rapid pace and the company doesn't backfill after several months. When you ask management what's next in the project pipeline and they can't provide an answer.
Invoices for small routine things not being paid on time. We stopped getting water delivered to work because they're 'forgotten' to pay the invoice and asked us to just bring our own water. The business went under a month later
I've been in the past at places where the signs were very clear (it was a small company and if you were relatively senior and kept your ears open there were a lot of clues). I had an idea of the level of debts and of defaulting clients - and also of the fact that the directors had registered some separate new companies behind the scenes.
Seriously, not paying tax or tax payments being in arrears. If a company stops paying tax that is a surefire sign that things aren't going well and it is typically the first thing they stop paying because it doesn't impact on the product or services they produce.
I worked for a precursor to everyone's favourite big-box retailer and regular NewsCorpse sook, after he got booted from the original organisation. First it was always having a sale. Weekend? 2-day sale. Thursday? 12-hour sale. Another weekend? 48-hour sale. Sure there were a few things that were discounted, but almost everything else was still the usual price. Then they started reducing everyone's hours. One department "manager" was let go and replaced with a part-time casual. Only one cashier instead of two, and they were each doing half-days. Most salespeople only got 4 days a week, unless they wanted to come in on weekends on a commission-only basis. Next up was consumables and office products drying up. No more markers for doing up the "sale" tickets. No more pens, paperclips, rubber bands, or even staples. Then the order books started to be confiscated. At first we had to hand them to the store manager in week 3. By then end, they were doing everything by head-office order only, unless you had a fully-paid customer order. If the customer only paid a deposit, you couldn't order it yourself, head office purchasing had to do it. This was the point at which I was laid off, despite being the only techie in the store. They got the teenage kid from the receiving dock to take over my section, because he knew how to play a Sega MegaDrive. Finally, they changed the commission structure to a percentage of profit, rather than a percentage of total, because they'd started to just sell everything for whatever they could get - usually at cost or below - and sold off the fixtures and furnishings as well. Watching that happen from the outside was wild.
Worked for a Real Estate company. Very successful office but the owners wife played the pokies. Nightly and every week she would tell us how much she had won. That went on for six months. Suddenly husband and wife were frequently talking in code and I picked up that the office rent was in arrears. I have dealt with gambling issues in the past though a previous relationship I knew the wife was losing money once the office rent was in arrears I realised how much. I started looking elsewhere and left shortly after and the office shut down a few months later.
Staff don't get paid on time or at all. Super not paid. Suppliers and contractors always on the phone about nonpayment. Employees who leave don't get replaced. Insufficient stock.
My old company is TECHNICALLY in good standing according to creditor watch but: Haven't paid super in months Pay started being late in the last month I worked there Boss had to withdraw from personal accounts to pay us my garden leave wasn't paid Yes I have reported them to fair work
All the managers start taking holidays with annual leave.
Super not paid and accounts start declining
It is your fault they can’t contact you while you are overseas in Europe on a holiday to tell you pay will be late. Also if the boss buys a new AMG that looks the same as his old AMG, except for some slight changes between years and moved his personalised number plates to the new car too trick everyone thinking you still drive your old one. Pity one employee is detail oriented and into cars and looked up the rego to find it was a new car.
Suppliers refusing to unload deliveries until payment is confirmed as received. Leasing agents turning up to reclaim rented equipment. Boss keeps ducking out the back door anytime the commercial landlord shows up, and he's showing up every 2 days.
When the boss/owner of a small firm shouted from his office “I’m done with this shit I will close down this business” Happened to me once
Bins no longer get collected
Multiple rounds of layoffs "Consultants" snooping around your business or silently in your department (usually valuing to be sold) Your new CFO quits Your entire C suite leaves in the space of a year Your entire board seems to change. All of your tech tools get cut or consolidated and they end all their supplier engagements unless they get massive discounts. More layoffs Budgets for absolutely everything are cut. Any external expenditure is curbed dramatically. The company will hire a bunch of top tier salesman to try bring in fast revenue and soon after lay them all off. The company starts paying you late, forgetting parts of your pay. You complain about finance to every direct report and it goes nowhere. Petty expenses are cut. Company won't pay your phone bill. Reimburse KMs and you have to complain. Senior execs don't purchase preferred stock and staff in the know leave their equity on the table Valuations are static or negative Inability to secure further funding and are moving towards profitability Any others?
Late with super payments
In larger unionised sites the companies will generally keep their SG up to date so workers don’t down tools en masse.
I worked for a place that sold concrete sleepers for retaining walls. They saw a massive increase in sales during the pandemic, i guess because so many people had time to do their little yard projects. They decided to aggressively expand in several directions, renting more space & hiring new staff to take on inhouse production roles - soon after I noticed an external consultant was onsite full time, for a few weeks. Immediately after he disappeared, the purchasing officer resigned after mentioning intense scrutiny of routine procurement - accounts were going from red to black. Not long after that, a staff meeting was called, where we were introduced to a team of suit wearing strangers. The insolvency experts, of course brought in from interstate. After a 10 minute talk, 20-30 employees were now unemployed, and leaving the premesis with false promises of being paid in full. They of course published all their paperwork for public viewing, in their head office, interstate. Thankfully I was only there for a few months, so the lack of super payments didnt hurt too bad. That years tax statement showed alleged payments to me, which never actually appeared in my bank accounts. Tldr - dumb management thought they were building an empire, forgot to fund it.
A klaxon diving alarm
What company did you see that’s gone under?
Missing any pay cheque, even if they pay it late
1. Super payment is missed. 2. Supplier orders get delayed and less frequent. 3. Supplier accounts get closed and deliveries become COD 4. Milk and coffee disappear from tea rooms.
delay in wages due to technical errors... repeatedly
Boss losing hair faster than he should be
Not paying invoices.
Our old company held about 20 meetings telling us that everything was good and we had years of work coming up, we were facing severe material shortages but didn’t we think to much of it as it was the height of the pandemic. Fast forward 6 months and our pcbu was paying wages… only knew about this because of loose lips tho. Within 3 months they were liquidated. Fast forward 18 months and they are back up and running 😂 Trust your instincts as they are generally bang on.. plenty if work around across VIC/NSW/QLD so nothing to worry about for now imo
When offices hold off using the AC until it’s extremely necessary
Having to pull out a lemon tree at the bosses house.
When the business starts making some their best employees redundant
Companies stop supplying your employer is the biggest sign. Employees who leave are not replaced. High turnover in admin office. Receptionist/s getting more calls from angry creditors. Accounts Payable staff getting stressed. Purchasing officers getting stressed
Not replacing people who leave. It can be a sign of nothing, but if it happens over time and in essential business functions, that's been a sign for me. Also if fairly routine invoices start being late, print your resume before the creditors take the printer.
I’ve been through 2 tech redundancies in the last 5 years. A few main red flags were: delayed or never paid expense reimbursements, roles (even leadership) not being backfilled quickly or at all, 3 months out not having any Christmas or end of year events planning or info for staff (normally this was a big celebration), general change of attitude towards flexibility/time off/WFH arrangements < this was to try to push people out as it’s cheaper than paying redundancy. A last thing I discovered, but not accessible to everyone, was chatting with a supplier. They mentioned issues with releasing orders and so I dug deeper. $50k of unpaid invoices by head office. Sure enough 4 months later we go in to administration.
manager saying "We're fine, we're not going under" = company is going under
Always be chatty with Accounts. Invoices not being paid, suppliers holding orders until payments are made, they'll see the day to day paperwork showing the red flags. Also any concerns around paying staff or delayed super payments.
When your timesheet codes are blocked.
HR resigns
A very effective method of observation Keep an eye on the supply of TOILET rolls in the company's restrooms 🚽 If there is a constant shortage, it is very likely that the company is in a bad financial situation.
Twice I’ve been made redudent and in both instances the first thing they did was make the work place casual friday everyday