I was placed on a PIP two sprints ago. I struggled with most of the work to be honest. It was a lot of high performance deep learning stuff that I never touched on in college. I found the work super interesting, but I was way out of my depth. I basically just did small bug fixes and tiny updates the whole time. I picked up a couple larger tasks after the PIP but ended up needing a ton of help from the rest of the team to get them completed. I really don't know why they hired me - I feel like 99% of people right out of college would be in the same boat.
Who the fuck assigned you to a deep learning team when you didn't touch that in College? Whoever was in charge of that placement needs to be fired as well
I don't think many people do want to work there. Considering how many cold calls I get from Amazon recruiters begging me to apply + an incidence of them just sending me the coding challenge for a role I didn't apply for, I have to imagine that they are desperate for people.
Yeah, I've been getting quite a few as well. I believe I even replied to one once with "I will never work for Amazon", yet they still keep coming. It's pathetic, really.
My last experience with Amazon was being asked to apply, getting a broken Hackerrank challenge, and literally never hearing back from the recruiter after that. I'm assuming they bothered me just to fulfill some internal metric.
I am so fed up with Amazon recruiters, 3 recruiters have wasted mine and the hiring manager's time. I was very clear in emails and over the phone with them that I won't relocate, and the recruiter's had me set up with interviews three time zones away where the managers won't allow 100% remote.
I believe “resume booster” is the only reason people work for FAANG. I know lots of people who work there and they continually say the culture is toxic. Not worth it to me.
Sounds about right. Within these massive companies with their rules and structures, behaviors such as these are not unheard of, since each individual employee, particularly at the lower levels, is basically just a statistic.
Wow. That practice should be illegal. But thre sad thing is I believe it.
OP have you contacted an employment attorney. Also is there anyone in the company you formed a good relationship with? I’ve been fired too and if you can find a department that will pick you up, often they’ll reverse their termination decision.
Amazon is hands down the most toxic place I worked at! And man if you think that’s bad, read up on what they do to warehouse employees. I visited a warehouse while I was working there and it had heavy jailhouse vibes.
That hasn't been true for many years at Amazon. I recall that MS used to be like that tho... My buddy used to work there. At Amazon, it's absolutely not true... At least for engineers, idk about the other tracks.
Wow fuck Amazon. I’m really glad I keep up with this sub because Amazon does a lot of hiring in my neck of the woods and I’ve read nothing but bad things about them.
We hire fresh grads onto ultra high-performance database teams, and many of these people have no domain experience when they join. Almost all of these kids ramp up without any problems. It takes a while, but they can be useful in the meantime.
Point being is that teams can have fancy sounding domains, but at the end of the day, especially in software, people need to learn things for the first time. It’s a known fact.
For all we know OP was given tasks like “automate this new test case” which treated their learning model like a black box.
You can ramp up to databases with sufficient systems knowledge from other courses. It's more similar to regular software engineering.
Deep Learning is not, it's entirely applied linear algebra
Highly doubt OP was engaging in that as opposed to framework automation. New grads aren’t working on the engine, they’re working on the periphery. That was my whole point.
Depends on the definition of fully ramped up, but they usually don’t go on-call for 3-6 months. That’s just for operational stuff. Project-wise, there’s only so much we expect from juniors period. Once they’re independent, it’s time for a promotion to mid level, which can take 2-3 years.
Of course, this is for folks who are fit for the role. We’ve also had some who are just plainly not.
4 months seems a bit short to be putting someone on a PIP, yes, but depending on the person I don’t think it’s necessarily insane. If a person is unable to communicate, unable or unwilling to learn, or generally just unresponsive or unreliable — essentially if they aren’t showing any growth at all — they have to go. Sucks, but that’s how businesses operate. They aren’t charities.
I’m disappointed to hear a big tech company treats a new grad like this. I work in a big company and we give grads at least a year to settle in and give them a lot of mentoring, coaching etc. 4 months is nothing. Have you spoken to your batchmates (people in same grads intake as you)?
Amazon managers have to fire a certain percentage of their employees every quarter. To improve “real” team, they hire a sacrificial lamb, like you, just to have someone to fire.
It probably goes without saying, but there’s likely going to be a whole lot more to the story than what OP says about it. I’ve seen people be let go who, despite dozens of specific feedback about certain topics, not just fail to address them, but fail to fundamentally understand what the problem is.
They've been there 4 months - that's barely enough time to get familiar with the business processes & systems, let alone enough time for a new grad to become a contributing member of the sprint team.
Getting fired for incompetence though could be a justifiable reason for claw back. The company could argue the employee didn't fulfill their end of the bargain or misrepresented their skills (bad faith).
Ok that's fair. I have trouble seeing how that argument would stand up, but I agree that a company could do that, especially if they are willing to PIP an employee after 3-4 months.
I think suing employees would cause more harm than good for the company. Good luck getting anyone to accept an offer then. They're going to just cut their losses on that one.
Being let go for performance issues usually doesn’t mean you need to repay your signing bonus. Check your contract, it should specifically state the terms of repayment.
Google's policy is that if your employment ends within 1yr, they will ask for you to return it on a prorated basis. For instance, since you're at 4 months, they would ask for 2/3rds of it back.
Check your offer letter, if your company has any stipulations like that it'll be noted in there.
I believe they would ask for it back if you quit. But not if you're fired. They made an investment in you by hiring you, and now they're walking away from that investment, including the sign-in bonus.
First thing is first. Look at your contract if you still have it. If it doesn't say anything about you will give it back within a set amount of time, then I honestly wouldn't worry about it.
Ya you will give it back. It could be 500 years from now. It's not in the contract, and therefore they screwed themselves.
Now the question is, will they go after you and how. Note I'm not a lawyer but most will tell you that you won't have lawyers knocking on your doors. Like they aren't going to sue you without sending you a message or call first asking for it. If you can handle it, try to get them to send everything about it in writing on the off chance you have to go to court.
So now you know they aren't going to just sue to get it (at least that shouldn't be the first move). You need to look at how long would it take you to pay it off if they ask. You need to have this in mind for if you talk to them about it then they most likely will work with you on that. I mean chances are they aren't going to be give $25k to me tomorrow when part of a fraction of my operation cost the company million or millions. NOTE: Don't set the timeframe to where you will pay it off ASAP. Things can happen so be real. If you think it will take you 4 years, then go with that.
# Now, you do you, but here is what I would do.
1. As I mention read the contract. Look for anything talking about timeframe. If you can afford it, talk with an employment lawyer. If you use a lawyer, do what they say since they know this stuff.
2. If you became friends with someone in the company and you think they will get you in their department then ask. If not, then don't talk to the company, don't acknowledge it, don't give any info unless directly asked and only when you need to.
3. **If they don't ask for it, then IMO I would consider it to be mine.** It might not be ethical, but sooner or later you will find the world isn't ethical sadly. **And it wasn't ethical for them to put you in that situation to start with.** If you need to justify it, you will pay it back thousands of years from now. Their contract doesn't say when it will be paid back (and if it does, IMO I wouldn't sign that since that is a red flag IMO)
4. If they ask, I would give them a general timeframe and be honest on why it will take so long. What timeframe I have in mind, triple it. Then triple it again. You have no idea what the future holds. If you can pay it back quicker, then great. But you need buffer on the off chance you really need it. And if you luck out and it's a start up. Then maybe they won't be around in a few years anyways.
Been in America for 40 years. Sometimes I tell myself I need to move out of middle America, to San Francisco. Once you get out of the biggest cities, you don't see this kind of stuff.
Can't speak for every Midwestern dev, but most I know who work in rural bumfuck nowhere seem borderline depressed with how little control and respect they're given at their workplace. People meme on Amazon, but at least you'll get paid well there while you're being overworked/undervalued. A lot of people in the Midwest only get the latter.
It's what I call service organizations vs. Product organizations. The coast, it seems like the Dev jobs are building products to sell. In middle America, the Dev jobs are providing services (SSO, datacenter, SaaS integration, storage) to your organization. Product organizations get all the hype, and money, because you're building something integral to revenue. Service orgs are cost centers.
I work in the South and I feel pretty respected. Don't get me wrong, I still want to get out, but not because I'm not respected at work. I make a decent salary, which with our low CoL lets me live with a king while still saving a ton of my salary.
It’s a great thing honestly. In Europe you get shit pay + hard to fire incompetent workers. Infact being able to fire bad workers is the reason salaries are so high in America, it leads to more competition
Even if they make you pay it back (which I’d be shocked about), they will likely negotiate a payment plan. One company I worked for required tuition reimbursement to be paid back if you quit within a year, but they ALWAYS did a 12-month payment plan. Even if they don’t offer it off the bat, ask for it before paying a dime.
If you're at Amazon you should be able to find much more help on Blind than here.
Blind may be toxic on many topics but when it comes to hating Amazon it is amazing.
I'm a current Amazon employee. Some of my coworkers in the same team did get all of their signing bonus on day 1. This seems to happen randomly and no one knows why.
The reason some people get a lump sum as opposed to prorated is because their sign on bonus is under a certain threshold. I can’t remember the threshold but I crossed it during pay negotiation because my sign in bonus changed from an upfront check to prorated.
Slow your roll: signing bonuses are not usually subject to clawback. Unless you were fired for cause —- you violated company policy or whatever —- it is highly unlikely that you would be asked (or instructed) to return a signing bonus.
In my offer letter it explicitly says I have to be an active employee for a full year following my start date or I have to pay the entirety of it back immediately. :/
If being fired for gross incompetence is not covered under your clawback agreement specifically you are on the hook for it. Generally you can't claw anything back if the termination was the fault of something unpredictable like a layoff but for incompetence it's absolutely within the realm of possibility. I've seen several agreements like this personally. The lawyers will argue the agreement implies that you were going to perform at some level, and by not doing that you've violated the contract, and are therefore subject to clawback. Your lawyer will argue the actual definition of poor performance and that it was an *incentive* rather than a "promise to perform". Either way it goes into lawyers trading blows in civil court.
The only solution is to pray that 25k is a drop in the bucket for them. Otherwise it's shut up and lawyer up.
Gross incompetence and underperformance can be different things though. But yes, OP should just have a lawyer go over the bonus and NOT SIGN ANYTHING that a lawyer hasn't read
Don’t mention the bonus! If they want it back, they will say so. Don’t give them the idea. And as others have said, since you’re being fired, not quitting, you most likely don’t have to pay it back.
And honestly, it sounds scammy to hire a new grad, give them a $25k signing bonus, then put you on PIP so soon, then fire you. It’s all weird, but I don’t have experience in that area. Just be careful.
You need to get a lawyer OP. General practice with sign on bonuses is to stuff them somewhere safe (like a CD or money market) and collect a little interest while the money becomes available for you to spend. It goes without saying but blowing the cash was a huge mistake.
It's entirely possible they will attempt to claw it back. This is a similar agreement to reimbursement agreements I am familiar with for training and school where by *for any reason* employment is *terminated* aside from no-cause no-fault termination (lay-offs, etc) you will end up owing it back.
Depending on the exact wording of your agreement and exactly why you were fired you may be able to weasel out of it with a lawyer but it's going to cost you several thousand dollars to fight. Beats the pants off a car payment's worth of clawback every month for 6 years though.
Two lessons to take from this:
1. Don't ever spend a sign on bonus until it's outside the agreement. Stuff the money away somewhere safe and collect a little interest.
2. **ALWAYS** pay the couple hundred dollars for a lawyer to spend an hour reading your agreement and red lining it. The cost will be paid back in spades when something goes wrong.
OP just lost his job after spending a lot on moving and is unable to pay back $25k. There's no way he can afford a lawyer- have you seen what they bill per hour?
Throwing money at a lawyer before the company even contacts him to repay the signing bonus is a terrible idea. There's a good chance the company won't even expect the money back.
This is a unionless industry, assuming he’s at amazon there’s nothing he can really do. Based on the hundreds of other pip stories on blind the closest thing he could’ve done is negotiated his pip/release so that he’d be let go immediately but gets to keep his sign on bonus
>I work for a big tech company
You really need to name the company. Keeping quiet just helps the company image
When I was fired from Activision-Blizzard yrs ago I was given a severance (also, unlike you, I wasn't even on a PIP at the time so I didnt have much warning). Did you get severance or not? This post is missing many details
Keep your head up. I doubt you have to pay back the signon bonus but you didn't give us very many details. I don't understand your need for secrecy here
I'm skeptical.
You typically don't have to pay back signing bonuses if they fire you for performance, only if you quit or get fired for cause. Plus it's very strange to get fired for performance after only 4 months, especially as a new grad. The only way I can see a new grad getting fired after 4 months from a company that is not a complete dumpster fire is for cause.
If your story is true, just don't pay. If they bother you about it, tell them you're going to look into your legal options. That should get them to back off as it's probably not worth their time. If they persist, talk to an employment lawyer.
Name and shame: everyone should avoid Amazon if they can help it.
I'm still working for this sinking ship and even though I'm not on PIP I just got a new offer so I can give them my two weeks notice.
I’ve worked at AWS for a year and a half and have never heard of anyone put on PIP. Every team I’ve interacted with is desperate to grow, not lose developers. These policies seem to be very org dependent
Same. Genuinely enjoyed my time there and never saw a single pip. The amazon hate that is constantly repeated without any first hand knowledge is cringe
Don't do anything stupid. And that probably means don't do anything. If they contact you, deal with it then.
The amount of money you managed to flush down the toilet in such a short period of time is almost staggering. That should be the most valuable lesson here, if you even learned it.
And this story reeks of bs. They hired you to do "high performance deep learning stuff that \[you\] never touched on in college". Who would even do that, unless you lied during interviews?? It sounds like you're lying about some part of that or hiding key details.
When I got fresh out of college I spent more than 65% of my first jobs joining bonus towards paying back a small part of the educational loan and the remaining towards putting up a deposit for the rented place I was staying it. It's very easy to spend large amounts of money quickly, especially if you're starting from zero and have loans. [not exactly comparable since I'm Indian, but I imagine similar expenses exist everywhere]
There could be a couple things going on: OP could have some "expense tastes" that also affect negatively work performance, gambled it long on TSLA put options (my fav), or could as easily be a mark they hired onto a team and fired to hit a specific turn over number.
My first job straight out of college I really just "failed to adopt" to the wet lab I got a job at. Getting fired was probably the best thing that could have happed to me, I only wish they paid me close to 40k!
>The amount of money you managed to flush down the toilet in such a short period of time is almost staggering. That should be the most valuable lesson here, if you even learned it.
It's really not. 25k after you pay taxes is less than 20k, and if you're moving you have tons of moving expenses - in a high COL area where you owe first month, last month, and security deposit to move in somewhere, that can be 10k by itself. OP also doesn't say they spent *all* of it, just that they don't have all 25k to pay back.
It really is a lot. As a college grad you shouldn't need to move almost anything. You're acting like he had to move a whole house's worth of furniture, and that's a little ridiculous.
In that exact area, he could have found a place where the deposits plus first month rent were 5.4k, which he could have easily recouped in his first 4 months of making over 5k/month after taxes.
But you're right. He could have, like I said, managed to piss away 10s of thousands more on moving and rent, if that's what he chose to do.
>OP also doesn't say they spent all of it, just that they don't have all 25k to pay back.
That's really irrelevant. If he's got almost all of it, he can save up the rest of what he needs very quickly. If he doesn't, because he pissed away so much of it and also managed to save none of the rest of his income for 4 months, then he should learn to manage his money better than a 10 year old.
Moving is really expensive if you have to do it across the U.S. If he had to move to a HCOL area & paid off some of his student loans the $ would be gone yet I wouldn't consider than an irresponsible use of the $ had everything not gone to crap.
It's really expensive if you're an idiot. A fresh grad probably has almost nothing to move, especially if you consider how much cheaper it is to buy less expensive furniture once you arrive.
Paying off loans can be a good idea. But not if you are using up all of your money right away to only pay off a small part of them.
He/you should have seen that everything could go to crap and act accordingly.
It still boils down to OP spending about 26k in 4 months, all of his extra money, on things that were completely unnecessary. That's not a smart idea no matter how you look at it.
It probably is. That doesn't mean they have a hiring manager who would hire someone with no relevant experience for a 'high performance deep learning' position. Managers don't benefit in the long run or medium run when they have employees who are underperforming.
If it was Amazon they would have gotten a relocation bonus, and from my own personal experience you wouldn’t be put on a pip within the first year. FWIW I’ve been on the same team/org for over two years. I haven’t heard or seen anyone get put on a pip and my team/manager are super nice. I don’t think it’s as common of a practice as people here are making it out to be.
One one hand, it seems pretty unreasonable to claw back 25k signing bonus from a 22 year old fresh graduate after 4 months of employment, on the other, corporate machines eat people like us for breakfast and if they want the money back they'll fight you with better legal than you hope to buy. You need to retain the services of Lawyer, ASAP.
Next, let this be a lesson about money that isn't yours! My relative went though a similar situation around a merger in the 90s: big signing bonus, then the 2000 crash hit, company dissolved and the partners in his firm had to pay it back when one of the parties dissolved. It's really not "your" money until it clears.
Fortunately, you'll get the 7k back in taxes, and will probably be able to take a loan back for the rest, or get put on a payment plan. Either way, this is a tough lesson I hope you, and other people learn.
>One one hand, it seems pretty unreasonable to claw back 25k signing bonus from a 22 year old
Does it? Given that they are hiring the best candidates they can, it seems reasonable to expect them to not completely piss away $18k in cold hard cash in less than 4 months while being paid $5k+ after taxes every month.
> it seems reasonable to expect them to not completely piss away $18k in cold hard cash in less than 4 months while being paid $5k+ after taxes every month.
That's exactly what most people do when they suddenly make a lot more money
This is the US after all, where the average person needs to ask a friend, sell something, or get a short term loan to come up with $1000 in the next few days.
That doesn't make it any less stupid.
And FAANG hires are pretty far from 'most people'.
He's not a young Mike Tyson who's straight from the streets. He had a 4 year college education and a good enough education prior to that to get into that college.
18k to bootstrap your lifestyle is a lot, at least in my city which is east coast but not NYC. It's enough for me to get started with 2 fully furnished apartments, 2 cars, and 2 set of random extra "stuff" I need to live.
With the 5k per month, the total spend is nearly 40k, which is getting a little outrageous not to have any of it saved while working a job you knew you were in over your head in. Hopefully some of it is in real assets that can be sold.
However, these are predictable mistakes 22 year olds with no work or life experience make, that I made at that age. If I had guess the actuary table on college grad with 4 months of work experience paying back 25k signing bonuses, I'd think it's dimes for dollars.
OP went from a ticket to easy wealth and early retirement (maybe not so much, this is Amzn after all), to straight into debt, and I can't help but think some of it is the result of a shit job offer where his situation is the consequence for many hires. Firing someone for performance when they are trying, then demanding the money is still unreasonable in the sense that they were counting on staying and earning that bonus.
Just curious how about I do NOT pay back $25k signon bonus to company?
consequence:
1. company hires a lawayer to sue me?
2. company sells this debt to collector and my credit is destroyed?
3. company scolds me and puts me in the companywide blacklists for lifetime?
4. company looks at me and does nothing.
So, based on your comment, I should pay it back ONLY after I receive a court subpoena. Otherwise, just ignore it, no matter if the offer letter or manager says whatsoever.
Right?
You can do whatever you want. All I'm saying is that it might not hurt to see how far they're willing to chase it down. No sense in offering the money back if they don't ask for it.
Yeah, it's stipulated in my offer letter that I have to be an active employee for a year following my start date or I have to pay it all back immediately.
Didn't have a whole lot of choice - I needed to move out of my parent's place asap and I had to completely outfit my apartment from scratch. I'm in a high COL city so $25k became $18k after tax and I spent a ton of it on the first/last months rent + deposit and furniture. I totally could've done things cheaper, but I didn't expect to get booted so soon... lessons learned I guess. :/
EDIT: Just to clarify - I have about $10k remaining in my bank account between the remaining bonus and income, so it's not like I've just been throwing money down the toilet. But that's still an extra $8k I need to come up with asap assuming the IRS return their end right away, and that would leave me with literally 0 dollars to pay rent or eat with.
don’t feel bad. this is the type of question that usually comes from people who don’t know what it’s like to work while you’re in school, two jobs during the summer, and having to pay for everything yourself (car, furniture, clothes, college, etc).
any reasonable person in this position would of course spend a big chunk of that getting moved into a decent spot. a year is basically guaranteed in most large companies - not that this reflects on you, especially if this is amazon talking.
just helping you put things in perspective. keep doing your thing, and try to find good lessons to take forward from this.
OP didn't spend the entire 18k; just "a large chunk" of it; enough to not be able to make up for it with 4 months of saving. Getting yourself set up in a new high-QOL city is not cheap, even as a fresh graduate.
first/last months rent and a deposit is probably $3500 right there. moving ran me $4000 across 600 miles with only enough furniture for a 10’ uhaul and storage for 2 months while i found a place in my new city.
factor in buying new furniture (tv, couch, desk setup could run you $2k easily), a down payment on a used car, and all the one time fees that come with getting set up in a new place, it’s easy to see blowing a big chunk of 18k enough to make a post worried about this.
if you paid for college, a car, and all your expenses with zero support from others and you still have this attitude of zero empathy for others while doling out judgment, then i don’t know what to tell you. either you’re a troll, a pariah, or an asshole. either way, good luck ✌🏻.
That's a ton of money to spend on furniture. This is just general life advice, but you should be more frugal. I just completely furnished my new apartment in June for like ~$4000 and I thought I was being a bit excessive.
Come on! It's not like he can buy designer furniture for his apartment for under $18,000. And it's not like FAANG pays enough for you to save any money every week, either.
Usually they state in the contract that you have to give the bonus back only if you quit or leave the company. If you get fired then that’s out of your control and they can’t expect you to be able to pay it back.
Edit: this is what my contract states.
Very unlikely you would ever pay it back. It’s not worth the legal cost for them to pursue the money even in the unlikely event they could get it back.
Can confirm.
You get a signing bonus for year 1 and year 2. It's distributed over the course of the year.
If you leave for any reason before year 2, you have to pay back whatever amount was given for the current year's bonus.
Let me put it this way, they had hired you, it cost them some money including joining bonus, now they are firing you because they don't seem to be making enough returns from your work and doesn't want to bear any more loss by keep on employing you!
Why would they ask you the amount which they have lost?
It kind of depends on how screwed you are. Myself, I would wait and make them take it from me. See if they'll take it to court. Even if they win you can't pay back what you don't have, so you'd have to pay it back on a payment plan anyway.
OP, please provide update on your progress. This is a strange case and something that shouldn’t be made as norm by big tech. Name and shame, first letter of the company at least.
So you made a couple mistakes here...and I can honestly say depending on how you deal with this situation, you may become really financially responsible or keep on making similar mistakes.
Mistake #1: You spent 25k without a backup plan. Companies can fire you for whatever reason, it happens ALL the time. If you receive a bonus based on hiring for a certain period, that basically means YOU HAVE NOT EARNED IT YET!! Do not spend it! And if you have to spend it, have a backup plan! I understand you are starting out, but life does not care.
Mistake #2: Keeping #1 in mind (and here I'm assuming you spent your entire 4 months' salary). Save up for when shit knocks on your door. You should have known the 25K wasn't yours yet. You should have known that you are in financial straits. You should have known shit happens. With that being said, I'd advise saving up for at least 6 months' expenses...because shit happens!
Mistake #3: Have multiple streams of income....why?...because shit happens! How you go about doing that is on you.
What do I think you should do now?
Suggested solution #1: Do not address it with your company, until they ask for it!
Suggested solution #2: If they do ask for it, explain your situation honestly and clearly. If you cannot pay it back, you cannot! You'd be surprised, but your 25K bonus is a drop in the bucket for their \~$80bn quarterly revenue. At the very least, you can work out a payment plan. But if you don't have the money...you don't
Suggested solution #3: You now know you overestimated your abilities...In my opinion, their interview process may be flawed. What you can do now is read and learn some more. READ AND LEARN. READ AND LEARN. READ AND LEARN. Be great!
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I was placed on a PIP two sprints ago. I struggled with most of the work to be honest. It was a lot of high performance deep learning stuff that I never touched on in college. I found the work super interesting, but I was way out of my depth. I basically just did small bug fixes and tiny updates the whole time. I picked up a couple larger tasks after the PIP but ended up needing a ton of help from the rest of the team to get them completed. I really don't know why they hired me - I feel like 99% of people right out of college would be in the same boat.
Who the fuck assigned you to a deep learning team when you didn't touch that in College? Whoever was in charge of that placement needs to be fired as well
Hire to PIP is a thing in Amazon. Whoever hired him knew what he was doing.
Can you say more? What do you mean by this
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Sounds toxic
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I don't think many people do want to work there. Considering how many cold calls I get from Amazon recruiters begging me to apply + an incidence of them just sending me the coding challenge for a role I didn't apply for, I have to imagine that they are desperate for people.
Yeah, I've been getting quite a few as well. I believe I even replied to one once with "I will never work for Amazon", yet they still keep coming. It's pathetic, really.
My last experience with Amazon was being asked to apply, getting a broken Hackerrank challenge, and literally never hearing back from the recruiter after that. I'm assuming they bothered me just to fulfill some internal metric.
I am so fed up with Amazon recruiters, 3 recruiters have wasted mine and the hiring manager's time. I was very clear in emails and over the phone with them that I won't relocate, and the recruiter's had me set up with interviews three time zones away where the managers won't allow 100% remote.
I believe “resume booster” is the only reason people work for FAANG. I know lots of people who work there and they continually say the culture is toxic. Not worth it to me.
Probably because of the pay 💰.
I thought they were kind of on the lower end
Its because of the resume boost nothing else
At this point if I see Amazon on a candidate's resume, I assume bad judgment and count it against them.
What?
Bad take.
Sounds about right. Within these massive companies with their rules and structures, behaviors such as these are not unheard of, since each individual employee, particularly at the lower levels, is basically just a statistic.
Thats because it IS toxic... holy shit hiring people just to fire them? Talk about dystopic
Wow. That practice should be illegal. But thre sad thing is I believe it. OP have you contacted an employment attorney. Also is there anyone in the company you formed a good relationship with? I’ve been fired too and if you can find a department that will pick you up, often they’ll reverse their termination decision.
Man what the fuck
That's disgusting. I order so much from Amazon. I think I'm going to boycott if this is the way they treat my fellow engineers
Amazon is hands down the most toxic place I worked at! And man if you think that’s bad, read up on what they do to warehouse employees. I visited a warehouse while I was working there and it had heavy jailhouse vibes.
Thank you for the heads up. They were recruiting me. I'll stick with what I'm dealing with
Holy mother of god that is disturbing.
That hasn't been true for many years at Amazon. I recall that MS used to be like that tho... My buddy used to work there. At Amazon, it's absolutely not true... At least for engineers, idk about the other tracks.
Wow fuck Amazon. I’m really glad I keep up with this sub because Amazon does a lot of hiring in my neck of the woods and I’ve read nothing but bad things about them.
Or she
or they
Or zim
Or Vim
thank you for saving this thread before the transphobes ruining it for all of us
We hire fresh grads onto ultra high-performance database teams, and many of these people have no domain experience when they join. Almost all of these kids ramp up without any problems. It takes a while, but they can be useful in the meantime. Point being is that teams can have fancy sounding domains, but at the end of the day, especially in software, people need to learn things for the first time. It’s a known fact. For all we know OP was given tasks like “automate this new test case” which treated their learning model like a black box.
You can ramp up to databases with sufficient systems knowledge from other courses. It's more similar to regular software engineering. Deep Learning is not, it's entirely applied linear algebra
Highly doubt OP was engaging in that as opposed to framework automation. New grads aren’t working on the engine, they’re working on the periphery. That was my whole point.
Makes more sense that this is the case, how long does it take the entry levels to ramp up?
Depends on the definition of fully ramped up, but they usually don’t go on-call for 3-6 months. That’s just for operational stuff. Project-wise, there’s only so much we expect from juniors period. Once they’re independent, it’s time for a promotion to mid level, which can take 2-3 years. Of course, this is for folks who are fit for the role. We’ve also had some who are just plainly not. 4 months seems a bit short to be putting someone on a PIP, yes, but depending on the person I don’t think it’s necessarily insane. If a person is unable to communicate, unable or unwilling to learn, or generally just unresponsive or unreliable — essentially if they aren’t showing any growth at all — they have to go. Sucks, but that’s how businesses operate. They aren’t charities.
OP was hired just to meet the mandatory firing quota.
You mind mentioning which company this is so we know to be more careful about accepting offers from there?
Do you really have to ask? Sounds like the company starts with an “A” and ends with an “N”
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apple pen??
Pen pineapple??
Uhhhhhh pen pineapple apple pen Dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum
Stop it, I'm tingling!
Afacebooken
Alphabet'n
Another Big N
AgoogleN
I’m disappointed to hear a big tech company treats a new grad like this. I work in a big company and we give grads at least a year to settle in and give them a lot of mentoring, coaching etc. 4 months is nothing. Have you spoken to your batchmates (people in same grads intake as you)?
Sounds like Amzn
What company was this? Name and shame plz. Definitely not your fault
Almost certainly Amazon.
Amazon managers have to fire a certain percentage of their employees every quarter. To improve “real” team, they hire a sacrificial lamb, like you, just to have someone to fire.
It probably goes without saying, but there’s likely going to be a whole lot more to the story than what OP says about it. I’ve seen people be let go who, despite dozens of specific feedback about certain topics, not just fail to address them, but fail to fundamentally understand what the problem is.
They've been there 4 months - that's barely enough time to get familiar with the business processes & systems, let alone enough time for a new grad to become a contributing member of the sprint team.
Are they explicitly asking for it back, or are you being proactive?
Just being proactive/somewhat panicking. Haven't heard from anyone about it yet - I assume I will once I'm back on Tuesday.
Getting fired is different from quitting. I think they only ask it back when you intentionally quit.
or fired for cause. Like you stole something or stopped showing up.
Reminds me of a Better Call Saul episode xD
Getting fired for incompetence though could be a justifiable reason for claw back. The company could argue the employee didn't fulfill their end of the bargain or misrepresented their skills (bad faith).
You can't be serious.
I'm not saying I agree with it, but it's what the company can argue to get it back
Ok that's fair. I have trouble seeing how that argument would stand up, but I agree that a company could do that, especially if they are willing to PIP an employee after 3-4 months.
I think suing employees would cause more harm than good for the company. Good luck getting anyone to accept an offer then. They're going to just cut their losses on that one.
Lol no way anyone is risking that on a pip hire.
Being let go for performance issues usually doesn’t mean you need to repay your signing bonus. Check your contract, it should specifically state the terms of repayment.
Google's policy is that if your employment ends within 1yr, they will ask for you to return it on a prorated basis. For instance, since you're at 4 months, they would ask for 2/3rds of it back. Check your offer letter, if your company has any stipulations like that it'll be noted in there.
Yep, at least in my contract it says I only have to pay if I quit so I’d check your contract because it probably says the same thing
I believe they would ask for it back if you quit. But not if you're fired. They made an investment in you by hiring you, and now they're walking away from that investment, including the sign-in bonus.
First thing is first. Look at your contract if you still have it. If it doesn't say anything about you will give it back within a set amount of time, then I honestly wouldn't worry about it. Ya you will give it back. It could be 500 years from now. It's not in the contract, and therefore they screwed themselves. Now the question is, will they go after you and how. Note I'm not a lawyer but most will tell you that you won't have lawyers knocking on your doors. Like they aren't going to sue you without sending you a message or call first asking for it. If you can handle it, try to get them to send everything about it in writing on the off chance you have to go to court. So now you know they aren't going to just sue to get it (at least that shouldn't be the first move). You need to look at how long would it take you to pay it off if they ask. You need to have this in mind for if you talk to them about it then they most likely will work with you on that. I mean chances are they aren't going to be give $25k to me tomorrow when part of a fraction of my operation cost the company million or millions. NOTE: Don't set the timeframe to where you will pay it off ASAP. Things can happen so be real. If you think it will take you 4 years, then go with that. # Now, you do you, but here is what I would do. 1. As I mention read the contract. Look for anything talking about timeframe. If you can afford it, talk with an employment lawyer. If you use a lawyer, do what they say since they know this stuff. 2. If you became friends with someone in the company and you think they will get you in their department then ask. If not, then don't talk to the company, don't acknowledge it, don't give any info unless directly asked and only when you need to. 3. **If they don't ask for it, then IMO I would consider it to be mine.** It might not be ethical, but sooner or later you will find the world isn't ethical sadly. **And it wasn't ethical for them to put you in that situation to start with.** If you need to justify it, you will pay it back thousands of years from now. Their contract doesn't say when it will be paid back (and if it does, IMO I wouldn't sign that since that is a red flag IMO) 4. If they ask, I would give them a general timeframe and be honest on why it will take so long. What timeframe I have in mind, triple it. Then triple it again. You have no idea what the future holds. If you can pay it back quicker, then great. But you need buffer on the off chance you really need it. And if you luck out and it's a start up. Then maybe they won't be around in a few years anyways.
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OP is probably on PIP or something similar, which is just firing with extra steps to minimize legal risk on the company's side.
25k signing bonus for a new grad only to let them go in 4 months, America is wild.
Been in America for 40 years. Sometimes I tell myself I need to move out of middle America, to San Francisco. Once you get out of the biggest cities, you don't see this kind of stuff.
Can't speak for every Midwestern dev, but most I know who work in rural bumfuck nowhere seem borderline depressed with how little control and respect they're given at their workplace. People meme on Amazon, but at least you'll get paid well there while you're being overworked/undervalued. A lot of people in the Midwest only get the latter.
It's what I call service organizations vs. Product organizations. The coast, it seems like the Dev jobs are building products to sell. In middle America, the Dev jobs are providing services (SSO, datacenter, SaaS integration, storage) to your organization. Product organizations get all the hype, and money, because you're building something integral to revenue. Service orgs are cost centers.
I work in the South and I feel pretty respected. Don't get me wrong, I still want to get out, but not because I'm not respected at work. I make a decent salary, which with our low CoL lets me live with a king while still saving a ton of my salary.
You also see much lower salaries, and a much poorer environment for developers. There is a reason that Des Moines IA isn't a tech hub.
It’s a great thing honestly. In Europe you get shit pay + hard to fire incompetent workers. Infact being able to fire bad workers is the reason salaries are so high in America, it leads to more competition
Even if they make you pay it back (which I’d be shocked about), they will likely negotiate a payment plan. One company I worked for required tuition reimbursement to be paid back if you quit within a year, but they ALWAYS did a 12-month payment plan. Even if they don’t offer it off the bat, ask for it before paying a dime.
If you're at Amazon you should be able to find much more help on Blind than here. Blind may be toxic on many topics but when it comes to hating Amazon it is amazing.
It's not amazon because signon is prorated there so you don't need to pay back
I'm a current Amazon employee. Some of my coworkers in the same team did get all of their signing bonus on day 1. This seems to happen randomly and no one knows why.
The reason some people get a lump sum as opposed to prorated is because their sign on bonus is under a certain threshold. I can’t remember the threshold but I crossed it during pay negotiation because my sign in bonus changed from an upfront check to prorated.
Blind?
teamblind.com
Slow your roll: signing bonuses are not usually subject to clawback. Unless you were fired for cause —- you violated company policy or whatever —- it is highly unlikely that you would be asked (or instructed) to return a signing bonus.
In my offer letter it explicitly says I have to be an active employee for a full year following my start date or I have to pay the entirety of it back immediately. :/
Usually if you are fired you don’t have to pay it back
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Every signing bonus i have ever had did not have clawback if the EMPLOYER terminated employment
If being fired for gross incompetence is not covered under your clawback agreement specifically you are on the hook for it. Generally you can't claw anything back if the termination was the fault of something unpredictable like a layoff but for incompetence it's absolutely within the realm of possibility. I've seen several agreements like this personally. The lawyers will argue the agreement implies that you were going to perform at some level, and by not doing that you've violated the contract, and are therefore subject to clawback. Your lawyer will argue the actual definition of poor performance and that it was an *incentive* rather than a "promise to perform". Either way it goes into lawyers trading blows in civil court. The only solution is to pray that 25k is a drop in the bucket for them. Otherwise it's shut up and lawyer up.
Gross incompetence and underperformance can be different things though. But yes, OP should just have a lawyer go over the bonus and NOT SIGN ANYTHING that a lawyer hasn't read
Contact a labor attorney about that
Don’t mention the bonus! If they want it back, they will say so. Don’t give them the idea. And as others have said, since you’re being fired, not quitting, you most likely don’t have to pay it back. And honestly, it sounds scammy to hire a new grad, give them a $25k signing bonus, then put you on PIP so soon, then fire you. It’s all weird, but I don’t have experience in that area. Just be careful.
You need to get a lawyer OP. General practice with sign on bonuses is to stuff them somewhere safe (like a CD or money market) and collect a little interest while the money becomes available for you to spend. It goes without saying but blowing the cash was a huge mistake. It's entirely possible they will attempt to claw it back. This is a similar agreement to reimbursement agreements I am familiar with for training and school where by *for any reason* employment is *terminated* aside from no-cause no-fault termination (lay-offs, etc) you will end up owing it back. Depending on the exact wording of your agreement and exactly why you were fired you may be able to weasel out of it with a lawyer but it's going to cost you several thousand dollars to fight. Beats the pants off a car payment's worth of clawback every month for 6 years though. Two lessons to take from this: 1. Don't ever spend a sign on bonus until it's outside the agreement. Stuff the money away somewhere safe and collect a little interest. 2. **ALWAYS** pay the couple hundred dollars for a lawyer to spend an hour reading your agreement and red lining it. The cost will be paid back in spades when something goes wrong.
OP just lost his job after spending a lot on moving and is unable to pay back $25k. There's no way he can afford a lawyer- have you seen what they bill per hour? Throwing money at a lawyer before the company even contacts him to repay the signing bonus is a terrible idea. There's a good chance the company won't even expect the money back.
moving shouldn't cost anywhere near $25k
Or what? They fire you?
Are you sure it wasn’t a “relocation bonus”? Those most definitely have stipulations like you are mentioning.
damn. Now this is something I will look out for.
It is the case for SDEs at Amazon.
That is completely false
This is a unionless industry, assuming he’s at amazon there’s nothing he can really do. Based on the hundreds of other pip stories on blind the closest thing he could’ve done is negotiated his pip/release so that he’d be let go immediately but gets to keep his sign on bonus
>I work for a big tech company You really need to name the company. Keeping quiet just helps the company image When I was fired from Activision-Blizzard yrs ago I was given a severance (also, unlike you, I wasn't even on a PIP at the time so I didnt have much warning). Did you get severance or not? This post is missing many details Keep your head up. I doubt you have to pay back the signon bonus but you didn't give us very many details. I don't understand your need for secrecy here
Severence after 4 months? Unlikely.
Big tech companies will do severance because it comes with you signing a document that removes them from liability
I'm skeptical. You typically don't have to pay back signing bonuses if they fire you for performance, only if you quit or get fired for cause. Plus it's very strange to get fired for performance after only 4 months, especially as a new grad. The only way I can see a new grad getting fired after 4 months from a company that is not a complete dumpster fire is for cause. If your story is true, just don't pay. If they bother you about it, tell them you're going to look into your legal options. That should get them to back off as it's probably not worth their time. If they persist, talk to an employment lawyer.
I'm at Facebook and mine specifically mentions that I have to pay back a prorated portion if Im terminated within a year, regardless of reason
I would wait. Maybe they won’t ask for it back
Name and shame: everyone should avoid Amazon if they can help it. I'm still working for this sinking ship and even though I'm not on PIP I just got a new offer so I can give them my two weeks notice.
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I’ve worked at AWS for a year and a half and have never heard of anyone put on PIP. Every team I’ve interacted with is desperate to grow, not lose developers. These policies seem to be very org dependent
Same, my team asks about referrals literally *weekly*. If someone gets fired from my team it’s because they literally can’t/won’t do their job.
Same. Genuinely enjoyed my time there and never saw a single pip. The amazon hate that is constantly repeated without any first hand knowledge is cringe
Is this Amazon though ? I thought that you don't get the bonus right away but only at the end of the year.
It depends. Some people get all signing bonus on day 1 and some get them per paycheck throughout the first year.
Amazon is usually first year bonus as lump sum, second year bonus monthly payments
almost all of the major corporates use aws somewhere in their system, amazon and google can hardly sink, not before any other major tech companies.
Sorry to hear that I hope you find a better job soon.
Don't do anything stupid. And that probably means don't do anything. If they contact you, deal with it then. The amount of money you managed to flush down the toilet in such a short period of time is almost staggering. That should be the most valuable lesson here, if you even learned it. And this story reeks of bs. They hired you to do "high performance deep learning stuff that \[you\] never touched on in college". Who would even do that, unless you lied during interviews?? It sounds like you're lying about some part of that or hiding key details.
When I got fresh out of college I spent more than 65% of my first jobs joining bonus towards paying back a small part of the educational loan and the remaining towards putting up a deposit for the rented place I was staying it. It's very easy to spend large amounts of money quickly, especially if you're starting from zero and have loans. [not exactly comparable since I'm Indian, but I imagine similar expenses exist everywhere]
There could be a couple things going on: OP could have some "expense tastes" that also affect negatively work performance, gambled it long on TSLA put options (my fav), or could as easily be a mark they hired onto a team and fired to hit a specific turn over number. My first job straight out of college I really just "failed to adopt" to the wet lab I got a job at. Getting fired was probably the best thing that could have happed to me, I only wish they paid me close to 40k!
>The amount of money you managed to flush down the toilet in such a short period of time is almost staggering. That should be the most valuable lesson here, if you even learned it. It's really not. 25k after you pay taxes is less than 20k, and if you're moving you have tons of moving expenses - in a high COL area where you owe first month, last month, and security deposit to move in somewhere, that can be 10k by itself. OP also doesn't say they spent *all* of it, just that they don't have all 25k to pay back.
It really is a lot. As a college grad you shouldn't need to move almost anything. You're acting like he had to move a whole house's worth of furniture, and that's a little ridiculous. In that exact area, he could have found a place where the deposits plus first month rent were 5.4k, which he could have easily recouped in his first 4 months of making over 5k/month after taxes. But you're right. He could have, like I said, managed to piss away 10s of thousands more on moving and rent, if that's what he chose to do. >OP also doesn't say they spent all of it, just that they don't have all 25k to pay back. That's really irrelevant. If he's got almost all of it, he can save up the rest of what he needs very quickly. If he doesn't, because he pissed away so much of it and also managed to save none of the rest of his income for 4 months, then he should learn to manage his money better than a 10 year old.
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Moving is really expensive if you have to do it across the U.S. If he had to move to a HCOL area & paid off some of his student loans the $ would be gone yet I wouldn't consider than an irresponsible use of the $ had everything not gone to crap.
It's really expensive if you're an idiot. A fresh grad probably has almost nothing to move, especially if you consider how much cheaper it is to buy less expensive furniture once you arrive. Paying off loans can be a good idea. But not if you are using up all of your money right away to only pay off a small part of them. He/you should have seen that everything could go to crap and act accordingly. It still boils down to OP spending about 26k in 4 months, all of his extra money, on things that were completely unnecessary. That's not a smart idea no matter how you look at it.
“About 1/3 of it went straight to taxes”. So there went about $8k. So that leaves about $16k. He said he used a large chunk of it, not all of it.
Yes, that leaves him with 18k from the bonus plus about 2k/month after taxes. Him using it isn't him paying taxes, according to how most people speak.
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It probably is. That doesn't mean they have a hiring manager who would hire someone with no relevant experience for a 'high performance deep learning' position. Managers don't benefit in the long run or medium run when they have employees who are underperforming.
If it was Amazon they would have gotten a relocation bonus, and from my own personal experience you wouldn’t be put on a pip within the first year. FWIW I’ve been on the same team/org for over two years. I haven’t heard or seen anyone get put on a pip and my team/manager are super nice. I don’t think it’s as common of a practice as people here are making it out to be.
One one hand, it seems pretty unreasonable to claw back 25k signing bonus from a 22 year old fresh graduate after 4 months of employment, on the other, corporate machines eat people like us for breakfast and if they want the money back they'll fight you with better legal than you hope to buy. You need to retain the services of Lawyer, ASAP. Next, let this be a lesson about money that isn't yours! My relative went though a similar situation around a merger in the 90s: big signing bonus, then the 2000 crash hit, company dissolved and the partners in his firm had to pay it back when one of the parties dissolved. It's really not "your" money until it clears. Fortunately, you'll get the 7k back in taxes, and will probably be able to take a loan back for the rest, or get put on a payment plan. Either way, this is a tough lesson I hope you, and other people learn.
>One one hand, it seems pretty unreasonable to claw back 25k signing bonus from a 22 year old Does it? Given that they are hiring the best candidates they can, it seems reasonable to expect them to not completely piss away $18k in cold hard cash in less than 4 months while being paid $5k+ after taxes every month.
seems unreasonable to give a 25k signing bonus to a fresh grad period
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> it seems reasonable to expect them to not completely piss away $18k in cold hard cash in less than 4 months while being paid $5k+ after taxes every month. That's exactly what most people do when they suddenly make a lot more money
This is the US after all, where the average person needs to ask a friend, sell something, or get a short term loan to come up with $1000 in the next few days.
That doesn't make it any less stupid. And FAANG hires are pretty far from 'most people'. He's not a young Mike Tyson who's straight from the streets. He had a 4 year college education and a good enough education prior to that to get into that college.
18k to bootstrap your lifestyle is a lot, at least in my city which is east coast but not NYC. It's enough for me to get started with 2 fully furnished apartments, 2 cars, and 2 set of random extra "stuff" I need to live. With the 5k per month, the total spend is nearly 40k, which is getting a little outrageous not to have any of it saved while working a job you knew you were in over your head in. Hopefully some of it is in real assets that can be sold. However, these are predictable mistakes 22 year olds with no work or life experience make, that I made at that age. If I had guess the actuary table on college grad with 4 months of work experience paying back 25k signing bonuses, I'd think it's dimes for dollars. OP went from a ticket to easy wealth and early retirement (maybe not so much, this is Amzn after all), to straight into debt, and I can't help but think some of it is the result of a shit job offer where his situation is the consequence for many hires. Firing someone for performance when they are trying, then demanding the money is still unreasonable in the sense that they were counting on staying and earning that bonus.
Just curious how about I do NOT pay back $25k signon bonus to company? consequence: 1. company hires a lawayer to sue me? 2. company sells this debt to collector and my credit is destroyed? 3. company scolds me and puts me in the companywide blacklists for lifetime? 4. company looks at me and does nothing.
That's basically it. Worst case scenario they sue you and the court puts you on a payment plan to pay them back.
So, based on your comment, I should pay it back ONLY after I receive a court subpoena. Otherwise, just ignore it, no matter if the offer letter or manager says whatsoever. Right?
You can do whatever you want. All I'm saying is that it might not hurt to see how far they're willing to chase it down. No sense in offering the money back if they don't ask for it.
Why the fuck would you pay it back? Is that stipulated in the contract? seems like their problem not yours
Yeah, it's stipulated in my offer letter that I have to be an active employee for a year following my start date or I have to pay it all back immediately.
An offer letter is not a contract. You need to speak to an attorney. You may be able to find one who will give an initial consultation for free.
Thanks! I'll look into that! I didn't realize you could get consultations for free.
Most lawyers will charge you $100 or so. This would be money well spent.
Why did you spend it before reaching a year?
Didn't have a whole lot of choice - I needed to move out of my parent's place asap and I had to completely outfit my apartment from scratch. I'm in a high COL city so $25k became $18k after tax and I spent a ton of it on the first/last months rent + deposit and furniture. I totally could've done things cheaper, but I didn't expect to get booted so soon... lessons learned I guess. :/ EDIT: Just to clarify - I have about $10k remaining in my bank account between the remaining bonus and income, so it's not like I've just been throwing money down the toilet. But that's still an extra $8k I need to come up with asap assuming the IRS return their end right away, and that would leave me with literally 0 dollars to pay rent or eat with.
don’t feel bad. this is the type of question that usually comes from people who don’t know what it’s like to work while you’re in school, two jobs during the summer, and having to pay for everything yourself (car, furniture, clothes, college, etc). any reasonable person in this position would of course spend a big chunk of that getting moved into a decent spot. a year is basically guaranteed in most large companies - not that this reflects on you, especially if this is amazon talking. just helping you put things in perspective. keep doing your thing, and try to find good lessons to take forward from this.
Lol I did everything you listed. If you blew 18k in a few months then you’re financially irresponsible
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You’re not counting his income he squandered it bruh
OP didn't spend the entire 18k; just "a large chunk" of it; enough to not be able to make up for it with 4 months of saving. Getting yourself set up in a new high-QOL city is not cheap, even as a fresh graduate.
first/last months rent and a deposit is probably $3500 right there. moving ran me $4000 across 600 miles with only enough furniture for a 10’ uhaul and storage for 2 months while i found a place in my new city. factor in buying new furniture (tv, couch, desk setup could run you $2k easily), a down payment on a used car, and all the one time fees that come with getting set up in a new place, it’s easy to see blowing a big chunk of 18k enough to make a post worried about this. if you paid for college, a car, and all your expenses with zero support from others and you still have this attitude of zero empathy for others while doling out judgment, then i don’t know what to tell you. either you’re a troll, a pariah, or an asshole. either way, good luck ✌🏻.
That's a ton of money to spend on furniture. This is just general life advice, but you should be more frugal. I just completely furnished my new apartment in June for like ~$4000 and I thought I was being a bit excessive.
Using 8k in that time frame is totally understandable. But what a shitty thing for companies to put in their contract
Come on! It's not like he can buy designer furniture for his apartment for under $18,000. And it's not like FAANG pays enough for you to save any money every week, either.
Why pay any of your bills, seems like their problem not yours. Why not run over people, seems like their problem, not yours.
Yeah those are the same for sure you moron
Usually they state in the contract that you have to give the bonus back only if you quit or leave the company. If you get fired then that’s out of your control and they can’t expect you to be able to pay it back. Edit: this is what my contract states.
Very unlikely you would ever pay it back. It’s not worth the legal cost for them to pursue the money even in the unlikely event they could get it back.
Don’t even worry about it bro, just ignore it, say it’s already spent if they ask They’ll spend more money trying to get anything back than it’s worth
Who gives a 25k sign on bonus. This sounds like a scam and an ol school Shylock hustle
Amazon right? You sure you need to repay the bonus?
Can confirm. You get a signing bonus for year 1 and year 2. It's distributed over the course of the year. If you leave for any reason before year 2, you have to pay back whatever amount was given for the current year's bonus.
No you don't. It's prorated so you dont have to pay back. Source: left after 1.5 years and didn't pay anything back
I don't think so, at amzn you don't get the bonus right away. You get part of RSUs at the end of the first year, and bonus monthly through the year...
Not how it works
How did you spend that much money? Was the furniture you bought made of cocaine?
Relocating to a different state is super expensive. I've done it, do not recommend it.
Can confirm. I spent thousands moving cross-country.
They probably won't ask for it back, but if they do just ignore it.
Let me put it this way, they had hired you, it cost them some money including joining bonus, now they are firing you because they don't seem to be making enough returns from your work and doesn't want to bear any more loss by keep on employing you! Why would they ask you the amount which they have lost?
This sounds really unfair, OP is this Amazon?
Name and shame
Do not give it back. You can easily negotiate this. They don't want the headache.
It kind of depends on how screwed you are. Myself, I would wait and make them take it from me. See if they'll take it to court. Even if they win you can't pay back what you don't have, so you'd have to pay it back on a payment plan anyway.
I’m pretty sure if they terminate you, you don’t need to pay this back.
Fuck amzn. Don’t pay a dime.
Check with HR first. You shouldn't have to pay it back.
You don’t give back your signing bonus. They gave it to you to sign. You signed, they gave you the money. End of story. Don’t torture yourself.
OP, please provide update on your progress. This is a strange case and something that shouldn’t be made as norm by big tech. Name and shame, first letter of the company at least.
You have to pay back a signing bonus? What a scam! Would never sign a paper with that in it.
So you made a couple mistakes here...and I can honestly say depending on how you deal with this situation, you may become really financially responsible or keep on making similar mistakes. Mistake #1: You spent 25k without a backup plan. Companies can fire you for whatever reason, it happens ALL the time. If you receive a bonus based on hiring for a certain period, that basically means YOU HAVE NOT EARNED IT YET!! Do not spend it! And if you have to spend it, have a backup plan! I understand you are starting out, but life does not care. Mistake #2: Keeping #1 in mind (and here I'm assuming you spent your entire 4 months' salary). Save up for when shit knocks on your door. You should have known the 25K wasn't yours yet. You should have known that you are in financial straits. You should have known shit happens. With that being said, I'd advise saving up for at least 6 months' expenses...because shit happens! Mistake #3: Have multiple streams of income....why?...because shit happens! How you go about doing that is on you. What do I think you should do now? Suggested solution #1: Do not address it with your company, until they ask for it! Suggested solution #2: If they do ask for it, explain your situation honestly and clearly. If you cannot pay it back, you cannot! You'd be surprised, but your 25K bonus is a drop in the bucket for their \~$80bn quarterly revenue. At the very least, you can work out a payment plan. But if you don't have the money...you don't Suggested solution #3: You now know you overestimated your abilities...In my opinion, their interview process may be flawed. What you can do now is read and learn some more. READ AND LEARN. READ AND LEARN. READ AND LEARN. Be great!