Interac Increasing Hours w/o Compensation

15 comments

1. what did they change it to?

2. There has never been much or any blowback for Interac pulling shit like this. I was in Interac North for 3 years and got dealt the “We are increasing your hours to 29.75 hours and we need you to sign a new contract.” We got no increase in salary and a lot of us actually took on another school at the time.

   There is nothing to discuss. They will abuse you until you stop putting up with it then they will find someone else. There is a backlog of 3 years worth of people just waiting to take your spot. I tried to support the teachers by helping run a support Facebook group, did the whole union thing and overall I would say just find something better and move on. Interac has been abusing foreign teachers since its inception and will continue to do so until it is illegal to do so. Which will probably not happen any time soon.

3. Hours used to be kept low to avoid paying Shakai Hoken.

   Due to changes in the law with effect from October 2022, they will no longer be able to avoid doing so. As such, there is no longer any reason for them to keep you at under 30h a week.

   The upside (?) of this would be, if your contract for this school year is 30h a week (or more), you must be enrolled in Shakai Hoken at the start of your contract, and not have to wait until October 2022.

4. Considering that Interac has a backlog of people who will literally go “I’m getting paid peanuts, but it’s cool because I get to go to JAPAN!”, I don’t see why there’s any incentive for compensation to be increased. Yes, those of us who know it’s a horrible rip-off are appalled, but again… lots of of folks who’ve been waiting years and go all starry-eyed when they hear “You’re coming to Japan!” are available for Interac to take advantage of.

5. I just learned about my actual working hours a few hours ago. They did it in a way so you can see everyone’s hours and I feel bad. Some people have what seems to me like a brutal schedule. Luckily my weekly hours only increased by 20 mins total, so I wasn’t deeply affected.

6. No one in Japan gives a shit. No one knows their rights as workers, or the labor laws. And sorry, but people who accept jobs with companies like Interac and 1000 other shitty, law bending companies, are the problem. Unfortunately the line of people begging to work at jobs like this is endless.

   If you care, join a Union and fight. Most of people who complain don’t actually care enough to do anything.

   And, ffs, start looking for a better job

7. You work for a shitty dispatch company. Why are you surprised when anything like this happens?

8. Have you joined the Interac union, and joined the recent protests against Interac? They did one in Tokyo last weekend.

   The only real power an employee has is to make the union strong and take legal action as a group, or to just quit. That’s it.

   And I’ll be honest: I find it hard to be supportive of Interac teachers when they decide to work at a company despite getting some very obvious red flags waved in their face. You wanted so badly to come to Japan that you ignored all the people telling you Interac is a black company, well, here you are. What are you going to do now?

9. I’m in Yokohama and my hours are the same as before. But I wonder if it will change in October when the social insurance starts.

10. The golden days are long gone. It’s been a slow slide into the abyss of lower wages and longer hours for a while now, and it’s only going to get worse. Simple supply and demand, in terms of both labour and business.

11. The more of us that unionise and fight for better working conditions, the better off we will all be and the harder it is for employers to pull off this kind of thing.
    Employers will squeeze and squeeze unless we organise and demand better.

12. They won’t be making you work 40 hours a week, but when mandatory off hours jobs/meetings come up, they can compensate you at 1/40 the weekly salary per hour, rather than 1/29.5. Hey, those folks in Ginza have to pay for stuff somehow.

13. This is the Sapporo ALT Union, mainly existing to fight Interac North: https://hokkaido-alt-union.net

14. Treat this job like a 1 to 2 year working vacation and then get out.

    You’re never going to be treated well or compensated well at a dispatch company. Go back to your home country or move on to something better ASAP.

15. meanwhile, They’ve been sending people to ask the BoEs for more money to cover the increase so they maintain their current levels of profit. You can guess how that went. Just any of the over a hundred ALTs in Tokyo. We a local chat in my area and were told to not talk about “gossip’ when this was mentioned by someone. Gossip? Mother fucker, its the truth.