A Not so Fond Farewell

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By day I am a graphic designer, but I am a contract employee so I get no benefits from my day job. So, in order to get health insurance, I got a part time job at Starbucks. You only have to work 20 hours a week in order to be eligible for insurance which is 240 hours worked per quarter.

After working there for 5 months, I was finally working enough hours to be eligible for insurance. I had insurance for exactly 3 months when I got a letter in the mail claiming that I did not make this quarters quota for hours and was losing my insurance. I was shocked, so I went back and looked at all of my old pay stubs. What happened was that the pay period ended on the 1st of April, so the 30+ hours I worked that pay period, even though I worked it in the first quarter, went towards the second quarters hours. A review of the hand book stated that the quarter goes from the 1st of the month through the last Friday of that quarter. It said nothing about the last full pay period.

If this was the case I should have had at least half of those hours count toward this quarter which would have put me past 240 hours for the quarter. They said they couldn't do anything for me and that I would be eligible for insurance in 3 more months if I hit the 240 hour level again.

I kindly told them that I wouldn't be around to see next quarter and turned in my notice.

I worked last night and found these flip card things that are displayed up front for the customers to see. It displays our picture and our recommended drink.

Being in a devious mood, I wrote:

Quote:

Hello, My name is JP.

I would have recommended a Grande skim with whip mocha, but these cheap bastards took away my health insurance so instead I recommend going to Alterra (Alterra is a local competitor).

I went home for lunch today and found a message from my boss saying that she has filled the rest of my hours and that my services were no longer needed... I guess she was mad.

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That' sucks JP.

I am going to drink a Dunkin' Donuts latte for you.

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As long as it's not a Starbucks latte... drink up.

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good work and piss on that bitch.

Tell her to sample your Grande.

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I'm not satsfied with just her... I have now made it my personal mission to stop everybody I know from drinking Starbucks

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I have a question though (despite not drinking Starbucks at all - I don't like it): Is this 240 hours per quarter policy a corporate
policiy or is this individually handled by the franchises?

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corporate... starbucks does not franchise.

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I'm sorry to appear stupid, but all this stuff is a bit alien to me.
Just WHAT happens to you over there, if you have no Medical Insurance?

It sounds a bit frightening.....for instance, if you broke a leg, surely there would be somewhere available to you for treatment, without massive expense being incurred?
Or would they just simply present you with a bill, and expect you to pay within a certain time span?

Over here, I have had several ops over the past three or four years, and it just happens. No bills, no Med Insurance, nothing.

You can take out optional Private Insurance and for the most part, get treatment a bit quicker in a fancier hospital. But the National Health hospitals are pretty good (I certainly have no complaints), the Nurses are efficient and just as good looking and you get treatment from exactly the same Doctors and Surgeons that work for the Private Hospitals in their spare time.

How does your system work?

PS.....I hate Starbucks....overpriced, over caffeinated and over here.

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They treat you (by law they have to), but then they stick you with the bill. Then they hound you until they get the money. This hounding can include lawsuits and then confiscating tax returns, bank accounts and attaching your salary.

It is even worse now as Bush and his Congressional Republican majority just screwed up Bankruptcy protection.

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Not only that, but due to the fact that the big insurance companies dictate what the doctor gets paid for his/her services, medical costs have SKYROCKETED... leaving those without insurance to get stuck with an artificially inflated bill that eventually leads into the situation ebrown_p stated above.

During the three months that I did have insurance my wife had a case of kidney stones. A trip to the hospital, in which they pumped her full of drugs that made her feel even worse ,took x-rays and told us she had kidney stone... we already knew that, even with insurance ended up costing around $1200. The best thing to do is just not get sick or get into any accidents.

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Can't you get a COBRA Insurance with the last carrier from
Starbucks? It is usually offered to past employees, and probably doesn't cost too much either.

Or check into insurance for hospitals only. Blue Cross offers
a plan like that for around 100 Dollar/month.

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Yeah... I can get cobra but the cost is around $500 a month. We are going to look into just getting major medical or a medical savings plan.

Apart from the kidney stone she is a healthy person and I never get sick so major medical seems like the way to go.

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jp - Way to go! That had to have felt good, despite the results.

A few years ago I worked a couple of months at a retail dress place (just through the holidays and winter so I'd have something to do.) I was hired as full time, but was not allowed to be scheduled for more than 30 hours per week so that I wouldn't qualify for insurance.

Everyone was treated this way, not just me. Management was salaried so hours didn't matter.

Many companies are doing this now to avoid insuring employees.

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squinney,
that's so unfortunate, but small companies sometimes
have no other choice than not offer health insurance as the
rates are so exorbitant high, they simply cannot afford it.

Starbucks of course is a corporate giant and shame on them,
I'm sure to tell other people to boycott them from now on.

Health insurances desperately need to be regulated, as neither the payee nor the care provider get their moneys worth.
The only ones benefiting are the health insurances themselves.

jp, check out Blue Cross for hospital coverage only, and
set up a medical savings plan which you also can deduct
from your taxes.

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jpinMilwaukee
As I am sure you know you have joined the 45 million other Americans without medical insurance. It is time for the American public to rise up and demand universal medical coverage. It is a shame that this rich and powerful country is the only major industrial nation that does not have medical coverage.

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Amen!

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squinney wrote:

...but was not allowed to be scheduled for more than 30 hours per week so that I wouldn't qualify for insurance.

I would look over the schedules and most of the employees had 15-19 hours a week... I don't think that it was a coincedence that they were all below the magic 20.

CalamityJane wrote:

Starbucks of course is a corporate giant and shame on them,
I'm sure to tell other people to boycott them from now on.

That is the plan.

When I first started I thought that the comany was really pretty great. They pay a fair price for all of their beans and build school and hospitals for their farmers. They care about the environment/employees and all that good stuff.

After a short time I quickly saw how transparent their words were. They produce more usless landfill waste... even above and beyond the space the cups take up. They had a release of a drinking chocolate called "Chantico." Besides being 360 calories for a 6 oz cup (a large cup is around 1200 calories), they produced thousands of tons of junk to promote it. there were these cards that you could open up (kind of like an advent calander) that had a phrase in it about the drink. I watched person after person pick one up, read it, throw it in the garbage.

Instead of wage increases we got "Mug Awards" which is a fancy name for a pin. One employee was 4 months past his review before he finally called the district manager in order to get it.

I am in the midst of writing a letter to the corporation. The jist of it will be that I am now going to do everything in my power to stop people from going to Starbucks. Will the company still survive? ... probably, but I am a very determined person.

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I have never thought much of them anyway, Boss, but you've got my vote. I'll never go near one.

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Setanta wrote:

I have never thought much of them anyway, Boss, but you've got my vote. I'll never go near one.

One person at a time Set... thanks for the support.

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Calamity - The Dress place of which I speak is a large national chain. (Think Dress + farm building) I fully understand small companies (been self employed for 14 years now) not being able to afford paid health insurance, but even as a small company of 3-4 people including myself and Bear, we got a company policy and offered insurance to those who wanted to pay for it. At least they got access to a group policy, rather than individual.

Then again, after Cav's experience in Canada, I'm also hesitant to back a national health program. I still think there has to be some incentive for the best and brightest to enter the field of medicine. If it goes the way of teacher salaries I'm not sure we would get the best care providers.

Kinda torn on that part of it. What I don't understand however, is the record profits being made by insurance companies. Outta be some regulation of that, I think.

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A Not so Fond Farewell

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