An unidentified Texas company is accused of telling its employees that it will dock their paychecks since they’ll be getting coronavirus stimulus checks, Austin’s KXAN-TV reports.
According to an unnamed employee of the as-yet-unidentified company who spoke to local news station KXAN, the company sent a form to workers titled “Employee Acknowledgement of ‘Government Assistance’ Pay Reduction.” The employee said, “The form says they are preemptively deducting funds from our paychecks. That number is based on what they’re anticipating the government relief fund to be.”
“[Employees will be put under a] temporary compensation reduction that is in line with the assistance that it receives from the federal government related to the COVID-19 pandemic,” the email reads.
Specifically, up to 100 percent of employees’ paychecks on April 6 and April 20 will be withheld, based on the amount they’re receiving via stimulus checks. The company would also purportedly dock even more money — $500 per dependent for custodial parents of minor children, as that’s the amount the stimulus package includes for families of kids.
The employee accuses her employer of trying to save money on the backs of its workers who are feeling the economic pinch, rather than cutting costs in areas where the pain isn’t likely to be felt as strongly.
“The company that I work for is a national company and they make hundreds of millions of dollars in profit a year and instead of making sacrifices at the higher levels, they’re passing it on down to everybody else,” they said.