Twitter’s boss Elon Musk- who has faced several problems after taking over the social media giant in October last year, is now facing another problem. Twitter employees who were fired shortly after Musk became the owner are still awaiting details of their severance packages months after being let go, a report by news agency Bloomberg on Friday (January 6) said.
On November 4 last year, Elon Musk fired over 7,000 employees and a day later he tweeted, “Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately, there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day. Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% more than legally required.”
Among the fired employees, 1,000 live in California and they were required under state and federal law to keep receiving regular packages over the past two months.
However, the two-month period ended on Wednesday (January 4). Three laid-off workers told Bloomberg that employees have still not heard any details about additional severance, or continuation of health coverage, known as COBRA.
Taking to Twitter, Sam Stryker, a laid-off employee, retweeted Musk’s November 5, 2022 tweet and said he never even saw a severance letter let alone being offered severance.
“I was laid off 2 months ago with thousands of coworkers and I’ve never even seen a severance letter let alone been offered severance,” Stryker tweeted on Thursday.
I was laid off 2 months ago with thousands of coworkers and I’ve never even seen a severance letter let alone been offered severance. https://t.co/rIvw7b9AsY
— Sam Stryker (@sbstryker) January 4, 2023
Meanwhile, Boston-based lawyer Shannon Liss-Riordan, who is representing hundreds of Twitter workers said they now had their last day at the company and have received no severance notice or pay.
Riordan has filed private arbitration cases and several federal class-action lawsuits and US labour board complaints related to the mass terminations (at Twitter), alleging a mix of retaliation, discrimination, and failure to provide required notice and pay. She told the news agency that 100 arbitration claims were filed on Thursday, on top of 100 already pending.
“We don’t know what Elon Musk is doing – we expected that those severance agreements would have been sent out by now because a lot of people had their last official day. We’re wondering what he’s planning to do but meanwhile, we’re pushing forward with our legal actions,” the Boston-based lawyer added.
Apart from the severance issue, Twitter is also facing multiple lawsuits over unpaid bills, including for private chartered plane flights, software services and rent at one of its San Francisco offices. At the social media giant’s offices in Seattle and San Francisco- which is the headquarters, Elon Musk has cancelled janitorial services, forcing employees to bring their toilet paper rolls to the workplace.
(With inputs from agencies)
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