topic Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers in Community Chat

AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

terrier3 — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 03:17:42 GMT

Last week the president of AOL issued a new policy. Employees wouldn't get their matching 401K money until the end of each year. If you quit or are fired during the year, you won't get a 401K match at all for the year.

This would save the company money. He said that 2 women had difficult pregnancies in the last year, costing the company over one million dollars each, so they would have to save $$$ on 401Ks.

This came as they announced their best profits in many years, and Mr. President got a great bonus...12 million dollars pay.

It turns out that several big companies are trying to change their 401Ks too - this will obviously save them a lot of money.

The outcry was huge...the boss was shamed into changing back to a policy of contributing to employees' 401K on each payday.

Let's hear it for the workers who made this a PR fiasco and got this harebrained policy reversed.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/aol-chief-reverses-changes-to-401k-policy-after-a-week-of-bad-publicity/2014/02/08/0aec4056-911f-11e3-b227-12a45d109e03_story.html

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

JaneMarple — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 03:19:53 GMT

I think it's great

Good luck on this thread.

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

mgm2 — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 03:20:06 GMT

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

Deb1010again — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 03:25:27 GMT

That's GREAT news. I'd still be ticked if I was one of the women who had one of the two "distressed babies" that "cost a million dollars a piece". Since they probably have a self-funded healthcare plan, they get a report that aggregates their healthcare spending... doesn't identify who used what services. But it's not hard to figure out who had the difficult pregnancy or "distressed baby" that needed lots of extra care. I was so DISGUSTED that the AOL president disclosed that info and used it as justification for cutting benefits in another area.

I'm disabled and use more healthcare services than the average person and my husband's company has a self-funded medical plan. It makes me worry that if they singled me out as a high cost, they could conceivably get rid of him. It's a slippery slope.

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

terrier3 — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 03:30:42 GMT

Just imagine all the people they could fire or lay off around Christmas...saving themselves the 401K match!

That would be a very demoralized place to work! Especially with a boss making over 12 million a year, based on the company's fantastic 2013 results.

Perhaps some of that bonus should have been shared with the employees who created it.

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

betteb — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 03:32:17 GMT

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

mgm2 — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 03:33:07 GMT

On 2/8/2014 terrier3 said:
Just imagine all the people they could fire or lay off around Christmas...saving themselves the 401K match!

That would be a very demoralized place to work! Especially with a boss making over 12 million a year, based on the company's fantastic 2013 results.

Perhaps some of that bonus should have been shared with the employees who created it.

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

chrystaltree — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 05:42:14 GMT

On 2/8/2014 Deb1010again said:
That's GREAT news. I'd still be ticked if I was one of the women who had one of the two "distressed babies" that "cost a million dollars a piece". Since they probably have a self-funded healthcare plan, they get a report that aggregates their healthcare spending... doesn't identify who used what services. But it's not hard to figure out who had the difficult pregnancy or "distressed baby" that needed lots of extra care. I was so DISGUSTED that the AOL president disclosed that info and used it as justification for cutting benefits in another area.

I'm disabled and use more healthcare services than the average person and my husband's company has a self-funded medical plan. It makes me worry that if they singled me out as a high cost, they could conceivably get rid of him. It's a slippery slope.

Good point, I thought the same thing. It wouldn't be hard to identify those women. Terrible invasion of their privacy. But not a financial burden for a company like that. There are other factors in play there. I suspect. I also wonder if the employees won the battle but will eventually lose the war. AOL could wait a year and just end the matching contribution. Many companies already have.

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

millieshops — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 06:56:14 GMT

No reason to single out AOL - bigger companies than AOL started the same procedure before AOL climbed on the wagon.

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

Lagan — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 16:13:58 GMT

It's my understanding that the richest 1% is feeling mighty put upon here lately!!

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

terrier3 — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 16:17:47 GMT

On 2/8/2014 millieshops said:
No reason to single out AOL - bigger companies than AOL started the same procedure before AOL climbed on the wagon.

They are the first company to REVERSE the annual contribution practice and go back to regular payroll contributions.

It's a good thing!

Re: AOL Reversal - a Win for Workers

terrier3 — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 16:20:24 GMT

On 2/8/2014 chrystaltree said:

Good point, I thought the same thing. It wouldn't be hard to identify those women. Terrible invasion of their privacy. But not a financial burden for a company like that. There are other factors in play there. I suspect. I also wonder if the employees won the battle but will eventually lose the war. AOL could wait a year and just end the matching contribution. Many companies already have.

I doubt if they will eliminate 401K company contributions.

All of their competitors offer great bennies - Facebook, Google, etc. They need to be able to attract the best and brightest workers.

It's not a matter of needing to save money either - they had their best quarter in years and did so well the CEO got a huge raise.