Ducati Sporting Club UK > General > Idle Chat > What a crap week this has been...

[webbyc]

I learnt in the middle of last week that the company that I work for has been forced by the FSA to withdraw its permissions to trade. The main reason for this is that we have two companies doing the same thing and the intention was to merge the two together towards the end of January/early feb. However the FSA, in their infinite wisdom - they never cease to amaze me - stepped and made us do things quicker. So I was then told to organise a branch meeting for monday morning at which attendance would be non-optional.

Monday morning comes and an announcement went out via email to the entire company - about 130 people - putting us all on risk of redundancy. What a wonderful christmas present. I then had to hold my branch meeting explaining to everyone (15 people) the situation and what the likely outcome could be, knowing I'm in exactly the same boat as them.

Tuesday and all of the salesforce trek off to Coventry on options for the advisers - this basically is to loose your employed status, accept redundancy and either transfer to the other company on a self-employed basis or leave. I'm in management, but could easily be an adviser as I do write business, so my situation is different, I'm probably more at risk. I personally won't know anything until after everyone else is sorted out and we know the likely requirements going forward so wonderful!!

Wednesday its back to the branch for the initial consultation meetings with each member of staff which was tough going, with a lot of anger being vented. Quite understandable though.

So now we've got to carry on as normal - without being able to advise anyone - until early in January when we might know our fate.

What a crap christmas this looks like being - suppose I'll just have to get drunk