Unemployment

[pete]

FBD laid off 150 plus workers today

FBD Redundencies

Insurer FBD Holdings is to close 13 of its 47 branches in Ireland and introduce a voluntary redundancy programme in a bid to reduce staff numbers by 150.

In a statement FBD said customer behaviour was changing with 70 per cent now using the phone and internet to buy insurance with fewer customers visiting local office

Note sure I would put this down to recession. I would have guessed local branches would have been closed eventually as almost all insurance down by phone now.

[OneRedArmy]

FBD laid off 150 plus workers today, January is going to be quiet shocking...does anyone suspect civil unrest like Iceland last month and Argentina a few years ago.. I wouldn't be surprised.

With the Playstation generation?!?!

Apathy is the only thing most people believe in these days.

[Reality Bites]

Unemployment Closing in on 8% - retail sector layoffs and those seeing out their notice till Christmas should see it push up to 10% early New Year

[mypost]

Remember there is no signing on in December, so the next figures aren't released until February. May easily hit 300k in 9 weeks time.

[RonnieB]

Went on short time myself a few days ago. Funnily enough the industry I was working in if the grant aid for the building of the agricultural buildings was spread out over a more realistic time scale of more than two years it would have been better for a hell of a lot of people. As it was a monumental amount of agricultural buildings were put up in 18 months with the deadline for completion the end of this year.

There was easily enough work to have been spread for well over three years. If they think tax revenue is down this year they are in for a shock when the amount of tax from the contractors doing these jobs dries up next year.

[OneRedArmy]

If they think tax revenue is down this year they are in for a shock when the amount of tax from the contractors doing these jobs dries up next year.

Self-employed people pay tax?






Joking aside, sorry to hear about your circumstances, its hitting more and more as the weeks go by.

[bennocelt]

The way things are at the moment it would nearly be better if my wife and myself were drawing the dole (and get the rent paid) such is the tax we have to bloody pay! I'm not complaining about the dole but why are ordinary people getting screwed by tax!

[Reality Bites]

The way things are at the moment it would nearly be better if my wife and myself were drawing the dole (and get the rent paid) such is the tax we have to bloody pay! I'm not complaining about the dole but why are ordinary people getting screwed by tax!

Strange Post when you consider Taxes are still historically low compared to the eye watering rates paid in the Eighties

[OneRedArmy]

The way things are at the moment it would nearly be better if my wife and myself were drawing the dole (and get the rent paid) such is the tax we have to bloody pay! I'm not complaining about the dole but why are ordinary people getting screwed by tax!

As Reality Bites says we have some of the lowest direct taxes in the developed world.

The indirect taxes and whether we get good value for money for our tax paid is a whole other question.

[bennocelt]

As Reality Bites says we have some of the lowest direct taxes in the developed world.

The indirect taxes and whether we get good value for money for our tax paid is a whole other question.

yeah fair enough - but you know what i mean - the both of us are not earning that much better than what we could get on the dole

[mypost]

The standard weekly minimum wage is 75% more than the standard dole allowance, so that's a considerable sum over the year.

1,500 odd lost their jobs over the pork crisis in a single day.

[pete]

1,500 odd lost their jobs over the pork crisis in a single day.

Some of them are protective notice. Fairly predictable if no pigs to slaughter. Export contracts will be most at risk as retailers abroad will have to source products elsewhere if Irish deliveries do not arrive. Will be difficult to get those contract back if lost.

The government has not taken to directly taking jobs off people.

[bennocelt]

The standard weekly minimum wage is 75% more than the standard dole allowance, so that's a considerable sum over the year.

1,500 odd lost their jobs over the pork crisis in a single day.

yeah i figured we are both better off by 600 a month - which is not bad
- but then you also have to figure in rent allowance, free travel, medical card, and wathin daytime tv and in the pub the rest of the day over actually work which is increasingly stressful

by the way wasnt the dole doubled this week - a nice thank you from the government to say thanks for all the hard work.

[ruben_sosa]

Some of them are protective notice. Fairly predictable if no pigs to slaughter. Export contracts will be most at risk as retailers abroad will have to source products elsewhere if Irish deliveries do not arrive. Will be difficult to get those contract back if lost.

The government has not taken to directly taking jobs off people.

i feel sorry for the piggery workers, a lot of them are brazillian and imagine having to fork out for a flight back there 2 weeks before christmas. The paper said it'd take 8 weeks for their dole applications to be processed ! what are they supposed to do until then. I wonder if it'll spread to the beef industry too, Governments are only too happy to slap a ban on foreign produce to gain political clout with their own farmers.

[RonnieB]

i feel sorry for the piggery workers, a lot of them are brazillian and imagine having to fork out for a flight back there 2 weeks before christmas. The paper said it'd take 8 weeks for their dole applications to be processed ! what are they supposed to do until then

I would imagine they are going to have to do the same every other worker has to do and wait.

[Royal rover]

gents how bad is the situation now , i only ask because i live abroad and have done for the last 2 years , i tried to come last summer but a recruitment guy advised me to stay away, london is as bad as it's ever been, but as yet none of my mates are out of work regardless whether there in construction banking etc,

[pete]

gents how bad is the situation now,

What industry do you work in? Construction obviously an Irish issue, world recession will affect other sectors but possibly the same in other countries?

[Noelys Guitar]

What industry do you work in? Construction obviously an Irish issue, world recession will affect other sectors but possibly the same in other countries?

I live in Pennsylvania and the situation job wise here is dire. Worse than Ireland in the 80's. No construction jobs. People with degrees having to apply for security jobs and getting turned away as these jobs are full. Nursing jobs are still available but that is about it.

[mypost]

by the way wasnt the dole doubled this week - a nice thank you from the government to say thanks for all the hard work.

The dole was only doubled for those claiming longer than the standard 13-month initial allowance. In other words, you have to be on the dole for more than a year before you are entitled to a "bonus" payment at Christmas time.

The 8-week backlog is a standard time frame for initial claims to be processed. You're required to make a claim on the first day of unemployment. Often all the paperwork from the employer hasn't been issued at that time. 6-8 weeks later, the claim is processed, and the backlog of outstanding payments are then issued to the claimant.

It's a bang-head, brick-wall process, and not helped by the long waits at SW offices, coupled with an inadequate telephone service, and non existent electronic facility in order to speed it up. And that was in the boomtimes. The current haemorraging of jobs in all sectors, is not going to help the situation.

[BohsPartisan]

It's a bang-head, brick-wall process, and not helped by the long waits at SW offices, coupled with an inadequate telephone service, and non existent electronic facility in order to speed it up. And that was in the boomtimes. The current haemorraging of jobs in all sectors, is not going to help the situation.

The SW offices are really snowed under. I don't work in one myself but I know people who do and they are up to their eyes from the time they start. A new claims processing section has been set up to assist the situation but because of cuts people have had to be taken away from other areas to do it. Its ironic that with unemployment on the rise, short sighted blanket cuts inthe public sector mean that the DSFA can't actually employ more staff to cope with the problem, which would of course ease the problem slightly because you'd be creating employment.