I finally have no reason not to say it. My boss is a drunk. The man is a class-A booze fiend. And my philosophy is usually: His liver, his life, I don’t care. Except there’s one, minor problem I recently discovered. My paycheck bounced.
Maybe “bounced” isn’t the right word. We have direct deposit, and two weeks ago, I checked my bank account and found that no deposit had been made.
I asked the other lawyer at the firm as well as our staff members, and none of them had been paid either.
My boss, the only one with equity in the firm, walked in stinking from one of his usual benders and assured us that we’d all have our paychecks in a day or two. That promise turned into a week, and then he asked if we’d all give him one pay period to make it right. Not that we have much choice in the matter. Walking out the door won’t make my paycheck come any sooner.
I don’t work for a very big firm. I’m sure that’s obvious, but you need to understand that I don’t make a six-figure salary. I make $55,000 a year and live in a major city. After I pay my student loans, my utility bills and my rent, there isn’t much left over. I don’t exactly live paycheck to paycheck, but it’s close.
Anyway, my boss’ promise came and went. The rumor around the office is that the owner of the firm is broke, and that his crazy drunken spending and basic office negligence has finally caught up with him so he also won’t be able to make payroll this go around. Earlier this month, a lawyer who’s pretty much been here from the beginning quit and took some clients with him (actually, he took our two best referring accounts), so I’m sure that hasn’t helped matters.
If we don’t get paid for both periods on the first, one of the paralegals said that he’s taking all the computers and our boss’ prized Remington cowboy statue that’s so ugly that only a drunk would think it’s cool. Something tells me that’s not going to fly, and even if it does, I doubt our junky computers would amount to much.
Come Monday, I might be forced to realize that I’m on a sinking ship, losing my job and have worked the last month for free. I guess I’ve known this was coming the last two weeks, but this morning I was talking to our bookkeeper, and she informed me that our drunk-ass boss also hasn’t been making payments to the state unemployment fund. Something I wish I knew two weeks ago; I would’ve cut my losses. Instead, I’ve been doing insurance defense pro bono.
But just in case he does comes through, let’s keep this anonymous.
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