Objective attempt
- 2016-01-11
Your reply to Benjamin appears to be based on your personal opinions rather than tackling the problems he apparently encountered. you cannot blame the man for wanting to leave a Kereoke scene with his pregnant wife and obviously that served as a good reason for not being too social in general any way.
In short, nobody will ever trust a company who changes vital clauses in a contract, especially when new staff is expected to sign a new contract after their arrival containing clauses to their detriment. It is called "misrepresentation" which is a nice way to describe a lie. This alone represents fundamental breach of contract.
Benjamin has, apart from possibly being effected by his wife's pregnancy, the fullest right to associate with whoever he wants and your comments in this regard doesn't even deserve mentioning.
Frankly, I don't know you guys at all nor do I know Benjamin, but I won't work for your school either-let's face it-after reading the other party's comments it is not difficult to reach the conclusion that you are a dishonest and unethical bunch.
Fifi
- 2016-01-09
Richard, you started your quite negative personal evaluation of the other poster by calling yourself his friend, and at the end, you signed "loadsa love". Tut tut... not nice. Can you see why? The other poster, obviously, did not enjoy your company. I would not either. It was his absolute right not to have a beer with you and keep his distance, mostly that he had a family. You sound like someone whose first priority is to have fun. There is a season to everything... It's OK to have fun. But this can't be imposed on others who have other priorities. I stand with the other poster.
Richard
- 2016-01-09
Hello Benjamin, remember me?
Yes. That's right, your old colleague and friend Richard. [edited]
Firstly, contract negotiation wasn't fun?!?! [edited] guess what, it's not meant to be. Chinese business deals, especially if you can't speak and Mandarin, probably seemed quite terse and negotiation is a 2-way street. 9k (after tax) for an unexperienced English teacher,such as yourself, in a city like Rugao is an ample salary, and your primary concern is receiving tax receipts?!?! [edited]
Secondly, I'm sure you would have found the staff more friendly if you bothered to interact with them, they are people like you and I. Instead of making an attempt to learn Mandarin (or even a few words in the local dialect) and converse with them, you'd rather sit at your desk playing computer games in silence.
Why didn't you come out with any of the students from Web, other foreign teachers or the staff when we went to a restaurant, KTV, etc? We tried to make you feel welcome and part of the team but you deemed distant, dismissive and rude. I remember when we (The staff and I) invited you to KTV (Only you, seeing as you were a member of Web staff) and [edited] then left after literally 5 minutes. You're a 6ft+ ex-U.S navy guy and some little Chinese girls 'physically stopped you from leaving' 
lol
[edited] the students invited you out to meals all the time, [edited]. I don't think we even went out for a solitary beer together, even though we were work colleagues, sat next to each other, for a year.
How can you be so dismissive of Rugao? I lived there for 1 year and had many friends, both Laowai and Chinese. The people of Rugao can seem initially rude but I made many great native Rugao friends there (Bruce, Neo and the legendary Ivan and his pizza shop!!!) and had a pleasant experience all in all. IF you want a big city, sure, go to Shanghai and pay Shanghai prices. My job was O.K, apartment was great and the students were great.
Yeah, some of the students did seem quite aloof, cocky and sometimes downright rude, but that's what a lot of Chinese students are like due to the one-child policy and also the fact their parents are wealthy. I got on fine with almost all of them and a mutual respect and rapport was easily and quickly obtained. The staff can be a little rude sometimes but mostly we had jokes and a laugh (Especially Hilary and Mandy when I used my British humour) and it was good fun winding them up too in a jokey way (Kathy, if you're reading this, when are we getting married?!?)
Anyway, in summary, Rugao is O.K, there are far worse places to teach English, believe me. The locals are friendly when you get to know them and can speak a little Mandarin (free drinks in Boiling, anyone? ) The pollution is minimal, the streets are fairly clean, the city is safe with low crime, the atmosphere is relaxed. My experience probably sounds like the complete polar opposite to Ben's. Oh well, horses for courses eh?
Loadsa love
Richard x
This is my review of web international english for the Rugao center.
If people do not wish to bother reading everything then I would like to simply state one thing - DO NOT WORK FOR WEB INTERNATIONAL OR HAPPY GOAL IN RUGAO!
The job
Long story short, I met my wife in Japan. She is a Chinese girl from a City near Nantong called Rugao. We decided to move from Japan to Rugao after discrimination my wife faced by Japanese people and especially doctors in general. I at first got a job at another english training center called harvard english but that experience wasn't any better. So the only job I could get was at web english.
Negotiating the contract with web was a terrible experience in itself. My wife accompanied me there and translated everything, we were constantly by lied to and told "not to worry" but that is when we began to worry. The initial contract copy we had signed was different from the copy we signed for web. The contract copy we signed it had flight reimbursement in it but the contract we signed for web did not. Thankfully my wife noticed and the managers took the copies with red faces and we never saw our copy of our contract during my stay despite us asking for it repeatedly.
Despite them agreeing to pay me 10,000 RMB a month, I was only paid around 9,000 every month. The other 1,000 or so went on taxes and whenever I asked for tax receipts I was always always given an excuse despite them being legally obliged to giving me my tax receipts.
Also when you come to rugao you will be made to sign an employees handbook which will have other clauses in it that were not included in your contract and will be contradictory to your contract terms. The clauses are so strict they will enable the school to fine you at will thus reducing your salary whenever they need extra money and replace you instantly.
Also the staff members at web will be rude towards you, no one will make any attempt to talk to you or make you feel welcome at all. You will just be another foreigner to them who will be gone shortly. The managers will call you at ridiculous times expecting you to cover classes on your off days and if you don't there will always be reprisal. You will not get 2 consistent days off, EVER! no one has 2 consistent days off, you won't be able to travel.
The school will be involved in your personal life, telling you what to do and what not to do. they forced me and my wife to once go to a ktv which is a karaoke bar when she was 7 months pregnant. there were staff members smoking and drinking in the room whilst my wife was there pregnant with a baby. they were all singing loudly and wouldn't let us leave, they physically stopped us from leaving at one point. then we had to sneak out to get away.
The school will keep some of your documents that you are legally obliged to have. I won't say anything further on this matter.
You will be expected not to do a maximum of 25 classes a week but a minimum of 25 classes a week. Believe me you will do a lot more classes because the school is understaffed.
Your students will be spoilt rich brats who hate foreigners and have powerful families connected to the chinese government, you won't be treated with much respect.
When the school wants to bring in a new foreigner other foreign teachers will be forced to say positive things about rugao otherwise there will be reprisals, like unexpected fines! You will be blackmailed a lot
The City
Rugao is a very small City. Despite it having a population of 1.5million people (most of whom live in the countryside) it is a very small City. There isn't much to do at all, there are like 2 or 3 bars in the entire city that are almost always empty. A few ktv's if you want to spend 3,000 RMB or so a night. One park. A lot of factories. 2 supermarkets which aren't great at all and a small mall which is extremely pricey.
For fun I simply stayed at home and played video games because I couldn't travel and I did everything there was to do in rugao in a day.
Rugao is like a redneck City with a bunch of ignorant people who know nothing about the outside world. The people are rude, they piss and shit on the street. People will stalk you and constantly stare at you because you're a foreigner and say rude things about you in Chinese. No one will want to try and befriend you for fear of reprisals for being with the foreign devil. A lot of people said a lot of rude things to my wife and parents in law. Rugao is a communist hell hole full of backward rednecks.
I didn't go out much because everytime I did I was faced with hostility.
To sum it up, don't go to Rugao. Save yourself one year of misery, hell, torture and unbelievable amounts of stress. Try Shanghai instead.