Very fair post!

I have never heard of Irene shorting people on cash. She is also usually pretty good at getting visas sorted out.

But you will spend a lot of time running around. Anyone considering working for New Times should seriously consider the comments of the last poster. They are a fair and accurate.

Also what you say about working privately is very true. It is not that steady and Holidays can be a pain because your clients will cancel for two weeks.

As for better places to work in Chengdu that would be most places. There are several places that are worse; Sunny's English and North American ESL are two of them. More or less the same thing as New Times but with dodgier management. Meten/Metro is another place to avoid. Really bad management no budget for markers or paper for the photocopier, but flat screens in all classrooms.

Watch out for the university and high school jobs. Most of them don't pay for July and August. Also watch out for Sichuan Normal, they have a habit of screwing up visas. They can be good gigs if you want a lot of free time.