Are you a NEWBIE?? Read your contract . At the END of one year employment your are paid the equivelent of a ROUND TRIP FARE. Round trip being your initial fare to the school and your fare home if you decide NOT TO RENEW. If you renew and not leave,then you just gained your FARE THERE BACK and the return fare is kinda like a FREEBIE DUH....WHY IS IT DONE THIS WAY..Because foreigners have a history of sneaking off in the middle of the night for any little thing wrong..SO ITS PAID AT THE END ,not in the begining..10 years ago when I first come here the laws were very lax on us..In the past 10 years they have been abused to the point that china laws have become increasingly more strict. Use to you could simply run down to Hong Kong and change your visa..Now you must go all the way back to your home country to do it..Am I defending the Chinese on this?? NO ..Contracts are designed to protect BOTH parties involved..If you get a bad contract it's because YOU SIGNED IT..YOU must do the research on a school..This forum is designed for us to share our experiences and warn of bad schools and of bad attitude foreigners as well..What many foreigners don't know and don't understand is that the contract you sign is NOT the contract submitted to the government to gain your expats book..The contract for that is a GOVERNMENT ISSUED CONTRACT..People,,wake up and smell the coffee..English in China is a MULTI-BILLION RMB a year BUSINESS..They been doing it a long time and and we are not GODS rolling in here and writing our own tickets..I am 60 years old and have some dissability..Can I find a job in America right now?? NO. But I make a very good living here and very content with my life here..Why do I help other schools find a teacher?? ONE REASON ONLY..In helping them I am maybe finding a good egg in the bunch to kick around with..I love fishing,a good weekend poker game,good conversation,sharing a good homecooked meal..Would I recommend someone a BAD SCHOOL to get this..NOT HARDLY..Global in Taizhou is a good school..They are legal,they have a fair contract,and they do pay well and on time..Sadly the one person that started this was not and is not THAT GOOD PERSON..But I will say again.I learned my lesson in this..YOU CAN'T HELP ANYONE THAT THINKS THEY ARE GOD..I know a lot of foreigners in this country and this is the first time my good name has been drug through the coals..And will be the last for I learned from this..I dissrespect no one and I will not be dissrespected especially by people that read something a nut wrote and and decided to stick their UNKNOWING 2 CENTS IN..What a joke this has become.