Ok, I hardly ever write angry posts. Because let’s be honest, who wants to read an angry blog? Nobody. I always try to focus on the positive in my writing, the good experiences, lo bueno as we say in Spain. I may throw in some disgruntled statements here and there topped with a boatload of sarcasm, but I always try to revert back to the positive in the end. I always try to be a positive person. However, this is an angry post. No two ways about it. I am pissed, no wait, livid. That’s right, LIVID: ALL-CAPS AND MULTIPLE EXCLAMATION POINTS!!! (If you want a typical happy Liz travel post, stop reading now and scroll down farther. You’ve been warned.)
As most of you already know, I teach English in Spain on a grant from the Spanish Ministry of Education called Auxiliares de Conversación or English Language and Culture Assistants. I wrote this long blog post last March with my thoughts on the program. So much has changed since then, and now I am going to tell you what I really think. I would say about 95% of people who do this program do it because they want to live in Spain. Not because they want to be teachers, not because they want teaching experience, not to help little children learn about English language and culture. Sure, that may be part of it, but I bet you the main reason is because they want to live in Spain, and it’s one of the only ways to live legally in Spain as an American. And you know what? The Spanish government takes FULL advantage of that.
Our contract says that we are to work 12 hours a week and be paid 700 euros a month as a stipend from October 1 to May 31. Really awesome, right? The program also tells us that we should come with about $1000 saved up to live off of for the first month until we get paid at the end of the first month, around November 1. However, it is almost Christmas and many of the auxilaires around Spain have still not been paid, that’s right, 3 months late. The program has been around for years, and yet, this issue comes up every year. Not with every region, but for many. Last year in Andalucía, my school just paid me every month and then kept the checks when they finally arrived from the government, but after all the budget cuts going on, few schools are willing to do this. After so many years, how can the Ministry of Education still be so disorganized?
Thousands of foreigners come every year with this scholarship to teach English in Spain, it is not a small group of people who is affected. And thousands more apply and don’t even get a spot. This program has become extremely popular, especially in the States as an ideal post-college pre-real world second study-abroad opportunity. The Ministry of Education knows this and knows how much we want to be here, and I think they take advantage of that by making us put up with a lot of bureaucratic bull****, knowing that we can’t and won’t do anything about. Not getting paid for 3 months? It’s not like we’ll stop working and go home. We can’t even afford a flight since we’ve used all our savings to live off of. Want to complain to someone about it? The majority of government don’t answer their phones or emails. Ever.
Besides, the people who run this program in Madrid and in the various Autonomous Communities around Spain are champions at not taking the blame for anything. If you can miraculously get a hold of someone to talk to about this program, they most likely cannot resolve your issues or even put you in contact with someone else who could. Nor will they fight for you. They just say, yeah we understand, it sucks. Sorry. Bye. I wish I was kidding! I have had this conversation with various government workers over the years, and it always ends the same. Oh no, it’s not our fault, it’s so-and-so’s fault but it will be fixed soon. When? Not sure. Soon. Don’t worry. If I had a euro for every time I had this conversation with a government employee I would be rich; I would certainly get more money from the government that way than from my actual work contract.
So what triggered this angry blog post? About this time every month I call up the Ministry of Education coordinator in La Rioja to ask when will I be paid for this month’s work. And yes, you got it, today was that happy day. Can we just start with the fact that I have to call them in the first place? That should give you some idea of what this program is like. 3 months later I still haven’t been officially paid yet, along with hundreds of other Americans in Spain. Luckily, one of my schools has been lending me the money, but I found out today that that’s going to stop for December. When will I get paid for December was my next question. Especially since the schools go on holiday from the 23 to January 9th. No matter how many ways I asked this question, the only answer I got was that they don’t know but hopefully soon, it’s out of their hands, it’s not their problem, ect. Word for word they said it was not their responsibility to make sure we get paid. Finally when I asked to speak to the director, he came on and said there was nothing more he could say and hung up on me. Yeah, he flat out hung up.
Again, it would be one thing if this was the first time this has happened, but this is the 3rd month in a row. I am also very angry at the way the Ministry of Education workers have been treating us. Every time I get off the phone with them or leave a meeting, somehow I feel like this is all my fault for not being OK with not getting paid. I mean, I am pretty sure I have the right to be paid for the work I do or at least know WHEN I’ll be paid, and I certainly don’t respect being spoken to in such a rude manner and being hung up on just for trying to figure out when I will be paid. I only have my rent to pay, along with bills, all my living expenses, student loans, ect. Not to mention they are violating our visa contracts by not paying us monthly. So for now, I have absolutely no idea when I will be paid, and according to my boss and my boss’s boss, it is not their responsibility or their problem, rather, it’s mine.
If this were my only issue with the program, things might be different, but it’s not. After the huge nightmare I went through last year renewing my residency papers to problems with my school to problems with the heath insurance, I am sick of it. I know many people don’t have the problems I am going through, but I also know many people are going through much worse than me, as in not being paid and not being able to borrow the money either and not even be able to talk to someone about it. The Ministry of Education has put us in the most uncomfortable, uncompromising and downright horrible situation: really what are we supposed to do? What options do we have? Go home? Complain some more to people who don’t care and won’t do anything about it? We have no options, no choice but to put up with this bureaucratic mess! And what makes this situation so effed up and horrible is that the government KNOWS this and uses it to their advantage. It’s times like this when living in Spain feels like living in a 3rd world country. At the end of the day, we shouldn’t have to be going through any of this. We keep up our end of the bargain and do our job, why can’t they?
So dear all future auxiliars, what sacrifices are you willing to make to live in Spain? How much are you willing to put up with? If you are already an auxiliar, have you gone through anything like this? What are your thoughts?
About the author
Hmm, I’m an auxiliar in Murcia and none of us have been paid yet either. When I decided to do this program I did a lot of researching and my most useful information came from blogs like elizabeth pitt, kaley and yours. I fully expected to not be paid for up to 3 months. I came with a huge chunk of change that I worked hard to come by. I also came with a bucket full of patience. But patience doesn’t pay the bills and even that supply is getting low.
But, I find myself on the fence. On one hand, I think it’s ridiculous that we STILL haven’t been paid. Christmas is 5 days away. There’s a teacher lunch on Friday that I can’t go to because I can’t afford to. I wanted to travel twice this month already, but with what money? I desperately need a haircut and can’t even risk that for fear that I won’t be able to eat next week if I do. I was prepared, but it’s been longer than anyone said.
But I have a few reservations about doing much about it. First, is that I’m expecting money any day. I heard that the auxiliars in Murcia might be paid tomorrow. But last week I was told last Friday. And before that I was told early December. And before that it was mid-November. So, part of me is just patiently waiting even though there have been so many delays that I have no reason to believe anything I hear.
I also have heard from the locals that even they’re not being paid. A spanish friend of mine told me the other day that he wouldn’t be paid until January. I asked him if it was legal, I asked him how he was going to survive. It seems relatively common here. I don’t know how they’re surviving. But if he isn’t getting paid, a citizen, how can I expect anything different?
The other concern I have is that you keep saying that they’re taking advantage of us. What’s the thinking? Eventually they have to pay us or deal with over 3000 extremely angry people. I can’t help but think that it’s unintentional. I just can’t see how it benefits them to not pay us on time.
I have never called to ask why I haven’t been paid. I listen to news that I hear from other auxiliars but I won’t call myself. How can it help? If I call, I’m just slowing down the process further, right? I have to complain to someone who can actually do something about it. But who is that? It’s not the lady that all of the auxiliars are calling and complaining to. She looks so stressed that she probably doesn’t sleep at night because she’s too busy trying to get us paid. So who do I call? I know that’s your question too.
I think we should spread the word and utilize this website: http://www.defensordelpueblo.es/en/index.html
The more the merrier. At least I can complain here and know that it’s not taking time away from someone who is trying to get me my money. Do I think it will help? Not really but I know that’s my american apathy speaking. It’s worth a few minutes of my time isn’t it? I obviously think so if I’m writing all this…
I also think it’s reasonable to not work in January if we’re not paid. I think that if we don’t work and we’re very tranquil about it, and very PUBLIC about it, than we can build some support. We call our schools everyday and say, “I can’t come to work today because I haven’t been paid for my previous work yet.” Cordial, polite. It’s certainly not their fault.
The real problem though isn’t going to change. The real problem is that we’re foreigners, we can’t vote, and in reality, 3000 people is such a small number of people that we’re truly the least of their numerous problems.
I’m going to weigh in on the Gareth comment, that is also slam it, but from a different angle. It is an incredibly gross stereotype, particularly ugly coming from a foreigner/outsider, to say (okay, to imply), “Oh, you knew what you were getting into, because Spaniards are lazy (and/or incompetent).” First, let me agree with everyone else by adding that his post is just salt in the wound. Liz, I feel for you, and as a foreign worker probably feeling the occasional helplessness of being far from home, I can imagine this is doubly difficult. So f-off, Gareth, for being so snotty and callous in your comment.
However, you are not alone, and not only in the sense of other foreign workers like you. Spaniards are also suffering this failure-to-be-paid. In fact, yesterday, today, and tomorrow, pharmacies in Valencia are closed in protest to the failure of the regional government to pay them what they are owed for the last 6 months – http://goo.gl/FhdtL. @ Gareth, no, the pharmacists aren’t sitting back and thinking, “Well, this is just how it is here in Spain.” They are pissed and furious and angry. And so they are doing exactly what Spaniards do in this situation, and what Liz ought to be doing, they are protesting publicly about it in the hopes that it will shame the government into doing the right thing and paying them.
Liz, some of your challenges–powerlessness to leave the country, lack of economic mobility–are unique to your position as a foreign worker with a restricted visa. But some aren’t… the government, who clearly just simply lacks the money at present to make good on what it owes, appears perfectly comfortable ignoring its debt to (certain) Spaniards, too (small businesses like pharmacies, contract workers, freelancers, etc.). What’s more, some of those Spaniards face additional challenges you probably don’t, such as payment on storefront mortgage (a declaration of bankruptcy here won’t liberate them from that), which is why the pharmacies say they are going to go bankrupt if they aren’t paid soon. (Many of them are also currently surviving off loans, from banks, whom recently have said, no more… Again, you are not alone on many of your problems. In fact, that may be part of your problem – your school may be running out of surfeit money with which to loan you.)
The backdrop to all this is not some Spanish fast-and-looseness in following protocol. It is the crisis. (Similar delays in payment are happening in the U.S., too, because of the crisis and freeze in bank loans, with similar impacts on small businesses.) So let’s all dispatch with that annoying impulse as outsiders to write off Spanish government incompetence as some kind of intransigent cultural thing, and recognize it for what it is, a historically unprecedented shift in the economy.
Moreover, I’d encourage you to feel more empowered about complaining. Spaniards are much more accustomed to a protest culture than Americans, and you have more rights to protest than you probably realize. (You can strike, you can “manifestar”, and you can lodge complaints on the website mentioned above… you can do all of these, with some fair degree of legal protection, even if you were an undocumented worker. If you’re not, then more so.)
Man, I guess I needed to rant about all of this. (You can intuit from my blog title that I’ve got a bug about outsider stereotypes about Spain.) Sorry for the earful. Maybe the summary is: Gareth, shut up and butt out. Liz, you are not alone. And “solidaridad”!
As other people have said, I can’t believe you haven’t been paid yet. In Galicia we were paid 10 days late in November and everyone was really mad about it, but I can’t imagine not having been paid yet at all! Kudos to you for surviving without a paycheck.
It’s really terrible that this is such a problem, especially since it’s just one on top of many other problems that this program has. Every time I get asked to do something that’s specifically prohibited in my contract, I get a tiny bit more angry, and if I wasn’t even getting paid to do any of it, I would be just as mad as you are.
I think the best idea is to kick up a fuss back home and see if that could get anything done–because clearly contacting people here in Spain isn’t working. And the idea to not work anymore until you’re paid is good too, although I think it would be a lot more effective if you could get all the other auxiliares in your communidad to go on strike with you.
I have checked, and you can use the “Defensor Del Pueblo” institution as well, it don’t depend on the nationality. There is an english version of the webpage to be informed “http://www.defensordelpueblo.es/en/index.html”, but the complain should be done in the spanish version. If there is a lot of people sending complains about the same case, probably the answer will be faster. I hope this can help all of you, because as an Spaniard, I’m ashamed about the Spanish bureaucracy, but as you already know, it sucks.