There comes a time when you have to say something. You have to make a little noise. You have to move your feet. This is the time." Beloved John Lewis

I knew it was my time:
On April 13, 2020, I was signed online for what was now my work at home due to the pandemic 3pm-12am shift. Approximately, ten minutes prior to taking my normal 8pm lunch break, I entered the associate chat room to inform that I was going to do so and started reading chats of "how am I going to pay the landlord," "how will my bills be paid, I have children to feed " "Did everyone get their hours reduced to 3 - 4 hour shifts?" “Why didn’t they tell us” Wondering what in the world was going on? I checked my online scheduled work hours to find that my shift was now 8pm - 12am, a four hour reduction. Thinking how can that be? We have several avenues for the company to provide the employees communication, how did I miss that? I immediately joined back into the chat asking the team supervisor on duty why we were not told about our work hours being reduced? I also informed her that “I have been here since 3pm working my regular shift,” completely unaware of the changes only to be made aware by the panic here in the chatroom that I was not even supposed to be on today until 8pm! The supervisor’s response, "I was not here Fatina the day the changes took place, but go ahead and log out for today because you are over your 4 hours".

Worth noting here, when it was time for the employer Teleperformance to certify for employees to receive unemployment benefits for the weeks of reduced hours, the employer certified falsely that no hour reduction took place which resulted in the denial of receiving benefits as well as character defamation in the highest form in that the false certification provided by the employer basically stated that I and others made false claims for benefits.

WHAT KIND OF COMPANY WOULD DO SUCH A THING!
HERE ARE SOME DISTURBING FACTS UNCOVERED IN MY INVESTIGATION TO GET THE ANSWER:
While this Paris France headquartered company Teleperformance/Teleperformance USA might not be a household name, the clients we are hired to provide our customer service representative services for definitely are! Clients for Teleperformance USA in the South Carolina call center are or were at some point are: Bank of America, United Healthcare, Direct TV, EFTPS, Liberty Mutual Insurance, and AT&T. My coworkers and I provided customer service for the Liberty Mutual Insurance client.
In the SC location the work force for Teleperformance USA are by my estimation 97% black and brown skin employees and it is people of color that TPUSA has consistently practiced and continues to practice a nationwide policy of permitting, encouraging, and/or requiring its Customer Service Representatives, including Plaintiffs and members of both proposed classes to perform work without compensation as documented in the found lawsuits during my search:
· Accordingly as declared here in these legal document - Defendant’s violations of the FLSA and the UPWA are willful and knowing. TPUSA was sued for similar violations in 2008 in this Court in Case No. 2:08-cv-00395. Despite this prior lawsuit and despite employee complaints, Defendant has failed to bring TPUSA’s wage and hour practices into compliance with law. Complete write-up: https://www.classaction.org/news/lawsuit-claims-teleperformance-usa-failed-to-pay-employees-for-pre-shift-work

 Cazeau et al. v. TPUSA, Inc., Filed: April 17, 2018  § 2:18-CV-00321

·         Augusta GA - Only on 12: Teleperformance facing class action lawsuit, Complete write-up - www.wrdw.com/home/headlines/28203894.html

TELEPERFORMANCE WORKER IN THE PHILIPPINES MADE TO SLEEP ON THE FLOOR BY THIS COMPANY. UNI GLOBAL UNION PARIS:

Christy Hoffman, UNI Global Union’s General Secretary, has blasted Teleperformance’s response to Covid-19 as “slow” and “inadequate,” a response that “has put thousands of workers in harm’s way or forced them to go without pay.” - https://www.investigate-europe.eu/teleperformance-covid19/

Teleperformance USA, FIRST AND FOREMOST THE BUCK STOPS HERE…YOU WILL NOT GET AWAY WITH ANY MONEY OWED EITHER ME OR MY COWORKERS. YOUR MODERN DAY PLANTATION HUMAN CASH CROP EGREGIOUS PRACTICES AGAINST MAJORITY PEOPLE OF COLOR HERE IN COLUMBIA, SC, AND OTHER PARTS OF THE USA, MUST STOP!

I AM DEMANDING:

Most importantly, I demand you the Teleperformance clients with contracted customer service representatives employed through Teleperformance USA in the Columbia, SC, as consumers of your goods review Teleperformance practices to become aware of as well as assist with the resolution of any and all of the shocking, outstandingly bad treatment, practices and policies against employees contracted for your behalf. .

I demand to know for myself and my former coworkers (due to my constructive discharge) from the client in particular the client that my coworkers and I provide customer service for, since we can’t get Teleperformance to provide answers as to how they could be so uncaring of their workers in the manner of not providing any previous or even current notice that our livelihood, our means of feeding, sheltering, caring for ourselves and or our children, our families, was going to be taken by reducing us from fulltime to part-time employees without any prior, current, and to date no written or vocal, notification why this disruption of our financial lives in this major way took place, what was your role! 

I demand to know from Teleperformance USA how you and or your acting agent denied our claims submitted for unemployment benefits to offset the reduced hours by falsely certifying that we were fulltime not part-time employees at the time of our filing weekly benefit claims with SCDEW and not eligible for benefits; worth noting: in doing so, you have created a defamation of character against us in that if we did not receive reduced hours then we have falsely filed claims for benefits.

I am demanding for myself and my former coworkers from Teleperformance USA to be paid in full for every benefit week that was falsely denied certification of our working fulltime and not part-time hours, to include the additional COVID19 $600 weekly benefit.

I demand to know for myself and my former coworkers from Teleperformance USA how the use of the Mandatory requesting employees sign out of their scheduled shifts for the day reducing already cut hours even more can be referred to as VTO voluntary time off when agents are ordered to end shifts mandatorily!

I demand to know for myself and my former coworkers from Teleperformance USA why you treated us this no informing way, then falsifying the certification for partial work hours to be paid us, having no regard for us or our families financially with still no apology or reasoning to this date why we were treated in such a manner. 

I am asking that you would please sign the petition to support us in letting this company know this is not how employees anywhere should be treated not just the employees of the USA. While also demanding the clients’ involvement in becoming aware of the culture of this employer and insisting on better and fair treatment of the predominantly people of color this employer employs to service their consumer products.