Influent - Interactive Teleservices Influent Lincoln Nebraska Paycheck, labor laws, help, Lincoln Nebraska

First off, if you are looking to get a job with this company, understand just what you are getting into.

Influent pays a standard wage for people who are scheduled to work less than full time (or less than 27.5 hours a week for night-shift) and a premium wage for those scheduled full time (27.5 hours for night-shift).

At the Lincoln, NE location you are eligible for the standard wage (~7.75/hour) and any commissions you make from sales as long as you have 95% of your hours. You must have 100% of your scheduled hours for the premium wage (8.50/h). If you fall below 95% of your hours you are dropped to minimum wage and your commissions are also dropped from your check.

At first, this seems fair, but occasionally employees will be sent home with "credited" hours. You are not paid credited hours, they simply count towards the total hours you work for that pay period so you still get the standard wage. However, if you have a premium wage, you will still have to work additional hours as credited hours stop at 95%. This means, if you want your premium wage you will have to make up ALL of your credited hours.

That may sound 'acceptable,' not fair, but 'acceptable.'

Now imagine getting sent home on the last day of the pay period. There is no possible way to make up these hours, you are forced out of $.75 an hour and there is literally nothing you can do about it.

It's not even a potential scenario, on April 30th (last night as of writing this) upwards of 35 employees where sent home on the last day of the pay period with 'credited' hours. Hours none of them will be paid for. Hours that will knock quite a few down to a lower pay-per-hour.

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Knowingly, supervisors will tell TSRs [Telephone Service Representatives, the people making the calls] to say things like "a reminder will be sent before the trial period ends" (they will be automatically enrolled and charged for the service, when that trail ends) when such things are blatant lies to the unknowing customers.

TSRs are taught to use 'power-scripts.' Power-scripts are essentially summarized scripts that differ from the scripts the companies write for the program that are meant to be read verbatim (and are believed to be read verbatim) by the companies working with ITC. In fact, TSRs are asked to read the company's scripts verbatim for several calls once a week or so, just so ITC can send the tapes to the companies fooling them into thinking they have been reading verbatim.

Required state disclaimers are completely skipped over and disclosures aren't even required to be read verbatim. Not all sales disclosures are even checked, so occasionally false sales go through and people who ITC has never actually gotten a hold of can be enrolled in something they haven't heard of (this is not just a possibility, I've seen it done successfully by TSRs sending calls as sales when no one was even on the line).

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Influent pays commission for sales. The goal (usually a sales per hour goal) they quote you is not what you get paid by. You actually have to be at 125% of goal to get paid, meaning, if goal is 4 sales a night, you will actually need to get five to get paid for them. Also, there is a limit to commission you can receive per year. So even if you are making sales way above goal, after several thousand dollars in commission, you will be cut off (even though ITC still gets paid just as much for your work by the companies they dial for). That alone has driven employees to quit.

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Overall, there are too many negative aspects of Influent to comb over in one sitting, it's simply to hard to recall all the tricks the company uses to scam employees. Understand that if you get a job at this company, as some point you will be given a run for your money. I've spoken with too many ex-employees that have yet to receive their final paycheck(s), and probably never will since it's simply too difficult for them to fight.

You can make really great money at Influent, but you go home at night feeling like a dog for lying all day to innocent people who never did anything to you other than answer the phone. Pitney Bowes is a big rip off. All of their programs are. But the biggest way that INFLUENT rips people off is in their pay. If you don't get one hundred percent of your time in, you are knocked down to minimum wage. That means if you or your child gets sick on the last day of the pay period, you loose all of your bonus and get knocked down to minimum wage. I don't even know if that is legal. Someone should check on that. A lot of people lose their money like this and just get minimum wage.