7 News Belize

Calling Out The Call Center
posted (November 13, 2014)
Today call center workers at ACCETEL BPO called out the media to air their grievances. The workers claim that their boss, Emroy Castillo, has failed to pay them for about 4 weeks and that, additionally, he has not been paying their Social Security. Now, they are out of work because operations at the call center have ceased. These workers - who chose not to disclose their identity- discussed their issues with us today.

Voice of: BPO worker
"The issue is that our boss Mr. Emroy Castillo made an arrangement with us. He opened a business, we were hired on the 5th September and on the 27th October he told us that we were not supposed to come into work, so we were on standby basically. We waited, time passed and he told us no work until further notice and then on 31st we were supposed to be paid but he made a promise telling us that he couldn't pay us until the 3rd the latest. So we told him okay no problem. On the 4th, he came to us telling us that we had to wait until Friday, that he didn't have the money, he had to sell his house and lot. When he finally paid us we got out two weeks' pay and then he told us that the business was closed down. We didn't get any letter stating that we were terminated. He owes us 4 weeks' pay at this point and we want to know how we can get our money from him. We've tried contacting him and wed don't get any information."

Voice of: BPO worker
"The staff went to look into Social Security and Labor to find out what the situation was. He was taking Social Security deductions from us. When we went to Social Security we found out that there was no Social Security being paid and we have a staff that is maternity leave and the first case came up when she came and she went to Social Security to make a claim for maternity and she couldn't get any because there was nothing registered. How unfair it is for us to come to work and try to continue to work on another campaign and we still haven't gotten paid and apart from that there was in September he held a week salary back from us stating that there was a change of ownership, a change of arrangements and investors would have paid us and saying that the investor is going to pay only one week. This has happen before."

And it's not only the workers who are left with their hands open and empty. The landlord who operates Zeus International Business Center also claims that Castillo owes over $24,000 dollars in rent.

Todd Ingram, President - Zeus International
"My business is affected because of the non-payment of rent. I am being put in a position where I have to lay off my own employees. I have to make deals with creditors simply because ACCETEL BPO hasn't paid a dime in their rent over the last 3 months. The most important thing was that Emroy should have been more communicative with his employees. I think that's the biggest issue that has really caused the issue that we are looking at now. Had he been forthcoming with where he actually was, how things are going then I am sure he would have had a better response from his employees. Now for future movement I would like to see his employees taken care of. For myself, it's just a learning business experience and I can write it off at the end of the year. These guys can't, they have some serious issues. I know some of them need to have maternity leave. There wasn't Social Security properly registered - all these are things are just atrocious in my mind."

We spoke with Castillo this afternoon and he states that the reason why he is having difficulty with payment is because of reluctant investors. He says that he resolved the Social Security issue today and added that he does not owe his employees anything because he has paid them. We were told that a follow up meeting is scheduled for tomorrow at 1. We'll have an update tomorrow.

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