Reply to: Whats going on at Albany?

[candyflipper]

Albany were one of the biggest, longest running and best managed companies offering this kind of service.

I agree; Albany seemed to be on the ball and more competent than the others. But I have to say they were still unprofessional overall.

Albany used spreadsheets for all their accounting, not a proper accounting package that ensures money within the system isn't created or destroyed. Their spreadsheets actually had data entry errors occasionally. And their were also accounting errors in the calculations.

At least they had enough sense to encrypt the spreadsheets.

I'm blown away by the 550k loss across six contractors. Why would so many contractors trust mirasol to that extent?

[Umbrellaphobic]

Good advice.

I now realise how important it is to make sure you get the contract terms screwed down as best you can. Things like demanding weekly invoicing and payment within 7 days of invoice submission otherwise it's down tools immediately until payment is received.

This is something many of the larger and more professional agencies can cater for (with weekly BACS runs etc), even if they don't like to admit it because they prefer to get payment terms strung out to a month or more for cash flow reasons.

Obviously this may be more difficult to achieve in the current economic climate where the chance of any work means people will be willing to open themselves to more risk in the hope it never happens to them. But if the agency isn't willing to come close to those kind of terms or is unable to stick to them you've got to worry about why that is. Complacency can be costly.

I'm sure the directors / shareholders of this company are exposed: My invoice went in on 5th January, money arrived in their account circa 8th January (almost 20K for Nov / Dec), they knew there was a problem in December.

I'm taking it further.

Pity I don't live in London...

[PAH]

If they are not able to stay in business, then I would have a great concern of any other agents/umbrella/service company and would be making sure that all possible funds were in my account, not accepting any excuses for late payments and stopping work or taking legal action immediately.

Good advice.

I now realise how important it is to make sure you get the contract terms screwed down as best you can. Things like demanding weekly invoicing and payment within 7 days of invoice submission otherwise it's down tools immediately until payment is received.

This is something many of the larger and more professional agencies can cater for (with weekly BACS runs etc), even if they don't like to admit it because they prefer to get payment terms strung out to a month or more for cash flow reasons.

Obviously this may be more difficult to achieve in the current economic climate where the chance of any work means people will be willing to open themselves to more risk in the hope it never happens to them. But if the agency isn't willing to come close to those kind of terms or is unable to stick to them you've got to worry about why that is. Complacency can be costly.

[pzz76077]

Wow, much sympathy is due. O&G travelling all round the world is not an easy business to be in.

My record in my younger days was 31 countries in 12 months, only 5 last year though.

Also, owing money to oil workers is generally not good for your health.
One of my team left school at 15 to become a bare knuckle prize fighter before getting in on the 70s oil wave in South America then spending 15 years working up to platform manager, (followed by 5 years at MIT to gain a MSc in organizational psychology, which is what he does now, man management).
He is the size of a whale and God help anyone that he catches who has anything to do with this.

PZZ

[Fred Bloggs]

several hundred, or possibly several thousand at a guess.

PZZ

Wow, much sympathy is due. O&G travelling all round the world is not an easy business to be in.

[pzz76077]

Wow, I can see how those are some very, very pi55ed off guys.

several hundred, or possibly several thousand at a guess.

PZZ

[Fred Bloggs]

Wow, I can see how those are some very, very pi55ed off guys.

[pzz76077]

I'm at a loss to understand how anyone could lose 2 or 3 years pay to an outfit like this? Did these guys not get paid for 2 or 3 years? How has that happened?

Mirasol was one of these split schemes- you got paid something like 25% locally in say Belgium and paid tax on that. The other 75% stayed in the Swiss bank of Mirasol. Every quarter, I think it was, you could opt to take out some or all of the money, pay tax on it or leave it there gaining interest.
The contractors that I know would have been able to legally take the money in the Mirasol account tax free back to their own country, Argentina, Indonesioa whatever, after the end of their European contract, once they had left the local tax system for a certain period of time.

You can see that this kind of arrangement would enable many to retire rich after 5 years or so working.

I the area that I contact in, oil and oilfield services, its not uncommon for contractors to be in the tax systems of 5 or more different countries in any given year and this sort of scheme is almost universally used by thousands of self employed consultants and contractors around the world to maximize their earnings.

Oh and 4 out of the 6 I know have not been paid since Nov just to make things worse.

PZZ

[Fred Bloggs]

I'm at a loss to understand how anyone could lose 2 or 3 years pay to an outfit like this? Did these guys not get paid for 2 or 3 years? How has that happened?

[pzz76077]

Do you know what is going on with Mirasol. Very hard to get in touch with them. They cannot pay from December.

From what I gather there is one girl in Mirasols Swiss office answering the phone but essentially telling everyone that she just takes messages and doesnt know anything.
I have been told that Mirasol are really a BVI registered company and if it is the case and all of the money is gone, then there is nothing that can be do to try and trace where it went.

I now have heard from 6 people that have lost nearly 550k between them. Between 2 and 3 years pay gone, and they are left with nothing but wondering how they are going to earn that again in todays contracting climate. War chests = a big fat zero.

A sad state of affairs.

Albany were one of the biggest, longest running and best managed companies offering this kind of service.
If they are not able to stay in business, then I would have a great concern of any other agents/umbrella/service company and would be making sure that all possible funds were in my account, not accepting any excuses for late payments and stopping work or taking legal action immediately.

Im just happy that Im out of contracting for good in another 2 months.



PZZ

[Fred Bloggs]

Bad enough having to rely on clients and agencies being solvent. Doesn't having a man co in the food chain just make the risk higher without adding any value to the contractor?

[PAH]

4 contractors in my team have lost 300k between them.

There's me feeling sorry for myself because it looks like I've lost just over 10k in similar circumstances via another agency.

Basically boils down to the agency's overheads (premises, staff, flash suits and cars, vats of hair gel,...) being too large for the margins they make on the contracts, mixed with lots and lots of incompetence from their staff. So in tough times like these the worst ones go to the wall, which isn't a bad thing if we could do something to make sure we avoid the bad ones. Credit checks are useless when it only takes a short period of time for it to all go tits up.

I'm really sick of agencies. They offer so little but an endless amount of grief. Shame no-one in the industry has enough about them to do something to get rid of these parasites.

[fred7777]

Mirasol

Do you know what is going on with Mirasol. Very hard to get in touch with them. They cannot pay from December.

[pzz76077]

Anyone any idea whats going on there. Some colleagues said that they received emails saying that they were changing banks and having some issues .. then some receiving calls/mails from a company called Von Hessen proposing to pick up the contract from Albany .....

Are Albany ok and Von Hessen just trying to jump on an opportunity??

Cheers!
Paul

Yep, you are screwed basically, RBS pulled Albanys line of credit and now they dont have your money to pay you.

Hopefully, you are not in on the Mirasol split as well as you will have lost all of your life savings also. 4 contractors in my team have lost 300k between them.

Happy days!

PZZ

[NeillC]

No, they're in lots of trouble by the looks of things, and it's been going on for a while.

http://www.recruiter.co.uk/albany-ap...003980.article

http://www.recruiter.co.uk/albany-an...004084.article

I'm owed money from November and December, and there's no sign of it coming yet. I've been told that they're trying to pay, but can't sort out the bank problems.

E-mail responses are becoming less frequent, and I'm getting deeper into financial trouble, and I'm sure I'm not alone.