Don't Let This Happen To You

[Informed]

Do Not Let This Happen to You


I am sitting in the City of Lights right now, which is not bad, when I should be sitting in one of the cities of a thousand nights. Partly our fault, for sure, but we wanted to share this experience so that you do not let this happen to you.

Back in February we went to the Search fair, had a few interviews, but nothing panned out. We really wanted to be posted in the Middle East. This made our choices limited. By April we said OK we will try again and this time we went on a P.R. campaign via e-mail. Surprisingly, we got quite a few nibbles and one of them was from the Middle East. So, of course, we went for it.

Everything was falling right into place. He school was a State Department sponsored, which we were very happy about, the package was up to par, and the phone interview went really well. The administrators seamed great. They were warm, knowledgeable, and appeared sincere in their endeavor to create a good school. They gave us an offer and we accepted. Regrettably, that was the last good thing that happened.

For two weeks after we did the welcome aboard e-mails, nothing was really moving visa wise. We received one or two general informational e-mails from the business manager that were addressed to all the new hires. In his e-mails he kept mentioning a woman and wrote about her as if everyone knew who she was. So, I asked and found out that she was the agent taking care of the visas. She was also the agent that was suppose to have contacted us but got our e-mail address wrong and never bothered to get the correct one. And that began the downward spiral.

To start off, we had some issues that we were not sure would pass us through the visa process and we were upfront about it. I went ahead and checked out our destination country?s embassy website (Saudi Arabia) to see the requirements for a work visa. The website was very clear and we knew from the start that my husband would have to send off his undergrad degrees to be authenticated by his country of origin. We talked about all of this with the agent and asked her how she wanted to move forward and when we should send off the papers. Her reply? ?No, no, he is one of us now. Don?t worry, I will take care of it.? She was so confident about it that, while we questioned it, we went along with it. One month later and we hadn?t heard a word from her.

When we contacted her, she had no idea who we were. In fact, she started telling my husband off because she thought he was some guy with a similar name that was suing her for discrimination. After we straightened that out, we found out that she had done nothing for us and didn?t remember who we were. After reminding her of who we were and of our situation she told us to contact and agent in another country. Why in the world? ???!!!... would we do that???!!!

In subsequent dealings with her I could see exactly why she was being sued. Besides being extremely condescending and always had a belittling comment before answering a question, she would make statements like; ?You know your people. They don?t like to work.? Needless to say, my husband was insulted by the ethnic comments and I was insulted by her attacks on my intelligence. I put a stop to her comments but there was nothing I could do to stop her utter incompetence. This is not an exaggeration either.

Literally, everything she did or said for us or to us was wrong. By the time August rolled around we found out that she had not even submitted our visa application to the consulate! Sadly, getting the business manager and administrators involved in the process did nothing for us. Yet, we wanted this to work so we forged ahead and did everything possible to make it work. This was in spite of the Israeli Lebanon conflict raging nearby.

Oh, and did I mention that we got pregnant one month after accepting the offer?

At the same time as all of the visa issues we were also preparing to leave. We were packing, storing, arranging, and buying. We had wanted to take a little vacation and when asked the business manager said we could buy our own tickets and be reimbursed for the same amount as a regular ticket to Saudi Arabia. Those tickets cost over $2200. I also bought a new $2000 laptop in anticipation of the projects I would be working on with my new special needs students. In addition, not only did I have to buy maternity clothes but I also had to buy clothes that were acceptable for the Saudi Arabian dress code. Oh, and let?s not forget the fees for the medical and visa.

In the end, our visas were so screwed up and confused that by September we were still sitting State side; and doing so without jobs. We were reassured over and over that all would be well. I even resigned my then current position in August. Our would be Principal also called to reassure us that all would be well and lamented on how she too had had difficulties with her visa and did not get to Saudi until late September. We were even told that we would be paid from August 19th since none of the visa problems were our fault.

During the first week of September we were told that our visas were rejected! Why? Apparently, everyone thought I was Moslem because my husband is and never caught that I put Christian on the application. I?m no going to say any more about Saudi and religion. ?And we never heard from anyone at the school again. E-mails to them requesting reimbursement for the air tickets were ignored. Not one peep from them. We didn?t ask for the salary they promised was waiting for us and not any of our other expenditures. Just for the air tickets. All we got was dead air.

So, we were so fed up that we hopped on a plane to the City of Lights to relax and enjoy the birth of our first child. We have no income and are living in a tiny kitchenette, but we are happy. Totally screwed, but happy.

Look for the full story in my coming book and don?t let this happen to you!
The search begins anew.

[bigzenman]

On this site feel free to post the name of the school for the benefit of others.

[tellus]

The purpose of this site is to warn people of these kinds of situations - thank you for doing so, but your warning would be far more effective if the name of the school were given.
Three years ago we were offered jobs by the former airline school in Saudi - is it called the American International School of Jeddah now? At the time of the offer, the administrators told us up front that 8 couples had not been granted visas the previous year when fall came, and the school was being sued but that the govt. office had denied the visas, not the school. Still, people were hurt. Due to these administrators' honesty and integrity, they warned all applicants of this situation. We did not take jobs there; we couldn't risk it. Numerous others did not - and some did, and did get their visas. There are good administrators out there; we have been fortunate and worked for some; yet we have missed others, like the ones in Jeddah at that time.

[Guest]

My husband and I were one of the couples hurt by not getting visas for the SAIS (the airline school). As well, two other couples were good friends of ours. We were told in early July that that the jobs we had been given were no longer. We were worried more than anything as it was very late in the year to be jobless. I agree that the school did the best they could to inform us but at the time they had no reasons as to why visas were denied.
We were very fortunate, with the help of a wonderful search associate, Sally Gordon, to find last minute jobs at the anglo-american school in St. Petersburg, Russia. It turned out to be a small but wonderful school and the city was amazing. We had excellent administators, Nancy Hoppe the first year and then turned over to Ron Gleason. Both were very effective, caring administrators.

Both of the other couples that we are friends with also landed excellent last minute jobs.

If you are in that last minute, I got screwed situation, don't give up. There are often many last min. positions right into the new school year at some very decent schools. I think that with the supposed teacher shortage there will be even more last min. jobs than ever in the coming years.

[Informed]

WOW, thanks for taking the time to read that extra long posting.

I didn't want to mention names only because i wanted to focus in on the situation, which can happen at any school.

So, not only does Saudi seem to have a problem but so does the same school..... currently AIS Jeddah. New management, same problem.

If the Business Manager had only said there were often times visas were denied i would not have laid out all that money for airfare. Better yet, they should scrutinize all applications for visas before they are submitted. That would have prevented our rejection!

I wonder how AIS R and AIS D get through the process... do they have the same problems as Jeddah?

[Guest]

I actually contacted Aramco at the time to see if they were having the same problems with their staff receiving visas and we were told they had not experienced any problems at all. HMMM interesting.

[TexianTravel]

My husband and I worked in Saudi for 7 months at Asir Academy. It was supposed to be 9, but we also had visa trouble. We spent two months of "you're leaving in a week...no, you're not...you're leaving in two days...no, you're not..." which was incredibly stressful. To the school's credit, they paid us our salaries even though we hadn't made it into the country yet. Once there, we never got our work visas, which is the reason we are no longer there. Among others.

The thing you have to remember about Saudi is it's a monarchy. Everything is based off of personal power. Every school has to have a sponsor. If your sponsor is a powerful company owned by one of the powerful princes, you get your stuff. If it isn't, you get jacked around as so many of us have experienced. Frequently the school's hands are as tied as they say they are. It is an unfortunate reality of that society.

Which by the way, their own people can't take. Why do you think Saudis travel so much?