Better.com, who’s founder and CEO, Vishal Garg has been in news for laying off 900 people on a zoom call is set for another round of lay offs in the company. In an email to employees, Kevin Ryan, CFO & Interim President, Better.com, mentioned that since the real estate industry is facing a huge drop in the organisation volume due to rising interest rates. To make ends meet, the company will have to take this difficult call of further streamlining its teams in the US and India.
“We must take the difficult step of streamlining our operations further and reducing our workforce in both the U.S. and India in a substantial way,” states the mail by Ryan to its employees.
Though, in the email to employees, which has also been published by the company on its website does not state the exact number of employees who will lose their jobs, but as per media reports, between 3000 to 4000 people are likely to get affected.
Ryan further mentions in the mail that these layoffs are not happening on the basis of any performance issues of Better.com employees. It is purely on the basis of the bad condition of the company. “This decision is driven heavily by the headwinds affecting the residential real estate market; it is in no way a reflection on the personal performance of any departing team members, all of whom have contributed to Better’s success,” mentions Ryan in the mail.
The layoffs will happen all across departments and as per some media reports, the layoff process will start from March 09 itself.
The company will also give financial support to its departing employees. As per Better.com, all affected employees are eligible for a minimum of 60 working days pay, which can go up to 80 working days as part of the severance payment scheme of Better.com.
The company will also extend the health insurance coverage of departing employees in the US through the month of March and will provide three months of COBRA (Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, which gives workers and their families who lose their health benefits the right to choose to continue group health benefits provided by their group health plan for limited periods of time under certain circumstances such as voluntary or involuntary job loss and more) coverage for which the company will pay the premium.
The company has also tied up with professional services firm to give assistance to departing employees in finding job opportunities elsewhere. Departing employees will also get access to job interview training modules. Moreover, depending upon the employee’s individual circumstances and to the extent allowed, the company will not enforce the existing non-compete provisions but the non-disclosure policy will remain in effect. Ryan also mentions that every affected employee will be contacted by the leadership team directly on their personal mobile phones.
But the company has also conveyed to the employees, that they would expect most of the separations to happen immediately.
Earlier Garg and Better.com has been in news for casually handling the layoffs of 900 employees which happened over a zoom call. The company’s reputation went for a toss when a video of that zoom call was posted on social media by an employee. After this fiasco, many top leaders of the company resigned and Garg himself went on a long break and has joined back recently.
