Yes I was also advised to keep turning up for work.
UPDATE:
Went to Council of Labor Affairs (5F, No.83, Sec. 2, YenPIng N. Rd, Taipei City) and discovered that my work permit has not yet been cancelled.
Filed labor dispute claim with Taipei City Government, Department of Labor.
Received very helpful advice from Labor Rights Association. They are located at 6F, No. 25, Lane 344, Nanjing W. Rd. (02)25596233. Should anyone have a similar problem in the future, I highly recommend contacting tem. There is a man there who speaks very good English. They were very well-informed, supportive, and sympathetic.
Now it’s just a matter of waiting to see what happens next.
Just want to say good on you for doing something about this.
Alot of people would just whine and moan but never do anything, leaving the path clear for the boss to do it to the next person.
Round of applause :bravo:
Thanks. I know I’m not alone. I’ve seen many excellent editors, many talented and creative people, come and go from this company in the two and a half years I’ve been there. They seem to have an official policy of maintaining a high employee turnover rate!!(’
’) It’s very hard to understand, because it certainly doesn’t improve the quality of their product. When people are harassed to the point where no one cares anymore, the quality of everyone’s work is bound to go down.
Anyway, here’s to finding a better job sometime soon!
Thanks for all the good advice.
Thank you very much for posting this useful information, both Skipper and the others with information on how to handle labor disputes. Perhaps the moderator could make this thread sticky?
Also, Skipper, please keep us informed as to what happens … and BTW, did you confront your (ex-)employer about filing the labor dispute, your knowledge of the law, and what he owes you? I’d love to hear how he reacted to that. If more people were willing to do what you’re doing and fight these asshole bosses (of which there are too many), it will start teaching them that they can’t screw us around because we DO have rights and will not just sit back and take that kind of unfair treatment like many Taiwanese tend to do. Good for you, girl! 
Got a pm from someone who asked me how it was possible that this company had issued me four work permits in two and a half years, and I thought it was worth explaining to everyone in case others were wondering.
I received work permits in September of 2002, 2003, and 2004 (that makes three). Then, in February 2005, the company told all foreign employees that they neded to apply for new work permits for us. We were told that they were changing the official name of the company “for tax reasons,” which would make our old work permits, issued under the old name, invalid. So they issued me a new work permit, valid from February 2005 to February 2006, and cancelled the previous one.
They fired me a month later. I still haven’t heard anything from the company since I was fired, though I’ve heard from ex-coworkers that they are discussing my situation with almost everyone else. My labor hearing is scheduled for tomorrow afternoon. I’ll keep you all posted on what happens.
This morning my employer contacted me for the first time since I was fired. I recieved an email that read:
"Dear Miss (my name),
Just to fill everyone in on how the process is working. 
My employer didn’t show up for the meeting yesterday. When the mediator called them, the company secretary claimed that they never received the notice. That seems odd though, considering they contacted me for the first time in three weeks yesterday morning. We’re going to try having another meeting on May 13th. The mediator therefore only recorded my side of the story and wrote down my requests. He seemed very sympathetic, but that doesn’t really count for all that much.
The next meeting will be what they call conciliation, where I guess the two sides just present their case to see if they can agree on something. If that doesn’t work, then we move on to another step called mediation. I’m not really clear on what the difference is.
The mediator also told me that there is still a chance that my work permit could be cancelled. In the letter they sent me yesterday mroning, they said that they were going to cancel my work permit on April 30th. The mediator called and asked them not do that until the labor dispute is settled, but they may very well do it anyway.
I’m reviewing my options.
Skipper,
Thank you very much for keeping us informed.
FYI, conciliation is an attempt to have the disputants reach an agreement/settlement on their own while mediation is an attempt to settle the dispute through a third party (mediator) who both parties are supposed to accept as neutral.
If the employer tries any dirty tricks, call the Labour Rights Association again right away. They will probably be willing to kick up a stink on your behalf.
“Also, the letter is all in Chinese, so my computer showed it on screen as nothing but underlines where the characters should be”
Right click your mouse go to encoding and choose Chinese Big Five and it should be legible.
[quote=“Skipper”]Just to fill everyone in on how the process is working.
My employer didn’t show up for the meeting yesterday. When the mediator called them, the company secretary claimed that they never received the notice. That seems odd though, considering they contacted me for the first time in three weeks yesterday morning. We’re going to try having another meeting on May 13th. The mediator therefore only recorded my side of the story and wrote down my requests. He seemed very sympathetic, but that doesn’t really count for all that much.
The next meeting will be what they call conciliation, where I guess the two sides just present their case to see if they can agree on something. If that doesn’t work, then we move on to another step called mediation. I’m not really clear on what the difference is.
The mediator also told me that there is still a chance that my work permit could be cancelled. In the letter they sent me yesterday mroning, AMC said that they were going to cancel my work permit on April 30th. The mediator called and asked them not do that until the labor dispute is settled, but they may very well do it anyway.
I’m reviewing my options.[/quote]
Skipper, I’m curious to know if you have any updates on this.