Do you know of, or have worked for a company that has filed chapter 11 bankruptcy?

I worked at a hotel that was in bankruptcy. Every little expenditure was reviewed by the Court. All checks over $50 had to be signed by the Master. And we were told that any theft, even pencils, was a federal crime.

A friend’s wife worked for a major corporation that went into bankruptcy. She was a computer programmer, and was kept on to maintain the mainframes until the company completely shut down. She was paid 2.5 times her previous salary to satay until the end, which was over a year later.

I was hired at Bloomingdale’s when they were in chapter 11. I don’t know if they had lay off right at the time they filed bankruptcy, but while I was there they changed the structure more than once. Management, sales, and support staff structure. Not only job descriptions changed, but also Pat structures changed often for the worse for employees, but sometimes not. Rarely did they have to let someone go, because retail has quite a bit of attrition anyway, but sometimes you were moved to a position you weren’t happy about.

Yes. Still work there. Just restructured debt. It wasnt a picnic to hear all the gossip but we didnt benefit either except keeping our jobs.

I worked through a bankruptcy. It started with a retail company of 800 employees, a large warehouse, a mail order operation mailing out catalogs, and stores in multiple states. In the end the stores were closed, the mail order stopped, and it was just the 30-person business-to-business team, making larger sales to corporate customers.

A larger company bought just that sales department out of the bankruptcy. It was buying a group of sales people and their rolodexes. Everything else was evaporated. The stock holders lost, the companies with unpaid invoices lost, the other employees lost.

But it worked out well for our little group. It was essentially keeping the same job, with the backing of a much larger and better-run company.

Businesses that file under chapter 11 are trying to survive, otherwise they would file under another chapter of the code. I would say there is a better chance that they will, than not, survive. It may look very different when they come out the other side though.

When I was about 18 or 19 I worked for a small local company that filed for either Chapter 7 or Chapter 11 – I don’t remember which. I remember not coming to work and the boss calling me and saying to come in just like before. I was a receptionist and so they wanted people to continue to believe that the company was continuing as before. I know the owner owed money to the IRS because the IRS was calling.

When it came time for taxes, they told me that my pay was as a contractor which was not what we agreed upon when I started working there. I filed my taxes and filled out some form (family member of mine is a CPA so he handled it) that specified why they were not giving me my tax forms). I told the IRS about how the agreement was that I was not a contractor. The IRS paid me my refund and I’m sure they added that to whatever the owner owed them.