Security guards attached to Integrated Security Service were told on Tuesday that they will receive their January and February salaries on Good Friday.
The guards who were told last Friday when they went to collect their salaries that they will have to revisit the Trinity Street office in New Amsterdam on Tuesday, were not pleased when the news was broken to them.
Angry guards attached to Integrated Security Services protesting for their January and February salaries
When Guyana Times visited the office, one guard was given a telephone and appeared to be speaking to an office clerk from the head office in Georgetown.
“Come and talk to us face to face, this is nonsense… So why we got to wait, that month gone, this month already done and we still got to get part money? Hello if alyu know aluy na bin able, alyu shouldn’t tek ova this place…” a female guard said and then handed the phone to the local office staff.
The guards have visited the company’s New Amsterdam office on several occasions since January for their January salaries and more recently for their February salaries as well. The most recent visit was on Friday when many of the guards were forced to wait until night before they were told that they will not be paid then but needed return to the office on Tuesday for their salaries.
For many of them, it is a $400 car fare with no guarantee that they will receive what they worked for.
Vanessa Rose of Rose Hall queried following the announcement, “Who pays on Good Friday?”
Rose noted that when they were at the office last Friday night, they were offered $5000 and told to return in four days. “He say that money should last until today Tuesday… We cannot wait till Good Friday; we want things, Easter coming up…. Good Friday is to go to church… Who gon leave and come till to New Amsterdam and then you don’t know if you will get it. It is not fair, if the company can’t handle it, let them give it over to somebody else,” she suggested. Like many of the other guards, Rose does not want a job that has no payday but refuses to walk off for fear that it might then become more difficult to receive her January and February salaries.
Meanwhile, Volda Cort says it is not only the lack of a salary, but that lack of payment has compounded the situation as GPL, GTT and GWI have not expressed any sympathy with them. The furniture stores are now threatening to reposes while those who she borrowed from are no longer calling since the phone is off; they are making personal appearances, claiming that they too have commitments.
Many of the workers are single parents, with school-age children. Some say they have to beg for money to get to and from work.
Meanwhile, guards in Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice) who are employed by the same company are also being made to wait for their salaries. The situation is the same with monies allegedly being owed for the months of December and January.
