made redundant

My husband and I are Americans living in England. Sent over by another company 3 years ago which has reneged on the expatriate agreement (lawyers doing something; or at least billing us...)

  He has been working for an American Telecom Company (with an office here) for 18 mos and is about to be laid off.  

There is no program for repatriation, moving package, benefits etc,  anyone else ever forseen this situation and have any advice?  We have a million questions and will be devastated financially with a nice goodbye and a paycheck for 2 wks to send us on our way-- home to no jobs, car, or house.   Any insights about unemployment benefit possibilities, suggestions or ideas are welcome.

Or even sympathy is good.  Thanks, hopefully someone can reveal a secret we don't know.

sorry to hear about your situation Iswood.  hopefully someone here can give ya some constructive information.  

i notice this was your first posting to the forum.  glad to have ya.  hope you visit us again ..soon.  

Geez...no fun at all.  Afraid I can't offer you any good advice, but sympathy I've got lots of.  

Best of luck and please let us know how it all turns out.

(And welcome from me, too.)  

Hello Iswood, so sorry to hear about your situation, and I must say that for them to screw you over like this is ridiculous. Slap them with a lawsuit, and good luck with it. I can't give any useful advice here but explore all of the options, which might be:

1) Speak to the American Embassy to see if they have any advice
2) Try consulting with other attorneys, such as the American attorneys listed on the Embassy website.
3) Use the media as a leverage, tell the company that you'll begin contacting American and UK media, to me this seems a story that they might want to avoid.

Shocking treatment, they should be hung out to dry. Please let us know how you get on? If the situation came up with someone else, any information would be extrememly useful.

<a href="http://www.usembassy.org.uk/">US Embassy London</a>

Another site might yield some information to you, the forum at
<a href="http://www.americanexpats.co.uk/">American Expats UK</a>

Best wishes, thoughts, and prayers.  

Leah

Thats horrible!!!! I've got a cousin living in London and a similar thing happened to her and her husband (both Americans) when they first got to London. They went with his job, and the company folded shortly after they moved there. They got through it, as he got another job after a while, but I know that they did go ahead and consult an Immigration Solicitor right away to help sort things out. There might be a loophole or something that will allow you to stay for longer than you might think, or something along those lines. I'm not sure about public assistance or snything - but my cousin said the Immigration Lawyer saved their lives. Cost a lot, but in the end they got to stay in England. I'm so sorry this happened to you, it's just rotten. Sounds like SOMEBODY needs a kick in the shins.

So sorry to hear about this. I can't offer much advise. Talking to a lawyer might help. Give you different options as to what you can and can't do here in UK. Good luck.