Teleidoscope

Mon, Aug 06, 2007

Vanishing Companies

Posted at 7:45 pm MDT to Miscellaneous

Considering the fact that I have worked in software since 1981, I have worked for very few companies. My current company is only my fifth employer. Proving that is a little trickier, though I have documentary evidence: I have W2s (somewhere) going all the way back. But verifying it could be a problem.

The first three companies I worked for (1981 to 1984, 1985 to 1993, 1993 to 1996) no longer exist. The first one just died a while after I left. The second one (my first period as a consultant) got merged. The third one went through a series of mergers and takeovers and ended up inside IBM, but I doubt that IBM has the employment records available.

The fourth company, at the time I resigned, had been swallowed by a very large corporation in its industry. The signs on the buildings had been changed by the time I left, but my W2 for 2000 still reflects the corporate name from the previous round of mergers. (My employer had 4 names during the 4 years I worked there because of mergers.)

The big corporation has a process that prospective employers can use to find out if you worked for them in the past. Very handy. Unfortunately, I am told, the merging of the payroll systems was not completely successful, so people who left the company that was swallowed before about 2002 are not reported properly. I left n the summer of 2000.

The existence of gaps in the coverage of the official process is not mentioned anywhere official. The paperwork for my next gig was stalled, because the process came up empty when they tried to verify my previous employment. I called HR at the location where I worked (which fortunately still exists) who told me about the problem with the official system, and they are supposed to be sorting things out.

I wonder if employment records for the next employer back still exist in the depths of IBM somewhere? My 401K eventually ended up in an IBM program...

The first two companies are probably untraceable.

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