Sit yourself down, this is going to be a long one.
Figuring out if I can have another extension on my contract was highly non-trivial. At first HR said no to me and some other people. But it turns out they were mistaken. Took me a few iterations with them to understand exactly what my contract position is though. In my case I can work here for up to 6 years, with two renewals along the way. Standard it is only 3 years though, hence the confusion.
Under Dutch law, temporary contracts are strictly limited. A person has to be offered a permanent contract after a certain number of renewals, or after the 3 (or 6) years. Fair enough if you work in a business, but this is killing for scientific positions. Post-docs either have to move into a staff position after a successful job, or leave. Since I formally work for one of the largest scientific employers of the country, I will be excluded from jobs even in another of their institutes.
One option is to become unemployed for 3 months, then the sheet is cleaned and they can offer me another temporary function. However, that constitutes a delay that is not always welcome. Though I wouldn't mind a three month holiday myself ;-)
Completely unrelated to my job search, but I need to get this off my chest.
I spent a morning in a small
claims court on Tuesday. When we moved here 4 years ago, the market
crashed and selling our house was no longer an option. So we rented it
out. The second tenant was a total jerk, didn't pay rent and left the
house a mess, so I filed a suit. The agency renting it out for me messed
up. The collecting agency messed up. And I was left on my own to make
amends as well as I could in front of a judge.
Apparently
in the Dutch legal system you cannot expect people to treat your house
with some measure of respect, even if they have a contractual obligation
to do so. Though he had to pay the rent, only the damages that we had
repair bills for were granted. In the end the legal fees were higher
than the money I got back. Lesson learned.
Free legal
advice to all of you renting a house here: don't pay your last month's
rent if you want your deposit back. The burden of proof is on the
landlord. And if you move out of the country, there is not a chance in
hell they will come an find you. Also, if you stay here, there are no
legal or other consequences, even though your contract says it is not
allowed.
Maybe I should have gone to law-school. For sure these people make much better salaries than a mere astronomer. And they can mess up without having to pay for the consequences.
Ilse, you have four potential lawyers in your family, so all is not lost!
ReplyDeleteMy dad has been a landlord since he acquired his granddad's home in the 1970s. He thereby inherited a renter who lived in the house since it was made into a rental place ('gevorderd') in 1945 (after his granddad died). The state has not let him adjust the rent to keep up with market rates, resulting in a situation that he was only to make minimal repairs to the house. Meanwhile the renter complained and complained about her outdated home..... She finally moved out 2 years ago due to dementia. Her son, a professor in Economics at RUG, had been supporting her complaints for all those years. Talking about unethical behavior.
To cut to the chase: renters have too many legal protections and loop holes in NL. And you are a victim of that too.