Luke’s Unexpected Unemployment – Savvy Journeys

In today’s rapidly changing job market, redundancy has become an unfortunate reality for many workers. Whether it’s due to economic downturns, company restructuring, or unforeseen circumstances, being made redundant can be a daunting and overwhelming experience.

In this podcast, follow us on this Savvy journey as Luke shares, his personal journey of sudden job loss, career transition, and the emotional toll that comes with redundancy.

Enjoyed our podcast but not a member yet? Sign up now!

If you have your very own story to share, you can do so via any of the
links below.

Credits

Host: Stacey Chew & Doa Demir

Producer: Josh Butt

Connect with Us

Get in touch

Email us at contact@creditsavvy.com.au for enquiries or PR/collaboration opportunities.

INTRO:  From the Credit Savvy team, hello and welcome to Chat Savvy. We’re here to help you take control of your credit life and empower you in your financial journeys one episode at a time.

STACEY: Welcome back to another episode of Chat Savvy guys! I’m Stacey Chew.

DOA: And I’m Doa Demir, from Credit Savvy.

DOA: Before we get started, Thank you Stacey for letting me host this episode.

STACEY: You’re most welcome Doa!

DOA: So let’s kick it off!

For the ones listening to us for the first time, each month we reveal a new member story and their financial journeys here.

STACEY: And if you have a story to share about your financial experiences, we would love to hear from you.

You can find us on Facebook, Instagram or your could email us at. Just check our show notes for how to get in touch with us.

DOA: Recently, we’ve had a new story come in.. Stacey, please tell us the background of this one.

STACEY: Well Doa, as we’ve all seen in the news, many companies are going through a tough time and making the decision to layoff their staff. I know of a few people that got impacted by it and it’s absolutely heart-breaking just hearing it all.

DOA: One of our listener’s has actually written in to share his experience on this topic and to protect the personal identity of this person, we will call him, Luke.

STACEY: Okay, this is Luke’s story:

“Last year, I found out that my wife, Dala, was pregnant and I thought, “wow, I’ve got a big journey ahead.” I had a bit of savings on the side, so took out a home loan, found a two-bedroom apartment. We moved to a bigger place for our daughter. It all happened so fast.”

DOA:  Big changes indeed.

STACEY: “I heard on the news about the economic uncertainty, but I still had a job that paid well and my wife had a part-time job in childcare, so I tuned out from all of the noise. I ignored everything I heard around me, until Dala asked for help with the grocery shop.

It was then when I realised that whatever I grabbed –  meats, milk, eggs, cabbage – everything had gone up in price and I just didn’t know what to buy without over spending.

I shared this with Dala and she laughed at me and explained that the same amount now gets her about 80% of the groceries she used to get. This was when I truly began following the Reserve Bank (RBA) updates and the climb of interest rates.

Every time the RBA increased their rates I thought, what does it mean for us? How does this affect my mortgage? How long is this going to go on like this? I didn’t have the answers at the time and some of it, I still don’t.

How was I let go? Well, I worked for a US company and it was with 40 other people who got let go and it felt like a punch to the gut. A week after my wife had given birth to our daughter, –“

DOA: Oh no this is not good.

STACEY: “It was a Friday night, around 10.30 pm. My phone was buzzing; it was Slack. I thought, that’s an unusual time for this constant buzz, so I checked what was going on. I saw a message pop up saying, “we’ve made the hard but necessary decision to..” and then everything else was a blur. There was a long list of names, most of the people I know. Then I saw my name last and got removed from the Slack channel immediately after.

STACEY:  I can’t believe that was how they told people.. over Slack! Okay there’s more.

“I just froze for a minute. I checked my emails to see if anyone had notified me prior. Nothing there. A pop-up then said that my email was disabled, and I stared back at the screen for a while. I was shell shocked. I have never been made redundant in my life. I used to think that this would never happen to a hardworking man like myself.”

DOA: I am so sorry to hear this has happened to you, Luke! But, it almost seems like last year’s layoff strategy was more about either closing down a specific region, or letting go of a specific team, you know, focusing on entire groups, rather than individual’s and their performance, so I guess luck may have also played a part?

STACEY:  Yeah, perhaps.. he goes on to say..

“I remember walking up to my wife holding our daughter and I was shocked, embarrassed, angry and confused. Maybe it’s the way I grew up but when I looked at my wife and daughter, I felt like I had failed them.

DOA: This is a hard conversation to have. I feel for him.

STACEY: Absolutely.

Luke then says that “it was hard in the beginning, but I pushed through and besides, I had a family at home as a source of motivation. Paying the mortgage and bills on time and checking my credit score became a very important part of my life.

You don’t really expect that, after studying two degrees and having over five years of working experience you would be falling into financial hardship – I won’t lie, it’s frustrating. I never thought that I would be the one shopping late at night to find the half-price meat, or keep a spreadsheet to track know how much electricity and food are costing, but it taught me a lot.”

DOA: I think we’ve been seeing more and more people being laid off due to the economic landscape and if I were in a similar situation and where possible, personally I would take a bit of break to think about where I want to head in my life, what is next in my life and keep track of my finances.

STACEY: Yeah and Doa, how would you keep track of your finance? Like do you have any tips and tricks that your follow?

DOA: For example, I think there is nothing to be ashamed off for buying discounted items – especially in this climate. When you buy things, think about do you really need this or do I want this? It’s not the time to overspend, or to make reckless decisions. Now is the time to be even smarter about money.

STACEY:  There is no such thing as ‘fun-employment” especially when you’ve got a family to support. You know I really resonated with Luke when he said he looks for discounted items because I think a lot of us do and actually I recently heard about a grocery hack. If you go to Coles or Woolies for example and the item is on discount,  but is out of stock, you can go up to the staff and ask for a rain check and when the stock comes back in, you’ll get it at the same price.

I also think that researching and reading up on ways to be financially savvy and gaining that knowledge is so important. If you’re listening you might struggle like I do with the financial jargons and it being intimidating, come and check out great articles on our learn centre where information and financial tips are more digestible and easier to understand.  I find that things constantly evolve and you just want to be on top of it.

DOA: Yeah, absolutely.

Stacey: Unfortunately, that’s all that we have time for today. Thank you Luke, for sharing your experience with us and our listeners.

We hope that this experience has only made you stronger and put you on a better path full of opportunities. The team here at Credit Savvy wishes you only the best.

DOA: Thank you for listening.

STACEY: Bye!

DOA: Bye.