Thread regarding American Electric Power Co. Inc. layoffs

I know someone that just got a 5% raise but they are the last knowledgeable person in what use to be a decent department. That is an outlaying raise, mine was 2.8%

How are you all feeling about raises? Is 2% about where everyone is going?

AEP has all but forfeited the revenue from its OPCOs as state assemblies and commissions move forward with legislation to strip AEP of its state granted monopolies to stop the economic strip mining of their states' economies and subjugation of their constituencies by hedge fund corporate te------ts and out of state major shareholder tyrants.

Legacy employees have seen this same song and dance time and time again. Tell employees what they want to hear to shut them up and string them along while deliberately failing to execute what is promised. That is why corporate wants to get rid of legacy employees, so they can exploit yet another generation of young and naïve employees, who do not know better and do not have anyone to tell them the irrefutable truth. Listen to your elders that aren't in C-suites, they will not lie to you.

I'm not sure anyone should do anything other than collect your paycheck and go home. Weekends will be off limits to the company after June 1st and I will not have a problem telling my supervisor that As for the week, I'll give them 40 hours and that's it.

Hopelessness setting in? I know I am not the only one. We are all backed by a conglomerate of silence with zero direction and feeling lostI I get it! I’m in the same boat, and THIS boat is leaking. No matter the amount of furious bailing, THE boat is sinking. The sinking is only the beginning and what came before will seem easy while what comes after, will likely be worse.

There has not been a break in the wall in the last 6+ months with announcement after announcement being progressively worse than the next. Picking up where legacy knowledge was FORCED out the door with zero consideration of what things would look like once they “left” while they were screaming, I MATTER!

Those left standing in the aftermath of “the purge” in the name of “flattening” picked up the slack and pushed themselves to a breaking point at times and are still doing so. Only to have this CEO put out initial messaging of “collaboration”, which is now a clear desperate excuse for RTO.

Next message was SOLIDARITY…. Your butt + GPS coordinates of an unknown location or undefined number of miles that makes you except from a mandate = showing the “frontline” employees they matter to you. BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!

Scratch that, it wasn’t really about showing SOLIDARITY, now it is really about SAFETY, and guess what? SAFETY WAS ABYSMAL last year, and those of you that were NOT in the field, and continued plugging away doing more with less, are at fault! You are horrible at your jobs, have done NOTHING, and you cannot be trusted! The only way to right this ship is to move your derrière (after Reddit said so before I could) to new, yet to be defined GPS coordinates, no matter the cost to efficiency, productivity, talent acquisition/retention, or employee acceptance/satisfaction.

However, DO NOT FEAR these are exciting times! (Insert sarcasm). Oh… and…. we are also changing the 2025 incentive structure s o that you will LITERALLY have no chance of achieving. YES, EXCITING TIMES INDEED!! Get PUMPED!! Pumped to suffer together in a yet to be disclosed location, not of your choice or convenience, because we want you to mentally break or rage quit!

The problem could NOT have simply been due to the decision of the CEO to obliterate people from groups across the entire company with no regard, thus placing more stress across the entire organization that lead to distractions and exhaustion, right? Nah!

Additionally, groups of people that have NO bearing on the SAFETY metrics are NOW the NEW reason (or scapegoats) for upending everything! They are somehow responsible for that “abysmal” performance as well! Does the mean that those on the “front-lines” are ONLY ever able focus and remain safe when someone else’s rear-end is stationed at specific GPS coordinates?

More likely, and logically it is that the job of someone in the field is already inherently unsafe, but when you create additional undue stress it is almost certain to manifest in the form of injuries or worse.

Does AEP really care about their employees? Additionally, if you don’t care for employees, can you really care for customers as you claim? After all, charity starts at home, right?

When AEP's monopoly in their service territories are revoked the new companies seeking to fill the void will be offering current and former AEP employees the opportunity to build back better without the corporate baggage that has alienated customers and employees. Coming in the Summer or early Fall of 2025.

The comments about employees holding the power and the strong insinuations employees should fight back against anyone in a leadership position seems overwhelming. I sadly walked away from AEP back in the summer because I shared a lot of the frustration exhibited on this board. I say sadly because I was there for two decades and most of it was great. However, I am in a far better spot than I was when I was at AEP. I can't imagine trying to strategize against leadership in any kind of meaningful way. My experience was that most of leadership had no real authority or autonomy to do anything. It feels like a fool's errand to engage with leadership at AEP, much less "fight back." I left and it was very easy. Much easier than I imagine trying to stage mutiny as some are suggesting. Don't lose sight of what really matters. It's just a job, if you are truly mad enough to consider an uprising, take a pause and realize you can walk away. Don't be silly or self righteous.

Are the new affordable apartment complexes being built in Columbus and Reynoldsburg intended to house the H1B Visa workers, if Vivek is elected the next Governor of Ohio? Ohio corporations subsidizing their cheap H1B Visa workforce with taxpayer funded affordable housing. Ohio tax payers paying for the affordable housing the immigrants, who are going to take their jobs, are going to live in. You just can't make this stuff up. Corporate America is going to enrich major shareholders even if it means betraying the American people in a futile attempt to satiate their insatiable greed. We truly are coming full circle to the days leading up to the American Revolution. I think this is the Founding Fathers' WTF moment.

Employees will respond with their feet and lack of productivity. Expect projects to come in late and over budget.

CEOs and other Corporate Officers are a micro-minority in our society. It is time we started exploiting their inferiority.

The .88 was about spot on so good source for the guy who posted it a week or so ago. Mine was higher that I was expecting, I was thinking in the .5 range. No promotion, but wasn't expecting any, mobility is pretty much gone. Merit was 2.5%, that will cover the added expenses come June so I broke even. When factoring in inflation of 2%, I'm losing money staying in this job, great. Next year without a decent ico, will lose even more money, thanks Bill.
So I'm stuck for now.

Ratepayer Unions are being formed in several states. Ratepayers will send their electric bill payments to the organization which will withhold payments, if ratepayers demands and expectations are not met. Revenue embargoes have the potential to dethrone Bill & the board. Major shareholders will lose their stranglehold on corporate governance.

In the immortal words of Samuel Adams, " If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom - go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!"

Ohio, the home state of AEP has Vivek governor candidate drooling with his billionaire friends ready, with the help of Trump, to open the the flood gates of H1B invasion cheap workers that’s who. If the citizens of the state of Ohio are stupid enough to vote for Vivek, who by your own admission intends to subjugate the citizens of Ohio and allow H1B Visa immigrants to supplant Ohioans in the states economy then they deserve to be subjugated. I think Ohioans are smart enough to realize Vivek is just another virtue-less un-American globalist corporate oligarch, who swears allegiance only to himself and his insatiable greed. The virtue-less un-American globalist corporate oligarchs have awakened and angered a sleeping giant and they are about to be revolutionized by an enormous angry constituency whose shadow shall eclipse them all.

Let’s show these hedge funds and CEOs where the real power lies — with us, the working people. Join the economic blackout tomorrow, February 28, by refusing to spend at big retailers. Every dollar is a vote — keep yours in the hands of local businesses. Together, we can make an impact.

“Time to change careers. Get into electrical or plumbing…”. If you have children or know of any young person that is deciding what to study and what kind of job to do for a living it would be crazy to commit a large investment of time and money to something you will have difficulty being marketable and being treated like filth. Already, much of accounting and IT is outsourced at AEP. The office jobs you do there at AEP are valuable to AEP and its success. However you can’t easily leave that job and find something comparable in money and benefits unfortunately. So, help those deciding what they want to do for a job in the future by pushing them towards something in the medical field or a trade and a job that is marketable enough where if you should lose that job or you are not treated well that you can find another one with ease and one that you will be treated better.

Just got my promotion/merit/ICP results and while my bonus was a little higher than I expected, the promotion amount was MUCH lower than I could’ve even imagined. So they’re asking for more responsibility with almost no compensation increase to show for it plus a huge paycut to return to the office. I’m actually offended at the promotion raise because it doesn’t even beat inflation over the last year…

Time to change careers, get into electrical or plumbing. Get into a union (I really don't like unions but in this case might be needed) for some protection. Get out of the white collar tracks and something that actually produces results. I just don't see office careers being that safe anymore.

“Who will fill the void? They can't afford us” - Ohio, the home state of AEP has Vivek governor candidate drooling with his billionaire friends ready, with the help of Trump, to open the the flood gates of H1B invasion cheap workers that’s who. According to Vivek, you along with all Americans workers are lazy parasites and H1B will fix that with, according to Trump, “The world’s best (really that would the world’s cheapest) talent”. Prepare for serfdom. You will work for breadcrumbs and like it. The billionaires are running the show.

A sad fact is that what is happening at AEP isn’t uncommon across corporate America. Which is why anyone not at C-level should stop caring, collect a check and benefits, and do the minimum. Loyalty is dead in all directions, so why knock yourself out for anyone you aren’t related to?

Bill is powerless without the consent of AEP employees. Who will fill the void? They can't afford us, who else will work for these narrisisitic, self-absorbed losers, who only win when we give in?

Sadly, the culture is also going through a downhill cycle. From the very top down, the song every manager is told to sing is that the employees are failing. That is why Gallup is no longer used to measure employee engagement. The goals and vision, the criteria used to measure employees' success are not within the employees' control, but failing will justify cutbacks, no future ICPs. Already the new tune is more strenous KPIs, less attainable minimum ICP. "Customer Focus" means blaming acts of God on individuals (i.e. hurricanes, fires, floods, mountainous terrain causing outages with longer restoration times). Choosing to tell your employees selective stats (with tiny fractions of % decreases from past years) to back up your negative tone and failing to highlight the positives doesn't fool us! In a year or 2, you will do the opposite and sing your accomplishments with the same narrow % increase. The "positive reinforcement" approach is dead in America. Its back to "you will be punished. You cannot win. Do as I say. You are nothing!"

Make sure to take advantage of the sick time policy. It is currently very generous. I'm sure Bill will destroy that too eventually, but for now you get a lot of sick time fully paid.
While remote I could power through a sick day and still get things done.
In office though I have a feeling I'll be sprinkling in some sick days every month when I'm not feeling 100%. It won't take much. I won't be taking my laptop home with me either, my laptop observes the "in office" policy and will be staying in my cube.

You may be right in certain areas of our service area. I'm going to be applying like crazy right after I complete another certification that I'm working on right now. I follow Dave R. so I'm set for a long period if nothing comes up and with the ICP, I can nurse that for another 2 months. Wife will pick up medical so no issue there. I'll most likely leave come June no matter what, just like the other guy said. You can only take so much of this sh it anyway.

If they start monitoring badge swipes, it’s time to turn salaried employees to hourly and pay OT. The rules are getting ridiculous.

Had to tell my kid I won’t be able to coach his summer or fall baseball squads with RTO. There is no way I can make it happen driving 40 -45 minutes both ways 5 days a week. I can’t do camp and school dropoffs, drive 40 minutes to downtown Columbus, work 8 hours, drive 45 minutes and then get to practice on time. It is impossible. We don’t even have the option of dropping them off before 8. For comparison, I was pulling 8:00-4:30 or 5 everyday remotely and logging on for a bit at night as well.

I’m struggling to comprehend the idea of forcing competent adults to upend their lives, just because I have the power to. It’s just not my character. The real life impact of this is just crushing. I’m going to lose at least 8-10 hours of time with my family weekly that I can’t buy back.

I've heard rumors about badge swipe monitoring so I doubt there will be any under the table hybrid work....

The problem with letting people stay hybrid under the table is that eventually other people notice and then question why they aren't getting the same treatment. Then the whole thing unravels.

The funny part is that they don’t want you to quit. There I already a backlog of open roles that haven’t been filled and are clear business needs approved by Bill to be filled. You leaving would just exacerbate the issue.

What they are banking on is the tough job market for white collar workers will force you to stay and accept the changes. All the employees need is a hot job market for this to blow up in management’s face disastrously

AEP STOCK HITS RECORD HIGH! SHAREHOLDERS CELEBRATE! CUSTOMERS AND EMPLOYEES STILL MISERABLE!

• Thanks to the Board for always knowing who comes first
• Thanks to Bill for enlightening (and constantly reminding) employees how terrible they were before he arrived
• Thanks to all pay grade 10 and above "leaders" for staying in line while their stock options continue to vest
• Thanks to the rest of us for accepting whatever ICP scraps are thrown our way

I'm pretty sure the potential of people leaving before getting the ICP is pretty low unless you trust your chain of command with paying it out even if you left. I think the people who retired before getting it would most likely still get it. Those who leave for another job, not so much.
I'm with most people, I just don't trust them and would wait until the money is in the bank before leaving.
The big question will be how many will leave or retire before June. I'm of the belief most will wait until the last minute unless managers let people stay hybrid under the table but that will only happen if you have a boss that understands your situation and cares.
We had hybrid work options BEFORE the Wuhan virus hit. I worked 2 days a week at home for years, started doing it about 2010.

To the comment below this one, I think they want is for us to quit. A quiet firing. Then they don’t have to pay. Now with what I’ve been tasked to do I’m starting to think they want me to leave before they can pay the ICP. I don’t trust this company anymore at all.

The hybrid schedule was a big reason I decided to join AEP. It's something that worked for my situation.
Bill has come in and within a few months completely upended my life. I will have to make major changes because of this, including moving closer to the office, which is going to require my elderly, disabled mother to sell her home and find somewhere else to live since I currently support her.
If there was a legitimate reason for requiring us in office 5 days a week, I wouldn't be so bitter about it, but what really irks me is we all know there wasn't a reason for it. It's just a power play from a newly hired CEO who hasn't put in the time to dare tell us we have performance issues. Supposed performance issues that he still hasn't bothered to explain.
The main performance issue we have now is YOU, Bill.

I've been on the fence about retirement but I think I after this week, I just got off the fence. I'll wait until June. I'm going to have an Irish Goodbye. I took all of my personal stuff home yesterday, the only thing at the house is the laptop and mouse. I'll do my hybrid until the end of May. Friday, I'll leave the laptop and mouse with a note that I'm retired. I'll figure out what to do from home over the phone with benefits. I'm not going back in June full time, it's just not worth it at my age

It’s gonna be a sh-t show at AEP right after the ICP pays out. People that have marketable skills will leave and then that will leave everyone to hold the bag. No experienced people will be around. Just the blind will be leading the blind. Takes years to train and develop high performers but AEP is losing top talent left and right. Nobody wants to work at that sh---y place anymore. My predictions are that top talent like myself will leave right after the ICP and then the dominos will all start falling.

Let me get this straight..if the CEO and the higher ups are so concerned about safety and how AEP has had the most injuries these past few years. They need to actually stop making so many changes! All these past severance packages, cutting workers, and making us now work in an office after 5 yrs of being hybrid. As well as without giving us all heart attacks and stressing us all the he-l out about what's going to happen at work the next day or next week maybe we wouldnt be at work injuring ourselves so much! If you stress the employees of course we are going to work stressed and not thinking about safety cause we are concerned if we are going to even have a job the next day. Now all these poor hybrid employees are coming back with more concerns about where to take the kids or loved ones while away even longer. The poor supervisors who were all cut the positions and thrown in new teams now cant sleep good cause they are stressed with more responsibilities with no clue whats the next plan. Also those poor linemen that were injured probably had stressed about those severance packages the weeks they were rumored. AEP needs to look at what they are doing to us.

Here's a question to ask yourself, what would be worse for our customers and stockholders, all SVPs and up took the next week off at the same time or if all of the linemen and planet engineers took all next week off?
Who would be missed more? I know what my response would be.

This place is depressing anymore. The culture su-ks and it’s not because of the employees.

I've watched this thread from the beginning and it's a good reminder I made the right choice to leave AEP last year. I'm happy, I have work that I enjoy, the people around me are happy and I have new friends. It's like it was when I joined AEP 20 some odd years ago There are jobs out there, it just takes time to find the right fit. More jobs are coming to Columbus over the next year or so, AEP better wake up soon or they will be looking at a large number of people leaving they were expecting to stay but won't. Good luck to all.