Dick Smith staff are sick of being asked this

DICK Smith staff are venting their frustration with passive aggressive signs protesting their uncertain futures.

Dick Smith staff vent their anger

IT’S THE question being asked by well-meaning customers, that’s driving Dick Smith staff up the wall.

And they’ve responded in a spirit that will resonate with passive aggressive note leavers around the world.

“When are we closing? How long’s a piece of string?” one of the sign posted on a shop window reads.

“Most of us have not found jobs yet, so feel free to recommend us to anyone you might know that has something going,” read another.

The dilemma faced by the workers is that they have not been told when they’ll be finishing up with the failed electronics retailer, which is roughly midway through an eight-week closing-down sale.

This makes it difficult for them to look for new jobs, as many staff are sticking it out to make sure they don’t lose out on being paid out their entitlements.

What not to ask ...

Passive aggressive notes dotcom.

Images of the signs were posted on Reddit, prompting hundreds of comments by customers and people identifying themselves as Dick Smith employees.

“I work at D.S. we get asked that question by nearly every customer,” one commenter wrote.

“We truly have no idea. And judging by the move and David Jones closures, we won’t find out till just a few days before.

“The situation sucks because those who are hopeful for a redundancy and entitlement payout cannot leave until we receive the official redundancy notice.”

Another Redditer, ericneo, said he was owed about 750 hours of unpaid overtime by Dick Smith, “and they’ve been stonewalling me for about a month now”.

We just don’t know.

A spokeswoman for receiver Ferrier Hodgson told Fairfax Media employees would receive redundancy notices and final work dates “closer to the closure date of their store”, and that it anticipated the fire sale to generate enough cash to pay all workers their entitlements.

She said workers would be paid the equivalent of their full notice period, regardless of when they were told their store was closing.

It comes after the Australian Securities and Investments Commission revealed it would investigate why Dick Smith collapsed, flagging a potential probe of the private equity firm behind the company’s controversial stock market listing.

Speaking at the commission’s annual forum yesterday, ASIC chairman Greg Medcraft reportedly vowed to “investigate and look to find some answers”, Fairfax Media reports.

Anchorage Capital bought the retailer from Woolworths for about $100 million in 2012, with $20 million up front.

The firm then floated the company on the share market for $520 million a year later, in what some critics — including businessman Dick Smith — labelled the “greatest private equity heist of all time”.