Stop targeting vulnerable young travellers

Over the summer of 2021, I was looking at Global Work and Travel. I was dreaming of going to Ireland on a work exchange. I was thinking of living there for a few months, working , meeting new people and perhaps do some genealogy research. I thought Global work and Travel would be awesome website if i worked more hours and saved up more money. I was telling a relative of mine , that it was a great idea and she had her concerns on the idea " is the website is safe ? ".

It was my dream to explore more of my heritage and my father country because my memories over there is very limited when I visited there in 2002, 2006 and 2011. I have'nt visited there for 11 years. I visited Quility and i stayed in Kildare overnight until I went to the airport to fly back to Australia.

Her doubts proved to be right. Even i have not seen the 2nd cousin ( not revealing name ) of mine for 20 years. But i did not do any proper research until early 2022 and I moved back home.

I firstly looked and discovered an ABC article.The article was written in 2014 . The authorities in QLD were investigating so many complaints made by customers and staff. A man in his 20's ( he was 27 year old when the article was written) , he said the company pushed him to travel to canada around christmas 2012.But he was left there alone without any money , it was so shocking to be tricked into thinking the company will help him find job interviews and help him find a job overseas.

He was wrong. A man in his twenties would be a less experienced traveller than a person that's middle aged. He was left alone in the hostel in Vancouver without a job. He did not find a job until late January which , he ended up finding a job himself. He realized that on the telephone GWAT ,used high pressure sale tactics with him.He claimed that the company told him " if he did not pay them quick as possible , he will miss out on the chances finding a job".

Glenn's parents were worried about their son. They supported on the best they could , but they were angry the company deceived their son and the son complained to the company. They received a portion of their money back but the family , including the parents have spoken to other families to warn about their false adverstising and will not recommend the company to anyone.

An english backpacker and an canadian backpacker who were twenty somethings looking for a working hoilday adventure in Australia.They arrived in 2014 during the Australian summer , and the company introduced them to an orientation session , which was part of a $1,500 dollar package which was targeted to help them secure work.

This turned out to be misleading because the company said their was sushi bars in Melbourne , but they had to pay from their own pockets to get to Melbourne.Even worse , GWAT lied and blamed the two women after the women found out the company has hired people already a month before.They realised in their contract package with GWAT, they did not describe the contracts properly. ' A guaranteed job ' may mean a job interview and not a actual job offer.

After 3 months in the country , they had no choice to fly back home after running out of funds and savings. GWAT denied the claims and also said they do not control employment opportunties to young people. But i do not believe them because the young travellers have their own experiences and eyewitness accounts with the company. They seemed like they did not act in the best interests of their clients because they were more focused making more profit for their company instead of focusing on the safety and wellbeing of their clients. There is a lot of disscussions that are needed to be done with young people before they are ready to go overseas.

Many young people may of went overseas before with family but some have never visited overseas. So they need support networks and agencies that can help them reach to the goal of having a working hoilday overseas and live there short term , and having a postive experience overall.

I looked at another article. This article was more focused on the employees of GWAT . They hated the way their boss trained them in sales and hated the way their boss treated the young people who were the customers. A man in Canada called Jeremy and he worked in the GWAT canada office after 4 days of sales training during the Canada summer. The man though his job tasks were unethical and he felt not comfortable doing the requested job tasks. Bad marketing methods were being used and he was being forced to talk to customers into paying a non refundable deposit.

This reminds you of a bad boss at work that you dislike ? I know that people tend to stay slient about disliking their boss at work. One of the reasons why that people tend to dislike their bosses at work because they disagree on the tasks they are given for many reasons. They may think they are forced to do tasks that are unethical under their employer's orders. They may also hate the way their employer treats other people and talking about them behind their backs. The employees stay slient for a while because they want a salary, but eventually they reach to a point they feel stressed , drained and depressed at work pretending they agree with the bosses orders. They may had enough arguing and disagreeing with their employer.At last, they may eventually quit.

Sometimes I see that employees are right they know about ethics and know what's not ethical at work. But if you are happy at work and if you have a supportive boss then just keep going on with your job.

The ex employees who no longer work at the company said they did not like peforming their job duties because they were taking advantage of young travellers that had a lack of experience travelling independently overseas.

I am really sorry to hear these twenty somethings had bad experiences booking with the company. It's really low they do exploit young people via false advertsing and leave them with limited support in a foreign country. To have a lack of understanding and empathy on a human level to not to worry about a person's safety overseas , as they may lack money resources in order to find a safe place to live short term and travel to places nearby oustside of work , such as famous landmarks.

Articles : Please copy and paste to see the articles and put them in your browser.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/global-work-travel-trains-salespeople-to-lie-ex-employees-say-1.2833119

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-11/authorities-investigate-travel-company-accused-of-rip-offs/5883918