Angry Russian boss pays workers in coins

MOSCOW: Two Russian women got an unpleasant surprise when their former boss paid them more than 1,000 dollars to settle a labour dispute -- in dozens of heavy bags full of tiny coins.

Two Russian women got an unpleasant surprise when their former boss paid them more than 1,000 dollars to settle a labour dispute -- in dozens of heavy bags full of tiny coins. [Agencies]

 Shemyakina, were laid off amid the global financial crisis and had demanded that their boss pay them for unused vacation time, the Komsomolskaya Pravda daily reported on Friday.

The two had worked as office managers for Deco-Line, a company that installs ceilings in Russia's far eastern city of Vladivostok. When the company refused to pay, Sizhuk and Shemyakina complained to Russian labour authorities.

Finally the director of the company relented and said he would pay the women the 36,000 rubles (1,150 dollars, 830 euros) they were demanding.

But when the company delivered the money, it came in 33 bags filled mostly with five-kopek coins, a virtually useless piece of currency that Russia keeps in circulation though it is worth only a fraction of a cent.

Sizhuk and Shemyakina had to call friends to help them carry the bags, which weighed around 20 kilograms (44 pounds). But their boss was unrepentant when a reporter from Komsomolskaya Pravda asked for an explanation.

"The girls wanted to get a lot of money, and they got it. What difference does it make what sort of units it came in?" Deco-Line director Konstantin Lyalikov told the newspaper.

He added that the two women had been sacked because they wasted too much time browsing the Internet for personal purposes.