Thread regarding Bank of New York Mellon Corp. layoffs

@OP BNY is a poor employer. The company recently changed some policies. 1. Associates have to be employed in January in order to receive the 401k match from the previous year.

1. New trading policy for all employees requires compliance approval prior to any trades. And no excessive trading. What is excessive? 5..10...100? Don't know as this is not specified in Corp policy. I was fired for excessive trading. 60 year old employee of 18 years. My U-5 shows termination. BNY is a real class act. And ..no severance. Zero

As a manager as one point at BNY, I remover my manager forcing me to rate an employee poorly because they did this one thing. I said know and they kept on harassing me about it over and over and I said no no..I was the queen of pushing back. I’m not going to rate my employee poorly for a stupid mistake. I was laid off a couple of years later. They literally force you to rate your direct reports poorly and then you as well, make them ineligible for severance. It’s insanity. Unethical and definitely illegal. I hate that place. I hope it burns in he-l.

Warning for employees:

I’m a manager and have been outspoken against these policies. I’ve also been collecting evidence for when my manager tries to lay me off w/o severance. The directives are handed down from the senior director level. It’s not your SVP or VP manager making these decisions and even if they push back, like myself, they are simply targeted. I have no doubt that I will be forced out next year or in 2027. It’s clear that my clock is ticking.

Anyway, here’s the warning: they are looking to change things up where they no longer give you a “rating”. You read that correctly. Management will still rate you in buckets 1-5 behind the scenes, but you will no longer get a rating such as meets or partially below or below. Instead, the comments in performance will require managers to list positive contributions and areas that require improvement for every employee. This way, the company can avoid lawsuits like Larry’s.

All I can say, is keep your eyes open and start collecting evidence of how BNY is attempting to circumvent employee rights. Keep all emails from colleagues or customers thanking you or recognizing you for any efforts/projects. Keep a copy of all awards. Keep an excel document with time spent of the training classes, town halls and other time su-ks they are forcing on employees in an attempt to terminate.

There eventually will be a much larger lawsuit.

Hope BNY gets fined in millions for this. Shittiest bank in the world.

I just read the lawsuit and it's pretty compelling. Will be interested to see how it turns out.

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71798181/steller-v-the-bny-separation-pay-plan-plan-no-557/

Its he said she said case.. with a good track record and supporting documentation you should be able to win back damages same as Larry's complaint filing

"While it is acknowledged that the Plan provides BNY with discretion to terminate an
employee based on their job performance, BNY cannot abuse that discretion. By relying solely on an unsupported label of “unsatisfactory job performance,” and by disregarding objective evidence of satisfactory work and procedural fairness, Defendants acted arbitrarily and capriciously and in violation of ERISA § 502(a)(1)(B). "

@11v they calculate severance during layoff by multiplying number of years of service times 2 weeks, up to a maximum of one year. He was there since 1997, so he would have maxed out at one year.

@qp agree. Their absolutely needs to be a class action lawsuit. This is going to continue until bny is put on blast and has to pay alot of money on top of looking stupid

Kudos to Larry for fighting for his rights. All the best to him and hope he gets his due soon. He has set an example for rest of us. TBH it has taken whole bunch of burden off my chest because now I know there is hope and what to do if they do same thing to me.

Shame on these su-k up managers and EC for running this abhorrent and immoral scheme. I hope CNBC's Sarah asks Vince about this lawsuit in next interview.

@b9 what did you tell bny to get a year of salary? Please share any tips

The hero we all need.

If impacted also contact this Bloomberg legal reporter in the article (her contract provided).
The reporter can report the hundreds of employees being denied their separation benefits as bny triggers forced 25% quota fraudulent under performance policy. A class action should of been started already.

Go Larry Go!!!

@hw I used to work at BNY. Their annual review policy utilized a bell curve states a certain number of employees must receive a ‘not meeting standard’ review status in order to justify denying severance pay when let go.

This is the article:

BNY Sued by Former Employee for Severance After Termination
2025-10-30 16:37:08 GMT

By Bloomberg Law Automation and Jacklyn Wille
(Bloomberg Law) -- A former Bank of New York Mellon Corp.
employee filed a federal lawsuit saying he was wrongfully denied
severance benefits under the bank’s employee welfare benefit
plan.
The employee claims his termination was classified as
“unsatisfactory job performance” despite evidence of
satisfactory work, and that he was denied severance benefits he
was entitled to under the bank’s plan for involuntary
terminations unrelated to performance.
Laurence Steller’s lawsuit, filed Wednesday in the US
District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeks
unpaid benefits, equitable relief, and attorneys’ fees under the
Employee Retirement Income Security Act.
BNY declined to comment on the lawsuit.
Stewart Lee Karlin Law Group PC represents Steller.
The case is Steller v. BNY Separation Pay Plan, S.D.N.Y.,
No. 1:25-cv-08970, complaint 10/29/25.

@f1 Add archive.is/ in front of most URLs and you'll be able to see indexed copies of paywalled articles. Works almost every time. Here's a link for this article: https://archive.is/fkMzf.

Question, if I get a good lawyer for fighting this zero severence scenario, how much of a percentage will the lawyer typically take? And how long does this take for people who claim to have won?
Thanks.

I love this for them because BNY thinks they're untouchable. Based on the recent forced ratings to put you intentionally below meeting so it ensures you get let go without severance, especially targeting forced wfh employees, there will be alot more lawsuits and should be. You cannot openly discriminate against people in a status you created and thats exactly what theyre doing. Dont let them get away with it

Can someone summarize the article. Its not accessible for me.

@ah You are right but they did not get him on any infraction, not even a minor one. That’s simply made up nonsense by BNY and hoping wouldn’t be challenged. They let me go too but in my case did not try the PIP thing or cite any infraction. They are systemically cutting anyone who has been there long time. I legally challenged them. They cut me a check for a year salary. Settled out of court within 2 months. I’ve seen comments on here where people think you can’t beat them. That is simply not true. Their attorneys operate about the same as the rest of the place in current form. Not very competent. Whomever you hire is better legally vs them. I encourage anyone who has been wronged by them to fight back. To those of you still working there, I sincerely wish you the best. It was a good company at one point but looks like things are getting worse by the month.

@ag agree and they are blinding just picking people. Especially those who are forced work from home. People cannot stay quiet on this. They need to get lawyers involved. Its being done intentionally to ensure you dont get severance

Good for Larry, I hope he gets a bundle. I never worked directly with him but heard nothing but good things from people who did.

2 people I used to work with were set up with these fake pips

They both fought it. One was reversed, but he was still sc--wed out of his bonus because HR couldn’t retroactively give it back to him - took months for HR to get it resolved

The other, was fought before it was official, and the manager acted like she was crazy for wanting to know details as to why she was put on the pIP and what she needed to do better… Manager got belligerent, telling her “what else do you want me to say? Just drop it.” That sad pathetic loser of a manager She had knew he was sc--wed by executing the fake review on behalf of the higher-ups.

These people doing this are sad, pathetic lackeys, and I hope karma gets them.

My point is to document everything and if you truly fill your unjustly being targeted fight, but make sure you have documentation to back it up
My other point is get the heck out of there… I did over the summer and the difference is amazing

@ag
Exactly. It’s not based on performance at all. It’s cost first, then favorability. Anyone can easily picture the scene…. The guy is in his late 50’s, doing his job satisfactorily year after year, he’s making decent coin, getting a max 401 match, he’s not in a favored location and not a threat to leave , just ride to retirement. This all goes against the RV regime’s directive. So, they cook up a scheme to dump the guy for some minor or hyped up infraction. If it indeed it was even a real measurable infraction at all. This story is being repeated over and over here….

@a4 management receives an email/direction on the percentage of employees which need to be put as Below. The most recent one is 25%, this direction comes from the directors. If the direct manager doesn’t comply, the managers manager will override it and put employees below and it’s not based on performance. They keep the favorites. It’s all about who you know and how much you do for your manager. Last time I was forced to put someone below I told them during their review.

L.S. A Risk management employee who was here over 17 years and got s..t canned with no severance. Also named in the suit was The Global Lead of People Governance and Internal Controls as Plan Administrator.
It will be interesting to see what this place does as many such suits should materialize.
Got get ‘em Larry

Ms Polcn should be next as BAH