This story has been updated to add comment from Yelp.
A Yelp employee who wrote a blistering post online about her low pay was fired, and has even got her ex-CEO responding on Twitter.
A customer-service rep named Talia Jane, who worked for the company’s food delivery arm Eat24, wrote an open letter to Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelmann on Friday explaining how she could not afford to pay groceries, had stopped using her heater, spent 80% of her income on paying rent in San Francisco, and was “balancing all sorts of debt and trying to pave a life for myself that doesn’t involve crying in the bathtub every week.”
“Your employee for your food delivery app that you spent $300 million to buy can’t afford to buy food. That’s gotta be a little ironic, right?” she added.
Even as she posted her letter online, however, Jane seemed to understand that the repercussions of her post could involve her job.
https://twitter.com/itsa_talia/status/700832377115844608
Her premonitions proved correct, as shortly after, she was let go by Yelp (YELP) for what she terms as a violation of their internal “terms of conduct.”
https://twitter.com/itsa_talia/status/700976987171475456
The incident drew a series of responses from Stoppelmann, who addressed her concerns by acknowledging the high cost of living in San Francisco, while rebuffing any allegations he was the one who fired Jane.
1/5 Late last night I read Talia's medium contribution and want to acknowledge her point that the cost of living in SF is far too high.
— Jeremy Stoppelman (@jeremys) February 20, 2016
2/5 I have been focused on this issue, backing anti-NIMBY group SFBARF and speaking out frequently about the need to lower cost of housing.
— Jeremy Stoppelman (@jeremys) February 20, 2016
3/5 I've not been personally involved in Talia being let go and it was not because she posted a Medium letter directed at me.
— Jeremy Stoppelman (@jeremys) February 20, 2016
4/5 Two sides to every HR story so Twitter army please put down the pitchforks. The reality of such a high Bay Area cost of living is…
— Jeremy Stoppelman (@jeremys) February 20, 2016
5/5 entry level jobs migrate to where costs of living are lower. Have already announced we are growing EAT24 support in AZ for this reason.
— Jeremy Stoppelman (@jeremys) February 20, 2016
A Yelp spokesperson told Fortune that the company would not comment on personnel matters. However, the spokesperson did echo both Jane and Stoppelmann’s comments on the standard of living in San Francisco. “We agree with her remarks about the high costs of living in San Francisco, which is why we announced in December that we are expanding our Eat24 customer support team into our Phoenix office where will pay the same wage.”
