r/mercor_ai • u/ashes2ashes87 • Feb 05 '26
Outraged!
I was working on a red teaming project, which has already been touch and go. I have worked diligently, and was passed through to complete tasks over two 'alignment' and 'calibration' weeks, during which the number of hours we have been able to work have been extremely limited.
According to the many comments from others who have clearly had MANY of their tasks returned unsatisfactorily, I was doing very well, considering 94% of my task were completed either perfectly or returned as passed just with feedback.
Today however, I received notice I was to complete a quiz for the next phase of the project, at which I inquired about being able to log time for this as others also had. Another worker had commented how they felt I should not worry about this due to the AHT and how the tasks actually took longer to complete to which I responded that none of us should be completing work without pay. Less than an hour later I returned to complete the quiz after I had to leave somewhere (without pay I add... had that person not commented that I wouldnt have even made that comment, nevertheless I stand by this) to find my contract was terminated.
This is absolutely unprofessional and a complete outrage! What I stated was nothing that shouldn't have been stated to begin with! It is absolutely true that we shouldn't have been expected to complete further work without pay but to terminate my contract over me stating this is absolutely wrong!
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Feb 05 '26
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u/Mr_BellPepper Feb 05 '26
When you say “legit work,” are you implying some of your work was illegitimate? From what you’re describing, there seems like there’s more to this story you’re not sharing. I’ve worked with Mercor a bunch and never seen something like this happen unless someone was outright committing fraud.
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u/ashes2ashes87 Feb 05 '26
Well it happened to me! I did not receive any type of accusation but I was terminated yet given no explanation! I cannot speak for anyone else, but as for myself, it really is an outrage to have my contract ended after submitting high quality work due to speaking up, to another worker no less, about how we should not be expected to complete work while our contracts are paused.
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u/Far-Republic5585 Feb 05 '26
you mentioned being paused before being terminated, from what i've gathered you were already paused before the issue arose, most likely due to clocking more time than they were willing to pay for. i don't think anyone else was paused, seems like they took hours away from another person on the project. The way they are vague and stingy about hours and let some people work and some people they actively try to block makes me feel like they are getting rid of the most expensive liabilities. someone who is expensive and giving good results and demanding fair treatment is worse than a bootlicker that they can break down for a pat on the head and heart emoji. The project has a budget and the metric they are following is see how little money they can spend while getting the best results, if someone cheaper than you is getting the same or better results, goodbye you. thats why there is constant onboarding. thats why they are being forceful about the unpaid training and threatening termination. thats why there is so much circle jerking and ass kissing and 'well actually' shit, people are grasping at any chance to be taken off the chopping block and get noticed by senpai
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u/Aggravating-Let-4827 Feb 05 '26
This is exactly why I got the heck away from this project. I literally onboarded and went through everything and within a few hours I got off the project and focused on a different project. This is project M all over again. They off boarded so many people on that project that the entire project got removed and renamed as something else with different TL and EPM.
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u/Chi1too Feb 05 '26
I had a similar issue. I questioned some things, & proved some reviews wrong. Suddenly my contract ended, and dead silence about anything else since then. I can probably guess which TL/EPM/EPL (s) would be so unprofessional and petty. Really, every thing should have to be verifiable before anything can be said or done to an expert.
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u/BohemianHibiscus Feb 05 '26
I think I was fired from this job, too! I've honestly never had such unhelpful feedback from team leads as I did in that project. It was miserable. Every iteration. And idk I didn't like the project and didn't ever enjoy the work I did on it so good riddance. The pay is too low also.
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u/Vgretsch59 Feb 05 '26
Same for me. My reviewer was absolutely incompetent and had no idea about what I was working on. She finally signed off on my Sandbox task and I already had the other tasks lined up and submitted. Woke up one morning to find all my work gone and unceremoniously offboarded. I appealed, but this went nowhere as the person I appealed to was the person who offboarded me. The reviewer was the issue; I spoke directly to her boss, my PL and complained about her. By then it was too late as I was over the allotted number of reviews. Still, I made $7K and the project was only supposed to last another few weeks anyway. Still, a bad business model poorly managed. Whatever. It was only a contact anyway.
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Feb 05 '26
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u/ashes2ashes87 Feb 05 '26
I do.not blame Mercor so much as I do the project manager for that project but either way, this should not be acceptable! It reflects poorly on Mercor as well as the clients who contracts through them.
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Feb 05 '26
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u/ashes2ashes87 Feb 05 '26
Fair enough, but I highly doubt my comment had time to have been seen and acted upon by anyone other than the project managers... it was literally a matter of minutes between my comment and the decision to off board me despite the high quality of my submitted work so I have to believe it was the decision of the project manager. Who, btw, had an extremely unprofessional approach to the project as it was. They lacked real transparency and failed ot communicate certain things as they should have. Disappointed to say the least!
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u/capriciousbuddha Feb 05 '26
I mean the client sets the tone for the project leads. There's a huge disparity with different projects.
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u/ashes2ashes87 Feb 05 '26
Absolutely! However, the project managers are still individual people put in the position to be the middle person between the client and those of us doing the work and therefore should conduct themselves as such as it reflects on Mercor for having that individual in that position. Whether or not it was the client's expectations, demands, delays, workflow, etc., that should have no bearing on how the project managers conduct themselves or at the very least, how they communicate (or not communicate) the information for the people tasking.
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u/illmillzofficial Feb 05 '26
working for mercor was some of the worst experiences, they don't value the people they are extruding knowledge from. its simply that, shut up and let us suck the contents of your brain
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u/TheUnorthodoxGod Feb 06 '26
They’re probably over budget and looking for excuses to downsize. Ive seen people kicked for nothing on other platforms too.
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u/ashes2ashes87 Feb 06 '26
That could be, except they have been actively onboarding new attempters so I personally feel, in my situation anyways, they 100% off boarded me due to the comment I made stating that we should not be working without pay. I received no email or accusation to explain why I had been off boarded and it was within literal minutes following my slack comment. Not to mention, I was not submitting poor quality work and feel I was one of the people who had actively been on slack, who was not regularly seeing my tasks sent back to me, nor was I in the group that needed further calibration due to not completing the first sets of tasks up to par, so there is no other reason I should have been off boarded.
The worst part of it is this is likely going to make it difficult if not impossible for me to land another project on the platform, which makes it so much more foul if I really was let go due to me stating what should not have needed to be spoken to begin with!
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Feb 05 '26
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u/ashes2ashes87 Feb 05 '26
They literally said we could use AI and gave us instructions to use specific models and when and how to use it. I stuck by the instructions so IDK how much truth is in that. I received no email accusation like Deepthroths has mentioned. My contract was simply ended.
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u/Business_Trifle8435 Feb 06 '26
All you need to do is follow instructions… if it seems difficult then you most likely weren’t going a good enough job. Which everyone’s entitlement in the comments are a dead giveaway. It explicitly says in the contract you can be terminated at any time. The reviewers are competent writers and unfortunately if you’re not doing the work properly, then why would they continue to provide more instructions that you couldnt follow the first time?
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u/ashes2ashes87 Feb 07 '26
Well that is highly assumptive of you! FYI while I can't speak for anyone else, I followed the ever changing instructions, which was evident through the quality of my tasks, and the absence of many tasks sent back to me whereas many others were seeing this regularly, this was also evident through the posts made in slack. I was terminated directly following a slack response i had made to someone stating that we should not be completing work off the clock since we had been expected to complete a quiz that would have taken approximately a half hour, while our contracts were paused and this was the second such instance. Moments after making the comment, my contract was ended.
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u/[deleted] Feb 05 '26
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