-Oh, it was a proper layoff, all right. Assuming you are in Norway, too - got summons to a 15.1 out of the blue, couple of days later I was told that my services were not required going forward, signed an agreement giving me several months of severance pay + no obligation to work during the termination period against waiving my right to sue.
Considering the petroleum service industry had been struggling for years, I took the severance pay rather than fighting to keep a job which would in all likelihood disappear shortly anyway.
Took four business days from having a steady job to being unemployed.
Ouch, that is really rough. I hope your severance was enough to carry you through until you can find something new. My partner is in petro-adjacent company* and they have a full hiring freeze. We are wondering when the layoffs are coming. Good luck.
*technically, they have an industry agnostic service, but something like 90% of their customers are oil companies, so...
-Thank you; unless this corona thing paralyse anything and everything for the rest of the year or more, I expect to land on my feet (and, should the current state of affairs continue for that long, I suspect the lack of a paycheck is not going to be the biggest of my worries!)
I hope we'll see a partial return to normal-ish after Easter - at least to the extent that the companies I've been in touch with start planning for the months and years ahead, rather than just trying to figure out how to survive until something resembling normalcy returns.
What I see locally (in the Sunnmøre maritime cluster) is that a lot of smaller companies have pivoted from being suppliers to the oil industry exclusively to catering to offshore wind, fisheries, aquaculture &c - whereas the larger corporations say they are doing the same, only spending years burning through cash trying to develop a strategy for the new reality.
With any luck, your partner's company will get business from this - for lack of a better phrase - 'greener' economy as it matures. Exciting times with lots of opportunities for entrepreneurs around here, at least - with lots (by rural Norwegian standards...) of skilled people, machinery and capital available for cheap.
> I hope we'll see a partial return to normal-ish after Easter - at least to the extent that the companies I've been in touch with start planning for the months and years ahead, rather than just trying to figure out how to survive until something resembling normalcy returns.
This is how it feels in Bulgaria as well. We are no longer an exclusively outsourcing destination; we have quite a few very adequate tech companies and people's salaries in the area are steadily, if at glacial pace, growing.
I feel that currently a lot of people are needlessly panicking and this has a snowballing effect BUT eventually people will realise they still have customers they have to serve if they want to receive the next invoices and will thus realise they need the tech workers.
I am in a similar situation like yours, albeit slightly worse -- I can ride my savings up until the end of June I reckon, and I hope the economy starts swinging back by then.
Considering the petroleum service industry had been struggling for years, I took the severance pay rather than fighting to keep a job which would in all likelihood disappear shortly anyway.
Took four business days from having a steady job to being unemployed.