Smart Moms Travel CEO responds after Disney cuts ties with firm – NBC Connecticut

NBC Connecticut was in a position to communicate with Smart Moms Travel CEO Lauralyn “LJ” Johnson over Zoom.

She is standing by her claims on social media that a few of these ladies stole from her firm.

Johnson mentioned she has no proof and he or she is withholding their commissions as a result of she mentioned the brokers breached their contracts. However, all the workers we spoke with are denying stealing.

Johnson mentioned the overwhelming majority of journey brokers with Smart Moms Travel are contractors, they usually do their very own taxes and that she solely despatched termination letters after they resigned.

However, one of many brokers we spoke with mentioned they by no means resigned and had been despatched a termination letter.

Johnson is claiming the brokers stole from her firm in two methods, a declare a number of present and former workers denied.

First, she alleges they had been arranging holidays immediately with Disney and chopping Smart Moms Travel out of the fee.

“I do not have proof of this,” Johnson said. “I believe that my leadership team was working behind the scenes with Disney. I need to hire somebody. I need to have my books examined. But our numbers don’t match, and my reporting staff fled the scene. They resigned.”

Johnson mentioned she by no means took these considerations to Disney. In response, Disney has denied the allegations.

Her second declare is that high stage administration in Smart Moms Travel had been working with accounting and payroll to pay out extra fee cash than what was owed to the brokers.

“I do not suppose any of the staff leaders had been paying any break up to the company in any respect. And once more, I did not see that in writing, however the math is smart that they are not doing the splits correctly,” Johnson mentioned.

Johnson additionally mentioned she plans to withhold funds to her brokers as a result of she believes they breached their contracts by violating the non-compete clauses.

“I’ve not but missed a payroll. I don’t owe them any cash till the tip of the month. I don’t plan to run that payroll as deliberate due to authorized conditions which are taking place,” Johnson mentioned.

We continued to press Johnson on why she was withholding payroll and he or she ended the interview.

Earlier this week, Disney mentioned they had been terminating their contract with Smart Moms Travel as a certified Disney trip planner.