Remote YearReviews of remoteyear.com

Late one night in autumn 2017, my husband Insomnia and I laid in bed scrolling through Instagram, wistfully dreaming about traveling. The sentient algorithm on the app immediately sensed my fernweh, and two thumb flicks later, I was looking at a high-res photo of a laptop, sitting by itself on a wooden table, overlooking a palm tree- lined beach. “Make anywhere your office. Be a digital nomad with #RemoteYear (RY) and start taking your meetings on the beach.” I immediately clicked on the travel company’s sponsored post, and hungrily devoured all the photos of exotic places on the profile. There were photos of many places I’d already been, but what me drew me in where the photos of places I hadn’t even heard about. I browsed the link in their bio, read the FAQs, and completed the questionnaire, praying that my answers would make me a good fit for the program. Remote Year offered everything I wanted, with no hassle. I could travel the world while working from my laptop, and they handle all the arrangements! For a $2,000 USD monthly fee, my flights, co-working space, three excursions per month and my lodging accommodations would be arranged for me. I’d been spending that amount on just rent in Brooklyn, so this felt like a steal. What I didn’t realize is that the answers in the questionnaire I completed didn’t matter, because they were only used to determine whether you can pay the initial down payment and monthly program fees, or not. The answers I provided on the interest survey were not used to recommend an itinerary, nor match me with the best-suited group, nor are they used to recommend excursions based on my interests. No, that would be too logical, and from what I gather, too expensive for this budding start up. In my later conversations with RY management, I suggested all of these uses for the data, and I wouldn’t be surprised if future participants see these improvements. More free ideas and labor from me, yay! There was no question about my desire join RY, I have been determined to start #ChasingCalatrava since I quit my corporate job in April 2017. My only hesitation came from my mother’s then-precarious health status. She was on dialysis and waiting for a kidney donor, and I didn’t want to be a world away from her. It pained me so much to know that this seemingly-tailor made opportunity existed, but it was just out of reach. The Universe knew my heart and heard my pleas, and on December 21, 2017, I got the call that my years of campaigning for a kidney donor on social media paid off. Mommy had a match. It is a day I’ll never forget- I was in BedStuy, Brooklyn, sitting in the back of a cab heading eastbound on Broadway with one of my bookends on our way to another girlfriend’s house, and was so overcome, I forgot how to make words with my mouth. I just started hyperventilating and sobbing tears of joy. It was two holiday presents in one: my mother was given a second lease on life, and I could confidently go traipsing off to places unknown and not be worried about her. 2018 was going to be my best year, yet. The Remote Year sales cycle for me was very short. I was the perfect customer: well-traveled, has disposable income, already familiar with working from home, accustomed to video and conference calls, no partner, no kids. In my first phone call with a very motivated young man from their recruiting/sales department I asked, “who do I send the money to, and when do I leave?” He laughed, realized he didn’t have to do much work, and the rest of the call was mostly me asking questions about a “day in the life” of a Remote (the name given to current participants in the program). There was no need to convince me to join, and there was no boss for me to beg to work remotely. I am my own boss, and before any of my conversations with people from RY, I’d already reviewed the FAQs a million times and watched countless Remote-created YouTube videos about the coworking spaces and different apartments in each country. I even started a wishlist on Amazon based on the recommendations from other Citizens (people who have completed a Remote Year program). It looked like the perfect way to spread my freelancer wings while exploring the globe. What better way to see if I could hack it as a freelancer than to recruit my clients from a time zone 12 hours ahead? My only dilemma was which fantastic itinerary to choose. Ultimately, I chose the Atlas program because it spanned four continents and we would be chasing summer. The word “Atlas” resonates with me on a lot of personal levels, so I believed this to be kismet. One thing that stood out in my RY research, and that I should have paid more attention to, was the near-absence of People of Color (POC) in any of the RY social media photos and online blogs and videos. I didn’t pay it much mind because I’m accustomed to working and living in majority-white spaces, and I took into consideration that international travel is a privilege not accessible to most of the population. In my subsequent conversations with RY leadership, I have stressed how disheartening it is to see so little visibility of LGBTQIA and POC people in their social media and marketing materials, and it appears that they listened, because there are now multiple pics of brown skin in their recent images. Before I fully committed to Remote Year, I inquired about speaking to Black women who had participated. I chatted with one Black woman who working for RY as a Program Leader at the time, and another Black man who worked for RY in an operations capacity. In hindsight, I should have pressed on and asked to speak to Black people who were paying to be in the program, or who had successfully completed it, not people who were being paid by RY. That was mistake number one. After chatting with those two Black employees, I quickly committed to the program with a $5,000 down payment and became a Premote (the designation you are given after you’ve paid to play, but before you depart). Access was granted to proprietary websites and a Slack workspace shared by the whole Remote Year Nation. Premotes are also assigned an onboarding specialist who answers questions, hosts webinars so that you can “meet” the other people in your cohort, and holds you accountable for deadlines related to things like buying travel insurance, applying for visas, etc. My onboarding specialist was very helpful, as were all the other RY staff I met with. When I discovered that each person was in a different international city, it became even more clear that this program really was built for a location independent lifestyle. Having staff that works remotely in different countries gave them lots of credibility, and I was confident that I was in good hands. I was very wrong. In the months before I left, I attended at least a dozen webinars and live workshops to get to know Remotes in other programs and people in my immediate group. It was on one such webinar that I learned one of my program leaders is a Black woman from Philly. I was OVER THE MOON. I immediately jumped into a group chat with my friends to tell them all about it. “#RepresentationMatters!! There’s more than one of me!” I cried real tears of joy and relief as soon as the webinar ended. Yet another sign that this trip was meant to be! As I met the rest of my colleagues online, it appeared that our group is somewhat racially diverse. Out of forty people, there are three men and one woman of Asian descent, four Latinas, and three Black women, including one of the program leaders. The other members of Atlas are primarily a mix of cisgender, heterosexual, Millennial white people from North America and Europe, with an Israeli man and an Australian man adding to the geographical diversity. Our ages range from 24 to 54, and our professions run the gamut from graphic design to finance to architectural design. Four of us identify as non-binary, but it would be months before I learned that. My preference would have been for even more diversity, but I was not completely alone, and I felt good about that. Mistake number two. All skinfolk ain’t your kinfolk, and many would rather remain silent than to stand up and speak out in the face of adversity. In all the webinars I attended, race, ethnicity and general diversity topics were never discussed. A very big missed opportunity on the part of Remote Year. Since this journey began, I have met some incredible people, several of who I am honored to call my friends, and who I hope will remain in my life in perpetuity. I’ve had opportunities to develop personally and professionally. I have volunteered with women who have escaped sex trafficking, I have learned how to decrease my carbon footprint and my environmental impact, I learned how to scuba dive, and I have hiked more in the last 9 months than I have in all of my 39 years on this planet. I chased waterfalls and I walked with elephants. I’m getting emotional as I type this because it has been a whirlwind of firsts and of so many emotional highs and lows. There have been many peaks, but the valleys were profound. I am sad and disappointed with how much money I spent on this once-in-a-lifetime experience to perform endless emotional labor while being mistreated by my fellow travelers. For much of the last year, I was a huge advocate of Remote Year, and I recommended it to strangers and familiars, often. I loved the idea of group travel, but I regret not doing more research, and I regret traveling with a company that has no real concept of representation and inclusion. If I’d had fewer stars in my eyes, I might have learned that other Black men and women had left their programs early because of negative experiences similar to mine. Mistake number three. Are there POC (specifically Black women) who successfully participate in Remote Year and have a good time? Sure. But, I will never recommend that someone spend $2k/month on a crap shoot in the hopes that their travel companions aren’t racist/misogynist

Avoid at all costs.

Remote Year will give you the above for $2,250/mo. (which you can do on your own for significantly less), and a whole lot more you didn’t bargain for! I left after 8 months, and don’t recommend it for reasons I’ll explain below. When I first got accepted into Remote Year, I was full of anticipation & excitement, not only about the immersive experience of actually living abroad (I had already traveled to 60+ countries), but also the opportunity to meet other adventurous and open-minded people, do some business networking, perhaps learn some new skills and potentially have a life-changing experience. It abruptly ended one day during my 8th month when I was told by a senior staff that I had been secretly “investigated” for some alleged “breach” of their code of conduct, and that I had to pack up and leave the program within 48 hours. Ok, I had sold my house, my car and fully planned on being away for at least a year. I had no place to go on such short notice, and demanded to know what exactly they’re accusing me of. But to this day, they won’t tell me what I was suddenly expelled for. I acknowledge that I didn’t like one of our Program Leaders, who constantly preaches the gospel of “One Love” and dreams of becoming a poet, but who fails at doing his job. One poignant example was when another member of our group threatened me with physical violence for talking to this girl he was trying to impress at a party. Making a physical threat was definitely a breach of the code of conduct. Following protocol, I asked the PL to keep this individual away from me and Remote Year premises, but not only was he was dismissive of my request, he repeatedly attempted to cajole me into “letting it go” because he’s now “cool” about the whole thing and really “popular,” which I thought was a ridiculous reason, but eventually, we agreed to move on. Half way through the program, this PL also shared a video on his Facebook timeline directly attacking and insulting our President. Given that most of us are friends with him on FB and most of us are Americans (he’s actually an Irish citizen), I felt this was improper for a Program Leader to post and questioned not his right to free speech, but his wisdom in posting something so controversial that we all can see. Obviously, some of us support the President and many of us don’t. That’s not the point. Imagine you work for a company and have been assigned a client. Would you post something that would likely be offensive to this client on your FB page while you’re still in this company’s employ? Probably not, if you want to keep working for this company, right? Remember, we’re clients, not employees! But this is Remote Year, not a real company, and over 3-years worth of red ink suggests its days are numbered. As others have eluded, it’s run like a fraternity/sorority, or some kind of a cult-ish summer camp. They preach diversity, tolerance and acceptance, but only if you’re talking about today’s liberal progressive political agenda, not the true meaning of those words. They encourage you to share and expose your vulnerability as a path to growth, after reassuring you that you’re in a “safe place,” but will use any information you thus share to stab you in the back in a despicable breach of trust. During my exit “interview,” they basically accused me of being homophobic, when one of my best friends in the program happens to be gay. They tried to make me sound like a violent person, when I was ironically on the receiving end of such behavior. Perhaps most surprising was when they questioned whether I may be a racist, when I’m a minority myself who had fought racism all of my life. At no time during my Remote Year experience did I ever physically touch or verbally threaten anyone with violence, nor make any racial slurs, or violate their code of conduct in any way, and I have no criminal history either. But I do admit that, as a man in my 50’s, I didn’t necessarily “fit in” with the mainstream millennial crowd. I wasn’t interested in their alcohol and drug-fueled party life, and my political views didn’t align with the majority. Well, so much for diversity, tolerance and acceptance. The concept of Remote Year is a good one: Travel around the world while keeping your 9 to 5. The reality is, less than half of our group had real jobs. Most only did just enough in order to get by, or lived off their savings, and of those, most were primarily interested in getting drunk/stoned by the beach/pool, not so much learning about the local culture/history/language. Within our group, there were some remarkable and reasonable people I’ve become good friends with, and it’s a pity I couldn’t finish out my year with them. If you still want to take your chances with Remote Year, honestly ask yourself if what I’ve described is what you want out of it and try to fit into their highly hypocritical social agenda, or at least pretend for a year. Just like the Stasi did in East Germany, if they think you’re a “subversive,” they will conduct a secret “investigation” on you, collect “testimonies” from collaborators and make you disappear. They don’t treat you like a client, even though you pay them a lot of money.

I am just finishing up month 4 in Asia. Hanoi, Chiang Mai, Kyoto and Kuala Lumpur have pushed me out of my comfort zone and into new territories. In my early sixties, I didn't think I would be having a mud bath with elephants, riding a cable car over rice paddies, and zip lining through a canyon. But then why not? Every day I am more active and happier and I have been re-thinking work. Life in a cubicle won't cut it for me now!

Remote Year treats their staff poorly as mentioned by another reviewer below. Don't believe the scripted and polished answer PR answer by Sam, it's all true what the reviewer said. Beyond mistreating employees, for us the paying customers they continuously try to sell you more and more stuff and add-ons along with your program, seemingly in desperation for money. They don't care about breaking the law in the local cities; they even encourage it through their communication. "How to dance around visa rules and restrictions, how to avoid paying taxes, how to stay in the EU longer". Very immoral for a company that pays less than minimum wages, but charge us 27000 American dollars. The networking opportunities they promise does not exist when everyone on the program is just some rich, spoiled American teen with a inheritance and nothing else to do! I thought this was a work and travel program, not a travel and selfie program. I wish I had gone on my own. Google and you fill find plenty of resources like nomadlist, wework or subreddits that can offer you the same for a fraction of the cost and without supporting exploitative wages or breaking the law.

I was excited to join Remote Year and travel the world. The city team in each country are amazing people and many of them became good friends. The more I talked to them the more I came to realize how poorly Remote Year treats its staff and I became disillusioned with my part in supporting such an exploitative company. What Remote Year doesn't tell you is that they don't pay their staff very well, even though they pay them in local wages, which are already cheap compared to Western wages. On top of that they make them work a lot of over time and on many weekends. The part that made most of them anxious and angry though is that Remote Year only pays them for the months when it has people in town. Otherwise its local workers need to find a way to work somewhere else in Remote Year (which is hard, because there are a lot of out of work people at any time) or they have to find another temporary job. You don't have to take my word for it though, read the employee reviews on glassdoor to see how bad the culture is at this company. I wish I had done my research before joining this program. I feel bad about supporting a company that treats the people who work so hard to make it successful like disposable commodities.

When I saw the RY ad the first time at Facebook I was sure that this model works for a lot of people but not for me. But somehow the thought of living the life of a digital nomad never let me go and so I applied first at RY and after their positive answer I started the negotiation with my company (8months long fight). To support me, as I am from Germany, was kind of a challenge for my admission consultant as processes, guidelines and the whole way of accepting a digital nomad was impressively different from the American approach. However, he was always their with smart advises whom to contact and motivating me to not give up. When I finally received the approval from my company I could not believe that I will truly live my dream. The whole on-boarding at RY was full of love and support and even before the program kicked off I was already 100% convinced that this was the best decision in my entire life - and so were my friends and family. Thanks to communities and collaboration platforms I met with one of my future remotee at the airport and we overcame our layover together. (By the way 4 months in, he is still one of my best friends ;) ) When we arrived we were welcomed with open arms and lovely greetings. Everything was seamlessly organized and we could all together celebrate the New Year - our New Year on the 31st of December in Buenos Aires. Till then the organization, passion and the overall commitment of our Program Leads, Local Teams as well as the Travel Team has not become less. If there is help needed you will always find support in a reasonable time. The only thing to be mentioned is that RY is not a program with exclusively full-time / part-time participants. In our program we do have a bunch of people not having a job and living based on their savings, what sometimes leads to frustration by full-time workers. So if you are eager to travel with approx. 50 interesting, inspiring and motivating people from all over the world, while exploring the hidden corners of the planet - RY IT IS!

Remote Year provides an amazing opportunity to travel the world, experience and connect with local communities while building lifelong personal/business connections within your own group and extended Remote Year member community. Remote Year provides all of the necessary resources needed to live, work and travel comfortably. Joining the Remote Year program has been the best life decision I've made and has exceeded my expectations!