Operation Relocation . . . is a GO!

*I wrote this blog post last Tuesday, just had to wait until Brian notified his boss before publishing.*

I can't believe I'm writing those words . . . this is very surreal. I just looked back on a blog post I wrote almost exactly one year ago. About how we had an opportunity to move to Seattle so Brian could work for Microsoft. How we really wanted to go, but it just didn't seem like the right opportunity. At the end of that post, I said this:

"This process opened our eyes up to the fact that we are open to moving, which I never thought that I would be. The HR lady at Microsoft told us that if we change our mind in the next year we should give her a call - "We might get you down here yet" were her words, or something to that effect. So while the timing and offer were not the right opportunity right NOW, who knows how we'll feel in a year? I know I sure don't!:)"

The year is up. We have an offer from Amazon. We're going to take it. Brian starts his new job August 26th.

Most of you reading this know that Brian has been applying for jobs in the Seattle area, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft. He started this back in February, right after we got back from our weekend in Seattle. We heard nothing for months. A few recruiters from Microsoft got in touch with him, but it never progressed past the initial interview stage. He did have a few phone interviews with Google, and it looked like they were going to be bring him on onsite for an interview, but in the end decided not to move forward. It was a bit discouraging for Brian, as he was starting to get a bit excited about the prospect of working for Google, but the reality was we might not have been able to accept a job with them anyway (not too sure how good their Autism treatment benefits are). This was back in May and we were back to square one. I was genuinely starting to think it wasn't going to happen this year. I was starting to settle into the idea that we were staying, and was perfectly happy with that. The kids were set for school next year, everything would be easy, smooth sailing.

And then out of the blue, an Amazon recruiter calls. They are coming to Calgary again and they want to interview Brian on Monday, June 10th. Okay, the door was open again! However, I was pretty sure that Amazon would never be an option for us because last year at least, they had no Autism treatment benefits at all. If anyone doesn't know, Autism treatment in the US can cost between $40,000 and $50,000 a year. Not exactly feasible for most families. Microsoft had amazing benefits, but at the time that we researched it, they were the only ones. Brian decided to look it up and lo and behold, Amazon switched to the same benefits company as Microsoft back in February of this year. That didn't necessarily mean their benefits would be the same, but we knew that at the very least, they had an Autism benefit now. Right before Brian was set to interview with Amazon, he found out from a Microsoft recruiter that he had been in touch with that there was a hiring manager that wanted to do a phone interview with him. The phone interview was on Friday, Brian's Amazon interview was on Monday. Just when you think the door is closed...

The Amazon interview went well. They let Brian know on Tuesday that they were very impressed with him and wanted to extend him an offer (I'm not surprised, I know how good he is at what he does:)). He let Microsoft know that he was getting an offer and they immediately told him they wanted to bring him down for an onsite interview - that Friday! So off he went to Seattle on Friday. While he was there, Amazon got in touch with him and gave him the offer. They actually called here first, and I was able to ask about benefits. The guy on the phone verified that they did indeed have an Autism treatment benefit and he sent me a very general overview of it. The offer was pretty good, better than the Microsoft offer last year, but there were still a lot of questions to be answered before we could accept. We put in a request to talk to benefits experts and waited to hear from them. In the meantime, Brian heard back from Microsoft. No-go for this group. It was a bit of an odd response, actually. The specific team he was interviewing with didn't think he would be a good fit for them, but they thought there might be other teams within Microsoft Office that he WOULD be a good fit for. So no, but yes . . . very weird. They told us that if he said no to Amazon, he should get back in touch with them and they would put an offer together for him, but they wouldn't be able to put one together in a short enough time frame to compete with Amazon.

We pretty much decided that we shouldn't count on Microsoft panning out, so we were back to trying to figure out if we could make Amazon work. Brian expressed some concerns about salary and vacation time, thinking they would probably not budge on either (such as our experience with Microsoft last year), and they immediately turned around and offered him 10% more on base salary and an extra week of vacation. Hmmm - maybe this would work after all?? Now we just had to wait and hear if they would cover Adam's preschool and ABA therapy. After much back and forth, we found out that the specific preschool we picked for him WAS covered, and that we would only have to pay a deductible and co-insurance up to a maximum, and that was an affordable number. Luckily, this is the same deductible and maximum that applies to ALL our medical expenses, so after we max this out, every medical expense we have will be covered at 100%. I wanted to add that in case anyone is concerned that we haven’t looked into that:).

Sooo that was the last thing we needed! All that was left now was to accept! And that we did - today, Tuesday, June 25th. There is a lot we need to do now. I am a bit overwhelmed at the thought. A relocation expert will be in contact with us soon to help us get started, so I'm hoping I don't feel too overwhelmed. Selling the house is the biggest obstacle in my mind. But, I know we will manage. I feel like God has opened the doors for us to make this change, and He is coming with us to Seattle! Or Bellevue . . . pretty sure we will live in Bellevue, although Brian's job is going to be in downtown Seattle.

Operation relocation begins!