Ask HN: How are you helping employees affected by the war in Ukraine? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How are you helping employees affected by the war in Ukraine?

67 pointshodgesrm36 comments

Like many companies we have employees affected by the the violence in Ukraine. What are others doing to help their employees?

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I have an employee who has 4 kids and a sick wife. We already pay him a good US-level salary, but I'd be happy to pay a few extra tens of thousands to help them immigrate.

I don't even know where to start. Can they get across a border? Can they board a plane? How do I help?

I'm terrified and sad for everyone there.

Ukrainian air space is closed at the moment. He would have to leave the country by land first.

That's what I was thinking. He's just a bit southwest of Kyiv, so it might be impossible to get all the way to a safe border soon. I'm sure there are lots of people escaping now.

Train to Lviv, take a cab, cross the border to Rzeszow (Ukrainians are allowed to enter EU for 90 days,) take a train to Warsaw, fly wherever you want.

That is extremely helpful. Thank you.

Right now, many feel it is too late to leave, and that it is safer to stay than to leave. The roads are blocked, lines for fuel are huge (and fuel is running out). I wish my family had left sooner.

That's helpful. It's hard to know from here which decisions are better or worse.

I'm sorry to hear about your family and hope that they stay safe. You must be absolutely wracked with anxiety. I am too, and I don't even have any family there.

Ideas:

(1) Help them locate countries that they can travel to.

(2) Arrange local accommodations in hotels/apartments so they have a place to stay when they arrive.

(3) If you have not done so already, get a Brex virtual credit card in their name that they can use to pay expenses once they are out. Paypal is another way to move funds that does not require a bank account. There are many others.

They are going to try to get to Romania or Poland. I have contacted an immigration lawyer to see if we can sponsor them and bring them to the US.

> If you have not done so already, get a Brex virtual credit card in their name that they can use to pay expenses once they are out. Paypal is another way to move funds that does not require a bank account. There are many others.

This is interesting. Why do you recommend this? Because you expect Putin to shut down their banking infrastructure?

We are not confident that it will be possible to get money out of Ukrainian banks. (Due to attacks physical and virtual on infrastructure.)

Edited: added sentence

Borders are open and they can cross without any visa. Russia is spreading some fake news about closed borders. There is a list of reception points in Poland (some are walking distance from the border) in case they have problems with finding accommodation:

https://www.gov.pl/web/udsc/ukraina-en (English)

https://www.gov.pl/web/udsc/ukraina---ua (Ukrainian)

[edit] looks like Ukraine doesn't allow men aged 18-60 to leave the country: https://espreso-tv.translate.goog/cholovikam-gromadyanam-ukr...

Honestly men of fighting age are probably better off going through Russian controlled points than Ukrainian as terrible as that sounds Russians are most likely to let people leave so they don’t have to fight them later

I reached out to an independent contractor who I used to work with on Upwork many years ago. It meant so much to her that I simply inquired to see how she was and if there was anything I could do to help. Often people feel so abandoned.

She told me that she is trying to cross the Polish border, but it is a huge traffic jam and a total stand still.

"It’s crazy here, we are trying to cross the border with Poland, but so many people are here, cars are just standing. Thank you for your warm words, I will update if I make it to Poland with my husband and two kids"

Just woke up to the news, we've got an engineer in Kyiv.

He wants to get out but, at this stage, no one even knows which borders are open.

Created an account real quick to post this. I would have him look into getting to Romania. They said they will take about 500k refugees from Ukraine. From Romania he might be able to get to the US or wherever your company is.

Slovakian prime minister announced that anybody running from the war will be allowed to cross our borders.

https://spectator.sme.sk/c/22848160/slovakia-will-let-everyb...

I wonder how companies like Jetbrains will function. HQ in Czech Republic but majority of developers in Russia, I believe. Might be hard to pay developers without SWIFT access.

europe cant block russian swift access, or they wont be able to get money invested in russia back out.

I would have agreed with you 48 hours ago. Not so sure today.

They can, but they don't want to.

Investment assets can be easily got back from black Russian money horded abroad. Like 1000x more.

what will europe do if/when russia cuts off oil and gas in retaliation for sanctions?

Be a little bit colder. But that beats supporting the Russian war machine.

Please post notes if your company has solutions. Ukrainian citizens can travel to Schengen region countries in the EU without a visa for up to 90 days. [1] Regulations related to COVID are still evolving. This complicates travel for unvaccinated employees and their families. [2]

[1] https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/who-needs-schengen-visa/

[2] https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/news/eu-lifts-non-essential...

Just published exempt from the quarantine obligation: https://twitter.com/a_niedzielski/status/1496963713676595201

Ireland is waiving visa requirements to Ukrainians who can get there. Canada is also accepting refugees from Ukraine. I have heard unconfirmed rumors Georgia is accepting folks as well, but have not been able to substantiate yet.

This was just posted in a reliable parent group I'm in (in San Francisco). I don't know about the organizations but it seems like a good starting point. RUSSIA-UKRAINE CRISIS/WAR: INFO AND WAYS TO HELP

https://ukrainewar.carrd.co/?fbclid=IwAR0v8CBtrrSj1dschsCPik...

Does anyone know where is the best place to donate for relief efforts? Or is it better just to wire money to our friends who we know?

> "Created an account real quick to post this. I would have him look into getting to Romania. They said they will take about 500k refugees from Ukraine. From Romania he might be able to get to the US or wherever your company is."

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30450738

Also what can we do to help affected in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Lebanon, Somalia, Ethiopia...

US Military Dogs were given seats on planes, while Afghans were hanging on the outside of those same planes and then eventually fell to their deaths. [1]

The US provides lots and lots of weapons to Saudi Arabia, who are artificially creating a famine in Yemen [3] and have used the US's provided weapons to deliberately attack MSF Hospitals [2].

There is no mass outrage. No trending tweets. No real pressure at all on the US administration for either of those things. Afghanistan was a thing for a few days, but eventually everyone started blaming the poor civilians instead.

Seems clear to me that you have to be a certain demographic to get sympathy from the Internet in the West.

1. https://www.news.com.au/world/middle-east/afghanistan-us-mil...

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Famine_in_Yemen_(2016%E2%80%93...

3. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2016/09/yemen-evidenc...

There is outrage. But when the conversion turns that way posts are flagged as too political

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