25 JAN 10: The 9.6 Million Dollar Man

Now now -- don't get the wrong idea from our title. We are NOT announcing a big cash giveaway for blog readers. We can't afford that these days. In fact, I thought I was splurging the other day when I spent 50 extra cents at the supermarket for a small fruit pie.

But other people have big bucks on their minds right now. I heard from one over the weekend - someone who apparently reads this blog in India. Of course, it wound up in our Spam e-mail. But no, it was NOT from an earthquake survivor trying to export three million dollars.

We mentioned last Thursday that TSYS expects to reduce its workforce by five percent this year. That led to this "outsourced" response:

And this is what the bosses at TSYS would offer themselves in case they got, errr, re-organised:....

Philip W. Tomlinson/$ 9,628,575

James B. Lipham/$ 3,644,207

M. Troy Woods/$ 7,883,336

William A. Pruett/$ 4,120,725

Kenneth L. Tye/$ 4,827,824

Have a nice day, y'all

Incidentally, the auditors they have in India refused to sign the "accounts".

Best/Veeresh Malik

New Delhi/India

We confirmed Sunday night that link is legitimate - from a page buried deep in a TSYS proxy statement filed last March. The five executives would get that combined 30 million dollars only if a "change of control" takes place. At this point, the Chinese government is only upset with Google....

The totals listed in the e-mail reflect total compensation. The proxy statement shows they're based on three times the TSYS executives' base salary. In the case of Chief Executive Officer Philip Tomlinson, that base at the end of 2008 was $840,000. With that salary, he'd better have his own corner booth for lunch at Country's downtown.

The proxy statement also notes top TSYS executives are required to own a lot of TSYS stock. For instance, Philip Tomlinson has to own enough stock for five times his base salary. Trading opens today with TSYS stock at $14.69 - so if you're a Columbus resident who does NOT a share of TSYS, I figure Tomlinson already owns it for you.

In case you don't know which executive is which: Philip Tomlinson is TSYS Chairman and C.E.O. James Lipham is C.F.O. M. Troy Woods is President and C.O.O. William Pruett is C.C.O. And Kenneth Tye is C.I.O. The workers being trimmed are simply C.O.'s - cut out.

(Before rumors start - no, I do NOT think Conan O'Brien will be hired by TSYS as Team COCO.)

But I admittedly don't understand Veeresh Malik's line about TSYS having auditors in India. The proxy statement I reviewed indicates KPMG conducted the company's independent audit last year. If the number-crunchers were in New Delhi, that seems about as independent from Columbus as you can get.

TSYS actually has employees located far from Columbus. As of Sunday night, the corporate web site showed job openings in Cyprus and Dubai. Of course, you'd have to be careful in Dubai about saying "T.G.I.F." to people - because they might expect an A instead.

But I digress -- our Indian reader has found five very nice "golden parachutes" waiting to be deployed, in case a major change occurs at TSYS. But c'mon now. Isn't this Columbus company stable? The day someone takes over TSYS is the day the New Orleans Saints go to the Super Bowl, and that will never.... oh wait....

If you don't have a job with this sort of golden parachute, the Georgia Lottery is about to offer a new temptation. Tuesday is the deadline to submit a home video promoting the arrival of Powerball in Georgia. If you think "Powerball" involves Columbus High School baseball players hitting home runs, you need to travel around more.

The Georgia Lottery will begin selling Powerball tickets next Sunday. The twice-weekly drawings will be added to the twice-weekly Mega Millions drawings -- so your dream of a fancy retirement home overlooking Lake Harding can be destroyed four times in five nights.

Our thanks to readers near and far who find these interesting tidbits - especially since we didn't find much in the Sunday news:

+ The Ledger-Enquirer web site reported St. Matthew Lutheran Church voted against separating from its denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The ELCA recently decided to allow homosexual ministers. I'm sorry, but I think this misinterprets the Bible - especially that verse in James about people with "gay clothing."

+ Author and magazine writer Gay Talese held a question-and-answer session at the Columbus Public Library. I'm a bit surprised this didn't inspire a protest march. After all, they brought a well-known "Gay" person to Columbus - and on a Sunday after church at that....

+ Georgia Tech flopped at Florida State in men's basketball 68-66. It was curious at one point to see both teams huddling side by side in the free throw lane. If the football teams huddled that close to each other, someone probably would have started a fight.

+ WLGA tried to show the Auburn-Kentucky women's basketball game, but a passing storm kept the screen dark for minutes at a time. Considering Kentucky won 68-50, they might as well have shown infomercials as usual.

+ Instant Message to Coach Charles Flowers: C'mon, admit it - you called Indianapolis Sunday night, didn't you? You called former Shaw linebacker Philip Wheeler and asked about Super Bowl tickets, didn't you?

TEN YEARS' LAUGHTER/25 JAN 00: And it was SO COLD in Atlanta over the weekend that the city had damaging ice storms. SO COLD.... it was colder than John Rocker's humor.

Today's main topic was the result of a blog reader's tip. To offer a story tip, advertise to our readers, make a PayPal donation or comment on this blog, write me - but be warned, I may post your e-mail comment and offer a reply.

BURKARD BULK MAIL INDEX: 378 (- 21, 5.3%)

The views expressed in this blog are solely those of the author -- not necessarily those of anyone else in Columbus living or dead, and perhaps not even you.

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