SHAH ALAM - The Malaysian twitterverse got a little heated last night when users had confused modest clothing line Mimpikita with skincare brand Mimpimika over a recent pay check controversy.
It all started when a former employee at the local skincare company exposed her former employer's failure to fulfil her Employee Provident Fund (EPF) and Social Security Organisation (SOCSO) payments to the public in a Twitter thread.
On Dec 22, the woman who served with the start-up, using her account on Twitter @nurulnazurahh insisted that EPF and Socso were the employee's rights and that the employer could not lie about and seemingly "forgot” to pay it.
She went on to state that it was an employer's responsibility thus they should not question why the staff were being vocal about it.
She followed up the first tweet with her unpleasant experience and even shared her conversation with the company owner who had asked her for seven to 10 days to hand over her paycheque.
The owner, according to her, had eventually ignored her text messages later when asking for updates and even physically avoided her by "faking a cough and choking” situation.
Shortly after the exposé, user @farahzeis quoted @nurulnazurahh’s tweet sharing her confusion:” All this time I thought this was Mimpikita, the local designer brand! Don't falsely boycott, guys. Pity the brand”.
Another account @shzwazid quoted the same tweet opining, "Mimpimika is a rising local brand and their products are quite good, but because of this, their years of effort to build the brand will go down to drain.
"Do not support a business that do not compensate efforts of their staff fairly. No business can survive without good employees," he reminded fellow users.
A Twitter user @flowerosese quoted the reflective tweet from @shzwazid captioning, "For those who are confused, Mimpimika (skincare) okay, not Mimpimika (clothes)”.
Later, the local fashion retailer whose name sounds only a consonant different, Mimpikita came forward on their Twitter clearing their name.
"In light of the recent viral news in the social medias, we would like to emphasise that we are not in any relations or ways involved to the matter nor the company mentioned as we are "MIMPIKITA”.
"Thank you,” it said in a statement.
Notably, the heated issue had even reached the attention of former PKR deputy secretary-general Sharifah Shahidah Syed Kamarulzaman who posted a pair of screenshots of both victims of the offence, the underpaid former staff's complaint as well as the modest clothing enterprise's statement on her Twitter page.
She wrote, "Mimpimika is some local skincare brand. Mimpikita is a top local fashion brand and they're a professional company.
"Mimpimika didn't pay their staff, Mimpikita makes great modest clothes (and pay their staff). Please don't get confused and tweet the wrong info," she helped clear the air.