DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — Employees at a healthcare business based in north Fulton County say they have gone months without getting a paycheck.
They say Our Community Health Care Systems shut down and locked up in October, and that’s when they started having issues with their pay.
“I believed in everything that the company was supposed to represent,” Nika Atkins-Jefferies told Channel 2’s Eryn Rogers.
Atkins-Jefferies and another former employee, who did not want to be identified, said they used to help seniors with things like group fitness and crafts.
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“We were feeding them, we were taking them on different trips and events,” the second former employee said.
But by October, they say the company’s owner started paying them partially through Zelle or with a check from a different company she used to own in Texas.
At one point, they say they received an email from the company asking them not to cash the checks.
“By December, pay had ceased, operations had ceased,” Atkins-Jefferies said. “They basically disappeared.”
Rogers spoke with the owner, Victoria Bells, who said the company just grew too fast.
“We had to take a step back for a minute, so we had delays in reimbursement, because the reimbursements are tied to documentation,” Bells said.
She said she plans to pay people.
“Everyone that has a legitimate claim, we are going to take care of them,” Bells assured.
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Atkins-Jefferies says she was never formally separated from the company and, therefore, cannot file for unemployment.
“I have nothing saying I don’t work there anymore,” she said.
When she tried looking up her 2025 wages, she says an IRS webpage shows no data found despite taxes being taken out of her paycheck.
“No taxes had been paid on my behalf for the entire year,” she said.
Bells says everyone will get their W2s and she hired a company to help her with billing.
“I’ve been working with the insurance companies. We have been hiring and training, so we are restructuring,” she said.
Part of that restructuring includes a new location in Alpharetta and a business called John’s Heart, focusing on cardiovascular health.
The former staff members say they feel abandoned.
“This new building that she just got and the new facility, and still without no pay, still without any answers to where my two checks were or if I was going to receive them,” the anonymous former employee said.
“It’s real upsetting,” Atkins-Jefferies said.
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