At Enron, employees under 50 weren't permitted to sell shares received as matching contributions made by the company. All employees were locked out of the plan between Oct. 26 and Nov. 13 while it changed administrators.
Rinard and his wife had planned to sell some Enron shares when the price reached US$30 but were locked out of their account.
"We were stuck," said Rinard, who saw his retirement account balance fall from US$400,000 to about US$35,000. "Twenty two years of savings is just completely shot." Ken Kahloni, a former information and technology manager at Enron, lost US$75,000 in his 401(k). "I took a pay cut to work there two years ago, because I wanted to work for the `best company,'" he said, referring to Enron's description of itself.
Trusting the Company Many Enron employees accuse the company of letting employees lose savings while executives sold shares before the stock price fell.
A suit filed on Wednesday in federal court in Houston on behalf of New York-based Amalgamated Bank alleged that 29 Enron executives and directors, including former Chief Executive Jeffrey Skilling and Chairman Kenneth Lay, made US$1.1 billion from "massive insider selling" while concealing Enron's deteriorating condition.
"With our 401(k), it was Enron's job as our employer to look after our investment," Rinard said. "We trusted the company down to the very end."
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