What kind of chief financial officer forgets to pay himself? This is what seems to have happened with James Herbst at telecom company Huge Group.<\/p>\n
Remuneration for Huge\u2019s directors came to R2,37m for the year to end February, but according to its recently published annual report, Herbst did not get a cent of it.<\/p>\n
He is quick to point out that not getting a salary as a director was not due to an unimaginable oversight on his part. He did receive payment, but was remunerated as a consultant and not as a full-time employee. \u201cI was a director in the company but not an employee of it,\u201d is how he describes his involvement.<\/p>\n
He says there were technical reasons why he was not on the books, but admits there were tax benefits in working as a consultant. He points out that he has been with Huge on a full-time basis since the beginning of March.<\/p>\n
Herbst and CEO Anton Potgieter listed Huge in August last year, following the merger of TelePassport and CentraCall. These companies were least-cost routers (LCRs), specialists in finding the cheapest way to route phone calls.<\/p>\n
Potgieter and Herbst stumbled onto each other when both were looking to become big players in the LCR market. They decided to combine their efforts, which led to the creation of Huge.<\/p>\n
So far Huge has been good for Herbst. He may not have received direct payment for his work, but with more than 16m shares, he gets a nice slice of the 12c maiden dividend Huge declared in June.<\/p>\n