Former Canoo employees face medical bills despite premiums deducted from pay, question if company truly tried avoiding bankruptcy

OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — Some former employees of bankrupt electric vehicle maker Canoo say they are now stuck with thousands of dollars in months-old medical bills their insurance plans through Canoo were supposed to have covered.

They question whether bankruptcy could have been avoided if company executives had just cut back on lavish spending habits, and if their experience is indicative of a new 'American Dream.'

Canoo came to Oklahoma on the heels of big promises.

“If we can land some of these major, major companies and these major manufacturing facilities, It will have a generational impact on the state of Oklahoma,” Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt said at a news conference in 2022 amidst advocating state legislators to set aside money to give companies like Canoo state-backed incentives.

The state eventually lured Canoo to locate its manufacturing in Oklahoma City with a $300 million state-backed, performance-based incentive package.

It set up a factory in an Oklahoma City warehouse.

As News 4 previously reported, Canoo leased the warehouse a space from a company owned by Canoo’s CEO, Tony Aquila.

“By the end of this year, we’ll bring 120 jobs to this site,” Aquila told News 4 during a media evcent at the warehouse in November 2023. “As the site continues to run to its run rate, it will grow to about 700.”

In 2023, Canoo also opened a battery manufacturing facility at the Mid-America Industrial Park in Pryor.

Later, the company relocated its headquarters from Torrance, California to Justin, Texas.

However, as News 4 reported, Canoo never ended up manufacturing vehicles at its Oklahoma City Warehouse.

The company furloughed employees late last year, before filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy last month.

Two former Canoo employees, who asked News 4 not share their identities while they explore legal options, say their entire experience with Canoo leaves them question whether the ‘American Dream’ is still alive.

“[Aquila] has the private jet that he bought,” the first former employee told News 4. “He has all this stuff—buying video consoles for these people that he’s bringing in from foreign countries… But doesn’t care about his own employees like that.”

The first former employee said, when he and others first noticed signs that Canoo was in financial trouble, they offered to make personal sacrifices to help keep the company afloat, but Canoo executives didn’t seem as interested.

“There was a lot of talk about a bunch of upper management, as well as ourselves, taking pay cuts just to, you know, go through the rocky period,” the second former employee said. “And it was pretty much told, ‘No, that’s not happening.’”

That refusal didn't make sense to the former employees. But then again, they said a lot of the things Canoo executives prioritized financially didn't make much sense to them.

“The Torrance facility had espresso machines on every floor, free coffee, free catered food every day,” the second former employee said.

They say Aquila had an affinity for luxury, and the people who could afford it.

“We had funding that was probably coming in from Saudi Arabia,” the second former employee said.

They claim Aquila had a close relationship with a Saudi Arabian prince, and Canoo would often spare no expense to make the Prince and his family feel valued by the company.

“We had engineers staying at the Saudi Arabian castle with the prince for a month,” the second former employee said. “When these people came for a tour of OKC, say, from overseas, there was an instance where someone had brought his adolescent child with them. They went out, they bought an Xbox and a bunch of stuff, and filled Tony’s office with things to keep him busy.”

The former employees believe that if Canoo had been serious about avoiding bankruptcy, the company could have cut back on those lavish expenses.

“There was so much more that they could have done,” the second former employee said. “Even to the moment we were going out the door, they were still trying to get us to hold on the hope, telling us, you know, we're unfortunately furloughing you for 12 weeks.”

News 4 obtained a copy of a more than 200-page court document Canoo filed as part of its bankruptcy proceedings.

The document lists people and companies Canoo currently is and/or once was indebted to.

The list included names of former employees and indicated how much money Canoo once owed them for unpaid salary and expenses.

Next to each name, it listed a date in which Canoo claims it finally paid them the money it owed.

The former employees News 4 spoke with say Canoo didn’t send them their full, final paychecks and expense reimbursements until after News 4 reported that Canoo withholding those payments could violate federal labor law.

“It wasn’t until News 4 aired that first story that they decided that they were going to extend benefits for the rest of the month and all those things,” the second former employee said.

Even when Canoo sent them corrected checks as reflected on its bankruptcy filing, the former employees say the payments still weren’t accurate.

The second former employee told News 4 he was expecting 80 hours—an entire pay cycle—worth of pay in the corrected check. But that isn’t what he got.

“I got another check, but for 16 hours of pay again—no hourly rate on the check stub, just 16 hours,” the second former employee said.

The former employees told News 4 the company may also owe them for much more, including reimbursements insurance premiums deducted from their salaries each pay check which they now suspect Canoo may have never actually paid to their insurance provider.

The former employees told News 4, that's because they now are both receiving bills for medical appointments they went to several months ago, while they were still fully employed — prior to the furloughs and layoffs.   

They say their medical benefits were supposed to have been active at the time of the appointments.

The first former employee told News 4 he is now facing a $3,500 medical bill for an appointment that he can’t afford.

“I’d like to know where all of the money that I paid in every paycheck went,” the second former employee said. “Because if I didn’t have health insurance, it should go back in my pocket. It should go back to my family.”

But legal experts say, getting any of that money back could prove challenging.

Oklahoma City-based attorney Ed Blau says—with Canoo being bankrupt its status as an LLC protecting its executives from being held personally liable for the company’s debts—former employees won’t have many options beyond suing for what is left of Canoo’s assets.

“In this particular instance, when Canoo closed its doors and filed for bankruptcy, there’s no longer any real regulatory means to effectuate the rights of the workers,” Oklahoma City Attorney Ed Blau said. “Therefore, in looking at what their options are, some sort of lawsuit is probably going to be their best bet.”

But there may not be many, if any, assets left to liquidate to pay the employees back.

When it filed for bankruptcy, Canoo listed it has less than $50,000 in assets.

Blau says, since Aquila’s other company was Canoo’s landlord—if Canoo failed to pay its rent, Aquila’s other company could evict Canoo and legally take possession of all the valuable equipment Canoo left behind in the warehouse, leaving Canoo unable to liquidate it to pay off its debts.  

“It’s going to be very difficult and it’s going to be a complicated situation for the employees to pierce those corporate veils and get in there to see what the actual ownership structure is in order to get any recourse or recompense for what they’re owed,” Blau said.

When the two former employees News 4 spoke with think about all the medical expenses and all other money they’re owed which they may not ever see — they can’t help but think they don’t even have it the worst.

They think about Canoo’s engineering staff, many of them recruited to work for Canoo from overseas.

“A lot of those people are here on work visas,” the first former employee said.

“They are now searching for somewhere to go to have somebody take over that visa or that H-1B,” the second former employee said.

The former employees say Canoo had just relocated its engineering to staff to Oklahoma from California one month prior to the furloughs.

“I sat with one of the engineers who was from Mexico, and just hearing his voice and hearing how upset he was, knowing that he found a home in Oklahoma,” the second former employee said.“I mean, God forbid they sold their houses and they got into leases and they're renting or they bought a house here. And then they were here for less than a month and furloughed. And now they're told to go collect unemployment. Well, guess what? You can't collect unemployment in Oklahoma because you haven't lived here long enough. So now what do they do? Do they go to try and collect unemployment in California? Well, they're not a resident of California anymore.”

“That just kind of puts a bad taste in especially, you know, the people that are from other countries,” the first former employee said. “And then we wonder why some of those people look down on Americans because of stuff like this. You know, they have no place to turn and they're at the mercy of the mercy of—if they find a job and if they find somebody to take over their work visa.”

For these employees, their time with Canoo has left them with a lasting impression of corporate life.

“People have been burned so many times, that’s why nobody trusts anybody anymore,” the first former employee said. “We pretty much uprooted our whole lives on this dream that you had… I mean, we did it all in vain.”

They still want to see Canoo leadership—particularly Aquila—offer some sort of accountability.

“I think Tony should be a man and step up and take care of the people that took care of him,” the second former employee said. “I think that when they go, they liquidate all these assets and they finally finalize everything. They should make good to everybody that supported them through this time, that put their blood, sweat and tears in for years, you know, trying to make it happen and make good on it. They really should they should make good on it.”

It all makes them think about that dream—and the definition they think fits it best.

“The American Dream?” the first former employee said. “Come over here and we’re just going to take advantage of you and see what we can get away with.”

News 4 has been unable to reach Canoo executives to ask them questions since the company filed for bankruptcy.

However, when Canoo announced its bankruptcy last month, CEO Tony Aquila released the following statement:

“We would like to thank the company’s employees for their dedication and hard work. We know that you believed in our company as we did. We are truly disappointed that things turned out as they did. We would also like to thank NASA, the Department of Defense, The United States Postal Service (“USPS”), the State of Oklahoma and Walmart for their belief in our products and our company. This means a lot to everyone in the company.”