HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) — Rite Aid suddenly withdrew biweekly severance payments it had already made to the accounts of laid-off employees Thursday, according to several employees who spoke with abc27 News and provided similar accounts of their experiences.

Philadelphia-based Rite Aid has been laying off workers and closing stores after filing last fall for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

“Six o’clock in the morning, I check, it’s in the bank,” said one employee, who was laid off early this year and asked not to be identified. “And I asked my son, ‘Would you like to go out to breakfast?’ And we go out to breakfast on the way to school.”

The employee returned home, and their spouse told them the Rite Aid payment was now “pending reversal.”

“And as of 7 p.m., my bank account is now negative because I took my son to breakfast, because we live paycheck to paycheck,” the employee said. “Unfortunately, right now it’s hard to save up money. So we’re kind of stuck right now.”

An e-mail message from the company to employees confirmed the sudden payment reversals weren’t an oversight.

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“We must now take another difficult action to further preserve cash in the short-term,” the message said. “This is necessary in order to best position Rite Aid to emerge from this process as a more financially stable company. As part of these cash-preservation efforts, severance payments due to be distributed on March 7 have been delayed. It remains our intention to make these payments to you. Given the fluid nature of the situation, we are not able to provide a definitive timeline for distribution at this time.”

Rite Aid didn’t immediately respond Thursday night to a request for comment.

“We recognize and apologize for the impact this has on you, and we are working as quickly as possible to resolve this matter,” the company continued in its message to employees.

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abc27 News couldn’t immediately confirm the number of employees affected by the move, which was highly unusual, according to an analyst who specializes in tracking retail finances and bankruptcies.

“In 25 years of doing this, I have never seen a company this far into court-supervised Chapter 11 proceedings make a move like that,” said the analyst, who asked not to be identified because of their involvement with matters related to the case.

The analyst said Rite Aid seemed to be progressing through bankruptcy at a typical pace for companies in similar situations, so Thursday night’s news was surprising.

“Maybe things were worse than they seemed,” the analyst said.

“This definitely has to be a breach of contract,” said the former Rite Aid employee, who agreed to numerous terms in exchange for the promised severance payments.

“We’re not talking about giant parachute bailouts for the C-suite,” the analyst said. “We’re talking about people who actually worked. And if you can’t honor that?”

Other stakeholders took what the analyst — using industry jargon — called “haircuts” during bankruptcy in exchange for promises from Rite Aid.

“It also brings into question — all of their debtors, vendors and landlords — whether they can honor any of their commitments,” the analyst said, adding the routine court supervision under which Rite Aid is operating should have caught any emerging problem before it resulted in the sudden reversal of severance payments.

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