I'd rather be known as the guy who helps than the guy who is rude about consulting rates.
If they call and ask they are in complete, dangerous illegality (I had once an American company czll me about an ex employee and they could not understand that).
Some companies used to ask for references, they were referred to friends and they do not ask anymore (this is a general case).
I had one of those for about a year and leaving after just over a year was a question I got used to answering.
The kind of person to lay into you like this is not going to give you a glowing reference whatever you do.
> after a bit of an ear bashing
If someone from my old employer calls and asks me politely for a bit of help with something I know well, I'd help.
If they call to yell at me about how I left behind a fragile system or how I left them in the lurch by quitting, the correct response is to tell them to get fucked, if they then ask for help after that, the correct response is to tell them to go fuck themselves.
Normalising that kind of abusive behaviour is not going to improve the lives of the co-workers you left behind.
You could warn him in advance about an impending negative issue. You could use lights, fireworks and even shout in his ears, but he would ignore you.
The the issue would occur and cause problems, big problems.
He would then ask "Why didn't you warn me?"
I would pull out my paper trail of emails, meeting notes etc.
To which he would reply "You didn't try hard enough to get my attention."
And that is why you don't put a career salesman in charge of your IT department.
“This is exactly the sort of behavior that made me leave. Do not contact me again. If you need something from me, have Steve call me instead.”
Let the people who actually gave a shit about you be your point of contact, not baby Napoleon.
Then you have angry baby Napoleon directing Steve to communicate with you and nobody wins.
Spending 10 minutes on the phone to answer questions is one thing, as long as they are respectful, but more than that means that they want you to work for them.
Often, if made redundant by a company, you cannot return to work for them (as employee or contractor) for a year, otherwise you have to pay back your redundancy pay.
That leads to a potentially hilarious conversation about rates.
"I'll do it, my rates are 100 per hour plus 10K if you want me to start before June next year"
Anything that takes more than an hour should be billed. If the guys at the company are really your friends, they would fight to see you get paid.
