- HP or HPE employee in the process of leaving: use the ASAP checklist. Join Ex-Compaq* and HP Connections groups on LinkedIn.

- Former Compaq employee who never worked for HP: Join Ex-Compaq* and HP Connections groups on LinkedIn.

If you received a "Potential Private Retirement Benefit Information" notice from Social Security, it is usually based on outdated information -- as indicated by the "Year Reported" date on the form included in the body of the notice. Here's how to decode it: https://www.hpalumni.org/PotentialBenefitLetter

LinkedIn. How to get your LinkedIn profile to show the correct company for each position. LinkedIn Tips & Traps - Positions

Time to untangle your stock! With any employer, no one but you really cares about your employment-related stock. Due to the HP Breakup, you may have stock in up to seven HP-related companies. It may not all be held in the same place. Many find stray accounts -- or need to retrieve stock or dividends turned over to a state as "unclaimed." With each spinoff, the cost basis for your shares changed. You could pay taxes twice on the same income. Your heirs won't need to know your cost basis, but will need to find all the shares. An HP Alumni team developed a step-by-step process to find and protect your stock. Go to Employee Stock  

Employee stock. HPAA stock decoder tables for employee stock in major predecessor companies:  Compaq   DEC    Tandem

Comments about this page to: info@hpalumni.org   (Updated May 23, 2019.)

If you bought CPQ shares under the Compaq employee stock purchase plan, those shares were automatically converted to HPQ shares at the time of the merger. Unless you have sold or transferred them, the shares (and your corresponding new Hewlett Packard Enterprise and other spinoff shares) are being held by the last administrator of the plan, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney -- which is no longer being paid by the company for this work. Details and HPAA advice for former CPQ employee shareholders

Morgan Stanley customers are getting different results from different divisions of the company -- depending on whether they were participants in the Compaq Employee Stock Purchase Plan or had transferred their HP stock to a personal account at Morgan Stanley's local-office-based retail brokerage division. Morgan Stanley issues reported by members

Service at predecessor companies. Of HP's many predecessor companies, only HP and DEC had retiree healthcare programs. Only HP, DEC, and EDS had pension plans. Over the years, HP, DEC, and EDS set aside money in dedicated trust funds to pay for those programs. Compaq, Tandem, Autonomy, Palm, etc. did not have retiree healthcare or pensions among their benefits programs. Their employees did not have those expectations and there were no corresponding trust funds to pass on to an acquiring company. Therefore, employees of those companies do not get credit under HP's retiree healthcare or pension programs for service at the predecessor company. (Predecessor service does count for FTO.)  Details: DEC  EDS

HPInc is the legal successor to Compaq HPInc has responsibility for any commitments. This includes any retiree health coverage, pension, 401(k), etc. plans. (Does not depend on whether the employee's last business unit ended up in HPInc or Hewlett Packard Enterprise in the HP Breakup.)

Experience letters and employment verification for HPInc, HPE, predecessor companies, and successor companies. How to provide current and past employment status and salary to potential employers, financial institutions, and government aid agencies. Employment Verification: https://www.hpalumni.org/verif. Experience Letter: https://www.hpalumni.org/verif-letter

Compaq news:

- October 25, 1991: "The Day Everything Changed at Compaq" LinkedIn "Pulse" article by Sean Burke

- "Open: How Compaq Ended IBM's PC Domination and Helped Invent Modern Computing" – by Rod Canion. "...a series of risky and daring decisions – often facing criticism and incredulity – that allowed the open PC standard marketplace to thrive and the incredible benefits of open computing to be realized." BenBella Books (October 15, 2013) ASIN: 1937856992  Author's website: The Compaq Story

- Documentary based on Rod Canion's "Open" -- "Silicon Cowboys"

Other links:

- Employment Verification for former HP and Compaq employees.

- Networking Directory of HP- and Compaq-related networks and groups around the world.

- Contacts for former HP and HPE employees  

Compaq history:

- Compaq company history (via the Internet Archive)

- Gordon Bell's Compaq/DEC timeline

- Compaq Wikipedia article – with references and links. Note: Wikipedia articles change over time, may not cover all aspects of the topic consistently, and may not be written from a neutral point of view.

* The informal Ex-Compaq Employees group on LinkedIn is operated by Compaq alumni, not by the HPAA. The group is not officially endorsed or supported by any company.

The Hewlett-Packard Alumni Association is operated by former employees who volunteer their time. Not officially endorsed or supported by any company. More about the HPAA