Many companies question the value of providing an offer letter to newly hired employees because they don’t understand the protection that the document can provide. Especially in situations where an employee is hired under special circumstances, an offer letter can be the document that saves your company from costly lawsuits or unemployment charges that arise at the time an employee resigns, is laid off, or fired.
To illustrate this, consider what happened to one of our clients, a lawn maintenance service. In the spring of each year, part-time employees are hired to work through late summer/early fall. After the last lawn cutting of the season, all part-time employees are laid off. At the end of last year’s season, one of the employees who was laid off, complained to the EEOC that he was unjustly terminated based on his race.
In the end, the employer proved that they did not discriminate or unfairly terminate the employee based on his race. However, the process would have been faster and cost a lot less in attorney fees and the owner’s time if the company had used an offer letter which clearly stated the work was part-time.
If you need an offer letter, please visit our store for the latest forms, documents and policies to simplify Human Resources. For information of content to include on an offer letter.
Can you share your comments where an offer letter helped you defend against a lawsuit or unemployment claim?
