Slashdot is powered by your submissions, so send in your scoop

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
Businesses

Some Firms Are Demanding Steep Repayments If Staff Depart (nytimes.com) 154

At 26, nurse Benzor Vidal moved from the Philippines to America for work, but quit his unsafe, understaffed nursing home job after 14 weeks. His employment contract stipulated he could owe $20,000+ in damages if he resigned early. The New York Times Magazine digs deeper: This type of contract provision is known as a "stay or pay" clause, and it used to be common only for certain high-paying roles or in certain specialized industries. For airline pilots and software engineers, for example, it has been a longstanding practice at some companies to require employees to stay at their jobs for a defined period of time in order to recoup costs related to hiring and training. But the line between recouping costs and penalizing workers for leaving can be blurry, and companies have increasingly taken advantage of that ambiguity. Workers' rights advocates say that, in many cases, stay-or-pay clauses no longer accurately reflect the company's costs but instead appear to be inflated financial penalties designed to discourage quitting.

The use of stay-or-pay clauses has grown rapidly over the past decade, and it has seemingly exploded since the start of the pandemic, as companies try to retain workers in a tight labor market. The clauses have spread far beyond the handful of roles and industries where they originated and are now used by thousands of mid- and low-wage employers -- something that came to light when workers began filing lawsuits challenging the practice. These contract terms have been applied to bank workers, salespeople, dog groomers, police officers, aestheticians, firefighters, mechanics, nurses, federal employees, electricians, roofers, social workers, paramedics, truckers, mortgage brokers, teachers and metal polishers. Legal experts believe stay-or-pay clauses might now be in industries that employ a third of all American workers.

This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Some Firms Are Demanding Steep Repayments If Staff Depart

Comments Filter:
  • by Baron_Yam ( 643147 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:04PM (#64027253)

    They have you so desperate that you'll sign your life away hoping the job they're underpaying you for won't be too bad.

    If you ain't rich, you're disposable.

    • by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @07:47PM (#64027695)

      OTOH, a company won't pay $20k for travel expenses and training to someone who can just quit as soon as they arrive.

      If they don't like the deal, they can stay in the Philippines. They don't have a "right" to $20k of someone else's money.

      • by dryeo ( 100693 )

        The question is, did it cost $20,000+ to bring the worker in and train them? And why was it not structured as a loan.
        These nurses are in high demand, why did this one pick such a bad deal with Australia and Canada at least having bidding wars on foreign nurses, especially in the Philippines.

        • In the Software Industry we have retention bonuses which are like a lumpsum 2 month salary which you get on the anniversary of your hiring. If you leave early you miss that. So what happens is if an employee gets selected by another company and the second company really cant wait till their anniversary the new company pays the retention bonus upfront to the employee and puts in a clause if the employee leaves before 1 year than they have to repay the retention bonus. The employee can keep moving and have a
        • And why was it not structured as a loan.

          Well, it kinda is structured as a loan. It's forgiven if you stay but must be repaid if you leave.

          These nurses are in high demand, why did this one pick such a bad deal with Australia and Canada at least having bidding wars

          I lived in the Philippines and I'm going back there in February.

          In my experience, many Filipinos want to come to America because they have relatives here. They are very family-oriented.

          The cultural and familial bonds between America and the Philippines are wide and deep.

        • The question is how is something that would be called human trafficcing if structured exactly like this in an another country even legal in usa? They could just you know hire already trained nurses and pay for them. And they would hire these anyway even if they couldn't put 20k debt on them. they just do it because they found a way to describe it with words that seem legal.

          Anyway have fun with the 3rd world nurses who'll end up feeling like they're in involuntary employment with some %

      • I think you're missing some point here.

        but quit his unsafe, understaffed nursing home job after 14 weeks

        Unsafe conditions are to be reported. And understaffed in nursing homes in some states can have your license pulled.

        the staffing agency that hired him, promised he would be responsible for 20 to 30 patients, but the reality was more than 40

        That's a breach of the contract offered to him. If he signed on for a 20-30 load and regularly got 40, the $20k folks lied to him.

        On two occasions, he was the only nurse on his floor, responsible for upward of 80 patients

        That's fucking illegal in pretty much every state of the United States.

        Fourteen weeks after starting the job, he told A.C.S. he wanted to quit

        And this is where we get the technical. ACS is the staffer, not the place he worked at committing all the shitty illegal work conditions. Hopefully he r

  • So don't quit. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:10PM (#64027255)

    Get fired.

    • THIS! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by higuita ( 129722 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:38PM (#64027309) Homepage

      Exactly, this is stupid, forcing a employee to stay is just a invite for him to stay at work, but ignoring all requests that they can legally ignore (a nurse may not refuse to give some medical treatment if the it risks the patient life, or may be accused of homicide)

      This tries to abuse the good people, that will try to do their work, no matter what. Bad workers would simply laugh and perform even worse. The end result is that USA will train good workers to be give up and fail to do anything useful when they want to leavehttps://slashdot.org/story/23/11/23/1836220/some-firms-are-demanding-steep-repayments-if-staff-depart?utm_source=rss1.0mainlinkanon&utm_medium=feed#

      • Hey, if these "good people" come here, they need to learn the American way... complain loudly and do as little as possible.

    • Get fired.

      I'd suggest following some of the steps in this helpful instructional video. [youtube.com]

    • by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      If it's a deeply religious institution, just dress as the opposite sex. They'll can you faster than thanksgiving yams.

      • Re:So don't quit. (Score:5, Informative)

        by Powercntrl ( 458442 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:58PM (#64027343) Homepage

        If it's a deeply religious institution, just dress as the opposite sex. They'll can you faster than thanksgiving yams.

        Well, they could, but then you can sue your employer and would likely win. [aclu.org] The logic is basically that it's still sexual discrimination, since it would be perfectly acceptable to wear the clothes of the opposite sex if you were the opposite sex, therefore you're being discriminated against because you're not the opposite sex.

      • Unlikely that any hospital is deeply religious. Just tell them youâ(TM)ll vote for Trump, theyâ(TM)ll deport you faster than Biden falling over after a speech.

        • Unlikely that any hospital is deeply religious.

          Umm, yeah, about that... [adventhealth.com]

          At AdventHealth, Extending the Healing Ministry of Christ is our mission. It calls us to be His hands and feet in helping people feel whole. Our story is one of hope — one that strives to heal and restore the body, mind and spirit.

          More than 92,000 skilled and compassionate caregivers in physician practices, hospitals, outpatient clinics, skilled nursing facilities, home health agencies and hospice centers provide individualized, wholistic care.

          Our Christian mission, shared vision, common values and focus on whole-person health is our commitment to making communities healthier with a unified system: 51 hospital campuses and hundreds of care sites in diverse markets throughout nine states.

          That's one of the major hospitals here in central Florida, so yeah, the "deeply religious institution" thing the OP mentioned isn't out of the realm of possibilities when it comes to hospitals.

        • by ghoul ( 157158 )
          If a new immigrant nurse from the Philippines is voting in Presidential elections there is something wrong. Even greencards need to stay 5 years before getting citizenship and voting rights.
    • So, sign an agreement knowing full well you'll do your best to "shithead" your way out of it.

      "Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom." - Aristotle

      You'll either make a bad employee, or a good lawyer.

      • Re:So don't quit. (Score:5, Interesting)

        by fahrbot-bot ( 874524 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @04:49PM (#64027427)

        Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.
        -- Aristotle

        From The Good Place [wikipedia.org], "Tahani Al-Jamil" (s1e3):

        Who died and left Aristotle in charge of ethics? [youtube.com]

        Chidi: So Aristotle was Plato's student. And Aristotle believes that your character is voluntary, because it's just the result of your actions, which are under your control. For example, right now, you have made the insane choice to ignore the person who is literally trying to save you from eternal damnation.

        Eleanor: No, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm listening. Uh, I just... are we sure we should be paying attention to these guys? It's like, who died and left Aristotle in charge of ethics?

        Chidi: [pointing to blackboard] Plato!

        Also mentioned by Chidi:

        Knowing others is wisdom, knowing yourself is enlightenment.
        -- Lao Tzu

        • Interesting. Thank you for posting.

          What I was implying was that signing an agreement with no intent to be bound by it says more about the signatory than the document.

          • What I was implying was that signing an agreement with no intent to be bound by it says more about the signatory than the document.

            Agreed. Breaking your word is (generally) a dick move.

            Though I disagree with these sort of conditions/clauses in general as hiring someone always involves some risk that it won't work out, but if the early resignation penalties are limited to, say, actual relocation or further education costs and the like, then I'd be more likely to see then as reasonable as the employee recognizes that the company is spending money to bring them onboard or up-to-speed unrelated to the actual usual performance of the jo

            • Yes, agreed. I really don't like these clauses either, save for a few caveats. Offers for specific people that include signing bonuses, roles that have large strategic impacts when vacant, these sorts of things might suggest the need for a quitting clause. But some of those occupations in the post strike me as ones where that's an overreach.

              Well put.

            • Yeah, Bell was great. IBM not so much. My moving expenses to the job were paid by IBM, but had I left in less than 1 year, I owed them back. I think it was 3 grand. Movers ain't cheap, and this was 82. I stayed 1 year and a bit more. Hated the job. Would have quit in a week without the payback clause.
          • by dryeo ( 100693 )

            Finding yourself at an unsafe abusive job may well be a good reason to quit as I doubt the person signed up for that.

  • Bullshit (Score:3, Informative)

    by Disco Ninja ( 7135795 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:11PM (#64027259)
    The employee is not compensated when they are laid off so why should the company.
    • by gweihir ( 88907 )

      Indeed.

    • Re:Bullshit (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @04:06PM (#64027353)

      This practice is extremely close to modern slavery, where the employee works off a large debt which effectively will never be paid off. Now this case is certainly not the same but it's a step along the same road and reputable companies might want to avoid that association.

      • This practice is extremely close to modern slavery, where the employee works off a large debt which effectively will never be paid off. Now this case is certainly not the same but it's a step along the same road and reputable companies might want to avoid that association.

        It isn't 'slavery'!! Its 'indentured servitude', its different!!!111 Slavery is what the USA has for prisoners.

        • Comment removed based on user account deletion
          • by ghoul ( 157158 )
            Anyone with a chronic health condition in the US is a slave as quitting would mean losing health insurance and private medical insurance at 2000 dollar a month is not feasible for someone on unemployment. Insulin with insurance is 10 dollar, without is 1000 dollar a pen.
      • This practice is extremely close to modern slavery, where the employee works off a large debt which effectively will never be paid off

        TFA specifically mentions three different ways this can be illegal depending on the circumstance.
        - The amount that has to be repayed can't effectively reduce the employee's pay for the time they worked to being below minimum wage. If his net pay was negative here, then they've run afoul of any applicable minimum wage laws.
        - Using the threat of a heavy debt burden is legally considered to be coercion under trafficking laws
        - There's already case law that reimbursement clauses must be closely tied to training

    • The employee is not compensated when they are laid off so why should the company.

      Depends on what you mean and/or if you're thinking more about new hires. I was laid off in June 2017, after 16 years, from a very large defense contractor, and got a rather hefty severance, unused vacation payout, paid medical/dental/vision through the end of that year, then 12 months of medical/dental/vision at the company rate (which was less expensive than the ACA rate). I'm also eligible for a pension (unrelated to my 401k, which I've since rolled over to an IRA).

  • Your offer of employment is just that - an offer. Some will simply strike the requirement if challenged. But for those who are unwilling to remove it, some will be willing to negotiate it downward.

    Some few will do neither - decide what you want to do. But don't just walk away from a position because of it. Poke at it a little.

  • by Kernel Kurtz ( 182424 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:27PM (#64027281)
    Anyone who tries to put this sort of clause in an employment contract is pretty much guaranteed to be a shitty employer in numerous other ways as well. Should be a huge red flag that it is not the sort of respectable business employees should ever want to work.
    • It is (Score:3, Insightful)

      by rsilvergun ( 571051 )
      they target vulnerable and desperate people. That's why the story is about a nurse from the Philippians. There's a pipeline for nurses from the Philippians to pretty much everywhere around the world. Not sure why but the world picked there to train nurses for abuse abroad.
    • by ghoul ( 157158 )
      Not necessarily. Visa paperwork and visa lawyers are expensive. It costs about 10K to get an H1B visa transfer (new one costs even more), add on around 3000 dollar as recruiter costs (recruiters work on commisssion they dont get anything if someone declines the offer so 3000 is spread over all the unsuccessful ones as well), air ticket and 2 weeks temporary housing for the worker as they get their feet on the ground in the US and its 20K. It is not unreasonable to expect 1 year of work before the employee l
  • by Hasaf ( 3744357 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:28PM (#64027285)
    I ahve a one-month window at the beginning of the summer where I can resign. If I resign at any other time I face a $5,000 fee. Of course, the window is before the hiring begins. I can see one part of it, it allows the district to know how many teachers will be staying before they start signing new contracts. However, it also makes it very hard for teachers to change districts.
    • I don't understand how this is supposed to work. Are you actually paying a fee? How is that a legal employment contract? My wife is a teacher. If she quits any time she forfeits a "good leaver bonus" which is very different to getting a bill.

      • by Hasaf ( 3744357 )
        Sorry, it is a bill. Further, the school district can put out an arrest warrant (remember, school districts have their own police departments). I know, from an incident that I knew all parties in about five years ago, that following the arrest, the terms of the bail and ensuing probation will be to teach until the end of the year. Needless, this person chose to pay the $5,000. Personally, I didn't get it, he left at spring break, not for a better job, he had just had enough. I think he could have made it th
  • Not new. A good chunk of my DNA came to America enslaved like this. "This group of Germans arrived late 1717 or early 1718 N.S. in Virginia. They had expected to go to Pennsylvania but the Captain of their ship instead took them to Virginia and offered them to Lt. Governor Spotswood as indentured servants." http://germannacolonies.org/ [germannacolonies.org]
  • by strike6 ( 823490 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:37PM (#64027301)
    People are being held to the contracts they sign? I mean, the dude from the Philippines has a good case to nullify the contract due to the working conditions and the fact that the amount owed isn't defined in the contract. But these other people who signed contracts with specific terms? No one forced them to sign those contracts. I worked for a large corporation that often relocated people. They would pay relocation costs but if you left within a period of time, typically 12-18 months, you'd have to repay it. That seems reasonable as some people would try to get the company to pay for them to relocate to cities they wanted to move to just so they could find another job and leave almost immediately. The same concept applies with training so I don't get why anyone would be surprised that such a clause might exist in their employment agreement. But, if you don't like the terms, don't sign.
    • by thegarbz ( 1787294 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @07:10PM (#64027649)

      People are being held to the contracts they sign?

      Employment contracts are never negotiated by two parties on equal footing. They are universally one sided. In many countries such fees are illegal for this reason. E.g. where I live we have "good leaver bonuses" in our contracts, rather than fees.

      No one forced them to sign those contracts.

      I suspect you have a trust fund and thus don't need to work for money? Or do you get food and lodging for free? A very significant portion of the people in your country (and others) are not in any position to voluntarily reject a work contract.

    • by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

      If a company pays out of pocket for some (future) employee that is their own problem. I am not paying the company back for anything, ever, that they did on their own. Just like I'm not paying the company back for "uniform" fees or anything else they are spending "on my behalf". Personally, if I saw that in a contract, I'm walking away. Even if I didn't see it and signed it, I'm still not paying. I'd burn down the business's buildings before I'd pay them. At least then an actual, real legal issue arises.

  • In California I don't believe such contracts are legal, but in other states it may be.

  • by chill ( 34294 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @03:51PM (#64027327) Journal

    Odds are that person who moved from the Philippines to the US for the job was here on a work visa. Lose the job, then you find another willing to sponsor you fast or back to the PI you go.

    People sign these contracts because they're desperate. The US is in the middle of a big shortage of healthcare workers and is aggressively importing them from overseas -- the Philippines is a big source. Unfortunately, we've never had a shortage of scum willing to take advantage of people just to make a buck.

  • All I have here is a time I have to give notice before I quit. Same for the employer. For that time I still have to work and they still have to pay me (even if they do not want me to work), but that is it. You can, of course, terminate earlier if both sides agree. Of course, if work conditions are unacceptable, I can quit immediately.

    This thing from the story is highly immoral.

    • by test321 ( 8891681 ) on Thursday November 23, 2023 @04:46PM (#64027415)

      Legal situation at least for France: both the employee and the employer are bound to follow the agreed notice (whose value is set by collective agreements negotiated by the worker's unions). (1) If any party fails to fulfil the notice period, the Labour Court (Conseil de Prud'homme) can force them to pay back to the remaining salaries. (Yes the employee may have to pay an equivalent value of his salary to the employer for the remaining time of the contract.) (2) Additionally in case the employee acted such way *for the purpose of creating a prejudice to the company* then the employer could also sue for damages (e.g. you are the IT person and you decide to quit immediately just as the entire computer system crashed, leaving the company without means to operate the business and no-one else to fix the system, also yelling through the font door as you leave "haha I told you this would happen, now good luck losers").

      (1) Explanation from Ministry of Labour of France https://code.travail.gouv.fr/c... [travail.gouv.fr]
      (2) analysis of case law (jurisprudence) from Cassation (+/- equivalent to a supreme court): https://www.documentissime.fr/... [documentissime.fr]

      • by gweihir ( 88907 )

        Yep, pretty standard. But good luck getting more in damages than the value of the remaining wages.

        • That's why I am not so shocked with the story here. Maybe USA does not have this provision in their laws, so the employer added it to the contract: if you leave early (before the end of the leave notice), then you have to pay back some months of salaries.

          • by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

            Unless they prepaid parts of my salary, or in some way advanced me actual money I didn't yet earn, I'm not giving anything back. The company can go fuck itself no matter what country it operates out of.

  • just do an beavis and butthead at you job!

  • Assuming he's not lying, if it's an unsafe work environment then that's not what he contracted for. Under US law employees may not have sub-par dangerous work environments. If it's par (coal mines, deep sea diving, etc.) then that's different, but nursing is a standard. Psych hospital nursing is a different standard, etc., commensurate with pay.

    If, say, OSHA were to find illegal violations then he can't be held to the contract.

    If he just got a better offer elsewhere and made up some BS then, sure, but le

    • Doesn't matter, contract is likely not enforceable anyways due to being unfairly lopsided. The employee doesn't get anything out of that clause... if it was for ACTUAL training and certifications that the company paid for that would be one thing. But just saying, you have to pay me $X to quit even though you have nothing tangible that cost the company that much is very VERY likely against contract law. Remember, you can put anything you want into a contract, that doesn't mean it is enforceable though.

      The sh

  • But in this case, I support making this crap illegal, with significant punishment for those who ignore the law
    People need to be free to quit a job that isn't right for them

  • ...coerced labour. Well, that & genocide. Happy Thanksgiving!
  • One would think that, in the course of a lawsuit, the unsafe and understaffed conditions would come to light. It seems like such clauses might be a bluff.

  • It looks like there could be worse fates than being fired for cause. Just speaking for myself, here, but I think if I were being coerced in the manner described, I could probably find some way to make the company regret it had ever heard of me while leaving with no worries about being harassed by them for money. Hey, accidents happen, right?

  • Garbage. If you cant stay with a job, probably your conscience is bothering you and you need to doing something different. My phone slipped while I was writing this, and the spell checker plugged in âoeUnionâ to my words. But it is not about organized labor, it is about running up against the wall of human conscience. Things need to change. People in power need to be willing to be human and listen to those working for them.

    • When I was young, I worked night shift at the nursing home. Wiping butts all night, literally cleaning human butts. But it never bothered my conscience, they were helpless and needed it for basic comfort. It is really a low bar to not violate tenets of human decency, but companies somehow cannot rise to it.

  • Probably the kind of thing that would disappear with the efforts of an employment lawyer, especially if the company doesn't actually have money involved with onboarding the employee.

  • So don't resign, stay home most of the week, come to work drunk as a skunk, don't wash, be rude as hell...

    They'll gladly abandon $20.000 to get rid of you.

  • Then if you fire me I want an equivalent deal, actually worse because (on average) individuals suffer more intensely when fired than anyone at a company does when someone leaves:

  • Employment at will goes both ways. If the employee can't quit yet the employer can still terminate employment, then that isn't employment at will, it is a contract of employment where only one side has the the employment-at-will bug^h^h^h feature. This seems to me to be a one-sided contract, but I'd be surprised if any judge in the United States found it unconscionable. Where do you think the re-election funds come from? A lot of libertarians will say: "You didn't read the contract, so it sucks to be you.

  • US: the only country in the world where such contracts are legal. In my third world country this kind of feudal schemes are absolutely illegal

Don't panic.

Working...