Severence contract still in force?

I worked for a company for 1 year, I was considered a "mission critical" employee. The company was having financial problems and to entice me to stay offered a very lucrative severence agreement Signed by me on 3/03. To our suprise on On 8/03, my division was fully sold to a new company, and the same managers all remained. Salaries and jobs stayed the same and our services were now under contract to our old parent company. Unknown to any of us, our old parent company Only gave our new company a 3 month contract and it has now expired. I am laid off effective 1/30 from the new company, and with only 2 weeks pay instead of 1 years salary, and 60 days notice as was my previous agreement. I did sign a job acceptance with the new company which stated all salary would remain the same, and that I was voluntarily terminating from the old company, because I was told the old company wouldn't pay severence anyway if I didn't take the position with the newly formed company. The executive VP informed us when this takeover happened, that the selling company had a 1 year service contract with the new company. We were floored when we found out that it expired 3 months after the aquisition. I would have never taken this job. What can I do? Since the managers are the same, and can I enforce my old agreement? Is there bad faith?

1 answer  |  asked Jan 8, 2004 8:20 PM [EST]  |  applies to Illinois

Answers (1)

Aaron Maduff
Severence contract still in force?

The facts here are unclear. If you signed a severance that they offered, it should still be in effect. But your taking the action of resigning, depending on the agreement and what it is you did, could change that. But, if you did so because of fraud by the company, that might well leave the agreeement in effeect anyway. In short, you need to have a consultation with an attorney to review the severance agreement and the facts more carefully. You should call us or any of the other fine employment lawyers on this site.
Aaron Maduff

posted by Aaron Maduff  |  Jan 9, 2004 10:50 AM [EST]

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