
Ask HN: Can I ask for more severance pay? - throwawayhnhn
Throwaway, long time HN participant.<p>Yesterday, without warning, my whole team was laid off. We didn&#x27;t even get to finish the day or tidy up loose ends, document anything, etc.<p>After 9 years at a financial company, currently as a Quant, I am being offered only 3 weeks severance pay. When I started we were passing spreadsheets back and forth!<p>I want to ask for more. How does one go about this?<p>I received an overnight delivery with standard paperwork and I must sign to get the severance pay.<p>The timing could not be worse. I am a remote employee and I need to remain a remote employee. I can&#x27;t relocate. I live in such a remote area that there are no jobs here. My wife and I are undergoing IVF, mortgage payments, my wife is back in school getting an RN degree with 18 months left to go. Starting to feel the stress today.<p>Any advice?
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methodover
You may have more leverage than you think. The documents that they want you to
sign are really important to them.

We had an employee refuse to sign them after we fired them, for cause. A few
weeks later he asked for a larger severence than we initially offered. We
offered a month's worth of pay, and he wanted way more than that if I recall
correctly. We said no. He then lied, said he was fired for racial
discrimination. Threatened a lawsuit. We caved and gave him an extra month of
severence. He signed the papers and took his two months of free pay.

Aside: I personally hired this person. I noticed big performance problems
early, and personally mentored him for six months before coming to the
conclusion that we needed to let him go. I was the one accused of racism. It
hurt. I lobbied for more time to turn this hire around, I gave him so much
attention and extra time to turn things around. Only to be lied about in the
end. Worst moment in my career so far. I wanted to fight any lawsuit-- we had
tons of documentation and evidence that the fire was 100% performance related
including commits demonstrating clearly these problems (and extensive notes
documenting the improvement plan). But our employement lawyer and the CEO
figured it would just be easier to give the severence.

Anyway. You may have more leverage than you think. Though, just be ethical
about how you handle it. They really need you to sign those papers just to tie
up the legal loose ends.

~~~
danieltillett
I guess you learned that valuable lesson that it is never too early to fire.
It is not that people don’t want to change, it is they can’t. Trying to change
causes such cognitive dissonance that it can only be resolved by blaming
others, normally the person trying to help them change.

Can I ask why you hired him in the first place?

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scott00
Everything's negotiable, but the wisdom of trying it depends on the strength
of your negotiating position. Many severance agreements simply reiterate
obligations to which you've already agreed in employment/non-compete/non-
solicitation agreements. If this is the case, you have basically no leverage.
If they're asking for substantial concessions (say, you have a 3 month non-
compete and the severance agreement extends it to 12), you've got more of a
shot.

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appleiigs
I was laid off last year, but in Canada so might be different where you are.
Here is my advice:

Everything is up to negotiation. You do have leverage, your lawyer will tell
you how much.

The process would be:

1\. Don't sign anything.

2\. You hire a lawyer who specializes in employment disputes. If the severance
package has a deadline, your lawyer will email the company saying they
represent you and need more time to respond.

3\. You meet with your lawyer and explain your situation. My lawyer explained
to me that when you get laid off, your company is breaking your employment
contract. That means they have to provide you with compensation to make you
whole. The amount of compensation depends on your skills, experience, job
level, age, health of the job market and any other specific circumstances.
Basically, the company has to compensate you enough money that would make you
whole - which is be employed again. The compensation is based on the time it
will take you to get a new job. 3 weeks is kinda short. Also, there maybe
rules-of-thumb: in my city in Canada, we expect to get a minimum of 1 month of
salary for each year you worked with the company. I have seen some very
generous companies give 2 months of salary per year worked.

4\. The lawyer will write up a demand letter asking for more severance. From
that point on the lawyer does all the communications with the company. My
company also offered employment services to help me find a new job which i
didn't need, so my lawyer said ask the company to pay that to me in cash...
was like $5K. My lawyer said there is zero risk in sending a demand letter -
never will get a worse package.

5\. Depending on the size of the company, they may expect that a certain
percentage of employees will dispute their severance package - which means
they already planned to give complainers a bit more... as in, already
authorized, you ask, they give... easy.

6\. My company said "No" to the demand letter. They pointed out that there
were many jobs that I would be hired for and my severance is enough. They
provided the job postings that I would be suitable for.

7\. In response, my lawyer told me to go through each job posting and write a
couple sentences of why I am not qualified for them. My lawyer sent that to
the company.

8\. Company responded with a higher severance, an extra few months of salary
on top of the 1 month per year and the $5K mentioned above. The legal costs
were less than $2K.

~~~
throwmeaway32
Interesting, how did you find that lawyer? (google? personal contacts?
Approached a law firm?)

~~~
appleiigs
I was referred to a lawyer by a friend who was laid off previously. Many
people were being laid off at this time.

Also, I worked with lawyers at the company I was employed with. I asked one
lawyer who I got along with to refer one. That referred lawyer was too
expensive (big name law firm who works for corporations).

If you don't know any lawyers, you can ask anyone who works with lawyers. For
example, if you have a friend who is banker or real-estate agent. Their lawyer
will know other lawyers.

Most importantly, you should have a conversation with a couple lawyers (ie.
interview them): "Here is my situation, do you think I can get more?", "If we
ask for more, how do you go about it?", "To keep costs down, do you have a
legal associate to do the work?".

Since you are interview them, calling local employment lawyers that you find
on google is OK too. The 15 minute phone call is free, lawyers have to do
marketing/business development too.

On a different topic: you mentioned stress. My advice to you is to make sure
you don't turn it into a bad time in your life. You have control. You can make
it better by doing things such as losing weight, improving your golf game,
traveling locally/camping (to keep costs down), visiting family, building a
side project, contribute to open source. All of these things give a silver-
lining and promote a positive optimistic outlook. Also, these things are great
in a future job interview when they ask "so what did you do with your time
off?" A fun, positive answer is best. You won't be unemployed forever.

------
chollida1
My email is in my profile.

Reach out to me if you are looking for quant work. I might be able to help on
the short term.

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joezydeco
The papers explain what you're supposed to give up in return for your
severance check. Decide if what you're giving up (your freedom to speak about
the company? You won't sue them? You'll keep their algorithms secret?) is
worth the 3 weeks or worth more.

Just remember: If you are in the USA and in an at-will state, they don't owe
you anything upon termination (other than unused vacation pay, etc, as per
your state laws)

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brudgers
[random advice from the internet]

If there are papers to sign in exchange, negotiation is possible, but may or
may not be worth it. At a minimum it is worth closely reading what is
contained in those documents. At the midlevel paying an attorney to review
them is not unreasonable. At the top end, hiring an attorney to negotiate the
severance contract (and that's what sign this for that boils down to) on your
behalf is always an option.

When I say it might not be worth negotiating, I mean that moving forward
toward a new job is a necessary step and negotiating severance is a step in a
different direction (a potential distraction). On the other hand, if you have
a relationship with a higher up, calling them and saying that three weeks
seems a bit thin after nine years, might be all it takes...with the caveat
that the context is sensitive and framing anything in a way that puts the
other party on the _defensive_ will probably backfire...they will or won't
find their own way to seeing an "injustice". Let them draw their own
conclusions. Heck, you might even wind up getting a position elsewhere in the
organization.

Good luck.

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chris11
I'm really not familiar with quant jobs, but is the company itself in good
shape? And was your job going well before your team got laid off? I"m kind of
curious about the three week severance. I've heard rumors that those companies
can have huge concerns about employees leaving jobs for competitors if their
jobs involve proprietary IP. So they have really strong non-competes they
enforce buy paying ex-employees for the length of the non-compete. But that
probably isn't a huge concern if they decided to only give the team three
weeks severance.

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throwawayhnhn
I can't edit the post any longer.

There were zero employee performance problems. The company is in California. I
am in NY.

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gumby
It never hurts to ask but you likely have no leverage. After all the company
by definition doesn't plan to have a future relationship with you.

The best opp'y is if you have a good relationship with someone higher up in
the organization who's still around and might be willing to do you a favor --
possibly (though unlikely) a bit more cash, but possibly a job referral,
especially useful in your industry.

What leverage? Well remember I said the company "doesn't plan to have a future
relationship with you." The only leverage you really have is that they _might_
have a future relationship with you: i.e. you don't take the severance and
(lowest risk for them) you may no longer be bound by NDAs etc or (highest risk
for them) you might sue them, so they're paying in exchange for you agreeing
that there are no open issues between you, possibly among other things.

Also, straight cash is unlikely to appear (among other things why you? What
about that other person of ${ethnicity}/${gender}/${age} different from you?
That's a lawsuit waiting to happen and HR will likely quash such a suggestion.

BUT: you could offer to help "tidy up loose ends, document anything, etc" in
exchange for them covering your COBRA until you get a new job / six months go
by, which might be a suitable fig leaf if you know a higher up.

And the company can't extend your normal health insurance except via (taxably)
paying COBRA premiums as the health plans require that eligible employees work
a minimum number of hours/week, typically 32.

~~~
gumby
I don't understand why this would be downvoted; it doesn't even express an
opinion, simply discusses the facts, from the perspective of someone who has
laid people off.

------
dyeje
You were laid off so you're eligible for unemployment. First, get signed up
for that. Next, take a week or two to gather yourself emotionally, brush up on
your interviewing skills, and refresh your resume. Finally, start interviewing
for the many remote positions out there. Don't worry, you're gonna be fine.

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sjg007
Don’t forget to file for unemployment.

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neerkumar
If you ask them to cover insurance for 6 months, they will probably do it
given the circumstances. Health insurance is usually the most negotiable
thing.

Beside that, just accept that you no longer work there and look at them just
like you would look at any other company. Can you offer them something that
would help them?

A good thing to offer is that, once they rebuild the team/hire new people, you
can help them get up to speed. It is not confrontational, it focuses on
something positive for the company too making them think about better days,
and you are not committing to anything in the short term (and you probably
won't have to do anything in the long term either).

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deepnotderp
Email me, we're hiring and happy to go remote.

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edmanet
You can always ask.

But they don't have to give it to you.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Yeah. It's certainly worth an hour of your time to ask for more. It might be
worth a day of your time. It's probably not worth more (but I'm guessing).

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JamesBarney
Find an employment attorney. They negotiate severance all the time. What state
are you in?

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fetus8
Get your resume together today, and start looking for jobs today if possible.
Don't wait.

I don't see any problem with asking for more severance, as 3 weeks seems
really really low. Contact the group that is handling your "transition".

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suls
Hang in there!

Don’t sign anything, find a good lawyer, get all the contracts etc. and put it
in one folder. Keep the end in mind and don’t let the stress take over your
thinking.

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Whymess
Like everything in life, its all about costs. Cost of a company fighting a
lawsuit vs. giving you more money.

~~~
greenyoda
If the company followed their documented severance policy, what grounds would
the OP have for a lawsuit? They didn't mention anything that the company did
that might be grounds for suing them (e.g., discrimination, breach of
contract, etc.). People get laid off all the time, and there's no legal
requirement for a company to pay any severance at all (I'm assuming they're in
the U.S.).

However, I don't see any downside in asking for more severance. The worst the
company could do is say "no".

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Mankhool
What country / state are you in? Check the local laws.

