
Ask HN: How to cancel a job offer finding another offer - president
Dear HN, I am a soon-to-be college graduate who accepted a job offer a few months ago. Just last week, I was offered a position a much more reputable company that would pay significantly higher than the previous offer. Of course, I accepted.<p>Now I am unsure how to contact the previous company that I made a commitment to. My question is whether this is a common scenario or was it a terrible taboo that I committed? Are they going to blacklist me from ever applying in the future or is this going to somehow bite me later on? Either way, I'm not sure how I should contact the rejected company and what to tell them (email, formal letter, phone?).<p>If anyone could give some advice, I would appreciate it greatly. Thank you.<p>EDIT: I forgot to mention that the second offer came a few weeks after I had already accepted the first. So far, it seems like directly contacting my recruiter is the right thing to do. I'll be making a call tomorrow for sure.<p>EDIT2: I haven't yet started either of the 2 jobs. The start dates for both are in June!
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patio11
Once, I would have said "That is very unprofessional. Are you sure you want to
do that? You'll lose karma, or something." But honestly? With darn few
exceptions, employment isn't a sacred trust. It's just business. They
underbid. Would they keep you on the payroll, out of a sense of fairness, if
it developed that you were not the best offer? Nope. You'd be shown the door.
It's just business.

I'd recommend a simple phone call. "Hiya Bob, thank you for your time in
getting us to this offer of employment. Circumstances have changed and it
looks like I will not be able to work for your firm. I apologize for the
inconvenience. ... Yes, Bob, I appreciate that this puts you in a bit of a
lurch. Please accept my apologies. Would you like me to recap this
conversation in a letter? Thank you Bob. Best of luck finding a candidate."

I don't particularly suggest telling them that you're taking employment
elsewhere. That's something you tell your friend. They're not your friend. If
you worked there, they would still not be your friend. Bob might eventually
have become your friend, but right now Bob is a corporate officer of a company
which underbid for your services. You don't particularly owe them explanations
or excuses.

At-will employment is a two-way street.

~~~
veyron
'Would they keep you on the payroll, out of a sense of fairness, if it
developed that you were not the best offer? Nope. You'd be shown the door.
It's just business.' <\-- dead wrong.

You can't rescind an offer after extending an offer just because a better
candidate showed up at your door. Because he hasnt joined yet, in most states
the at-will rules dont apply. In NJ and NY, for example, the employer is
legally obligated to pay damages.

After joining, the implied-contract exception to at-will employment kicks in
[in most states] which would protect you in the case a better candidate came.
If you actually were incompetent and demonstrated it on the job, that would be
a different story, but there should be no concern about it ...

I read something from BLS about this a long time ago, and I'll try to dig out
a citation.

EDIT: found citation: <http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2001/01/art1full.pdf>

~~~
tptacek
Careful. The three exceptions in that document are:

* Public interest (clearly inapplicable)

* Implied contract

* Covenant of good faith

The latter two seem like real issues for tech companies. But the HR process of
every moderately professional company in the world is designed in part to
inoculate them from "implied contract" claims, so having an offer withdrawn is
unlikely to leave you with a viable implied contract claim.

Eleven states, including CA and MA, honor some "covenant of good faith"
process. But it's unclear to me how exposed the standard offer letter used by
most companies are to "covenant" claims. For instance, most will state
specifically that "Your employment with Company is at-will and either party
can terminate the relationship at any time with or without cause and with or
without notice."

I don't think you're right; Patrick is probably _not_ "dead wrong" that
companies can withdraw offers.

------
veyron
This is a tricky situation, TBH. Think about it from the other side: company
invested HR and other resources to seek out talent, managed to arrange to hire
you a few months ago, and assumed that you would work for them. From the
company perspective, assuming they had to hire N people, you took a slot.
Furthermore, because it is so late in the hiring cycle, it will prove to be
hard to hire another qualified person.

It is not a terrible taboo. You are expected, as soon as you accept an offer,
to stop pursuing other job opportunities. That being said, the company will be
more understanding if you ended up taking an offer that was _SIGNIFICANTLY_
better than your current offer. If they have a shred of decency they will not
share this information with anyone [and certain people such as COO and HR
staff may be obliged not to discuss the situation as part of their contracts],
so they won't hurt your chances at other firms. You can bet your bottom dollar
that they won't reconsider you, though.

You should talk directly to the people who interviewed you [no email, letter,
etc]. especially if the firm is much more reputable and the pay is
significantly higher, they may be sympathetic.

But before doing it, make sure that is what you want to do. It may, in some
circumstances, make sense to take on a job that pays less or is less reputable
if you think you have a better opportunity to shine (I've turned down job
offers from lots of much more reputable places in lieu of an offer that put me
in a more senior position).

~~~
andrewstuart
Yes, more money and a big name company should mean precisely zero if you are
at the beginning of your career.

You should be taking the job that allows you to best practice, learn and hone
your craft, whatever that is.

Big name companies are often some of the least dynamic, most boring and slow
moving places to work.

Money comes later if you work hard early in your career.

~~~
akronim
A big name company with a good reputation at the start of your career is a
good social proof, since you would have beaten a lot of people to the role,
and have been exposed to a successful way of doing things. Other things are
important too but it means far from zero.

~~~
andrewstuart
Agreed, not zero but company name and pay should mean relatively little at the
beginning of your career. Be driven primarily by challenge, fun and learning.
If you get all that then use company name and salary as the next determining
factors.

------
triviatise
As a hiring manager this is simply not a big deal. Any employee can leave at
any time for any reason. I dont see anything wrong ethically with calling to
turn down the original position. If they are truly good people they would
recognize that it could be better for your career and be happy for you.

If it isnt truly better for your career, then they will have the opportunity
to explain why or sweeten.

The only time I get upset is if someone leaves in the middle of a project
without enough notice.

~~~
veyron
Have you tried hiring during a college cycle? There's a pool of people, and in
general the people you want to hire will accept a job offer before may.

It is especially frustrating if you have already planned and allocated
resources to hiring a candidate, and then found out that the candidate
rejected an offer. At that point, some employers actually call the school and
complain, and that's definitely something bad for a college grad .

Note: Again, its a general statement: there are point examples of very sharp
college grads deciding to search for jobs in april, but for the most part the
better people accept offers earlier in the year

With regards to your ethical query, what happens if the tables were turned
[i.e. company offered and then rescinded the offer months later]? Would that
be ethical?

~~~
triviatise
It isnt very nice, but Im sure it happens. We would only do it if business
circumstances forced us to do it (not because we found someone better). If at
all possible we would pay them a "severance" probably around 2 weeks of
salary.

I dont see it as unethical either.

------
andrewstuart
Sounds like you have not actually started work at the first job?

You call the person who recruited you personally on the telephone, don't email
as a first step because that is cowardly and rude. You say to them "I'm
feeling uncomfortable about this but I'm sorry I have been offered and
accepted a role which pays more and is at a company that I feel is a better
fit to what I am looking for. Apologies for doing this after I have already
accepted a role with you. I know it is bad form."

No, you should not expect that company or recruiter to ever do business with
you again, why would they? But that's the price you pay for continuing to
interview for jobs after you have accepted one. You have behaved
unprofessionally and were disrespectful of the time, money and resource that
it took to get you recruited into the first job. But that's okay, it's not a
huge sin, lots of people do it unfortunately and really you must look after
your interests primarily. Sh*t happens and people sometimes find better jobs,
probably because they really wanted a job and made the mistake of accepting
something that they really were not so enthused about.

~~~
president
No I have not yet started work at the first job (1st day is in June). And
actually I wasn't expecting the second offer to come about, they just waited
too long to call me and I didn't even think I was on their minds anymore.

I do genuinely feel bad as I did actually like the recruiter . But it looks
like the only thing to do now is make a phone call.

~~~
andrewstuart
Once you have accepted a job, as another poster points out, you are expected
to take yourself off the market. It shouldn't matter that someone calls you
and that you were not actively pursuing the second offer.

Having said that, as I mentioned earlier, there is no point in taking a job
that you do not want.

~~~
MenaMena123
Regardless when you get an offer, you go for the best one. Even if its your
first day and you get a call from say Facebook and they want you, you gonna
say no thank you, I rather stay here with less pay or name value. I don't
think so. It would be nice in a perfect world. :)

------
masterzora
Important question: Have you signed anything, cashed any checks, or done
anything else to actually make you beholden to the first? Even if you did, it
doesn't mean that you're stuck, but it will make your situation a touch
stickier.

That said, this is unlikely to significantly harm you, so don't worry about it
too much. It would have done you much worse to miss out on the second
opportunity!

------
epynonymous
anecdotally, i was blacklisted by a certain fortune 100 company because i had
turned down a face to face set of interviews in the 4th round the night
before. they were really pissed off, for whatever reason, i politely told them
that i wasn't interested in the position any longer and that i would have to
cancel the interview. i think 15 hour notice is sufficient.

anyway, the reason why i knew i was blacklisted was because i was interviewing
for a post with that same company in another region several months (~6) later
and as soon as the headhunter put me through to hr, they stopped all
communications, no details given.

fwiw you should never burn bridges, but in this case, over time i found that
this company was the complete anti-thesis of the type of company that i would
want to work for and i thank their hr for donning light on that through their
utter ineptitude and incompetence, not because they blacklisted me, but
because they were so ridiculously disorganized. the facts: hr could not
identify the exact title and position that i was interviewing for correctly,
several times i would be interviewing for position x (told by hr, job
description in hand), only to figure out that the interviewer was looking for
position y and was considering me for position y (which was with the same
division, but a different role). when doing a phone interview with the vp of
the region, he didn't successfully make it until our 3rd attempt (across 3
differently scheduled days) at a conference call, various reasons which i
think were ridiculous: laptop was having problems so he couldn't access the
conference call number from his calendar, second time was more forgivable that
something important had come up, but i was not given advanced notice, only
told after waiting in the conference call for 20 minutes and after 3 emails to
hr to figure out why the guy was late.

but to come back to your point, you had gone a bit further than i by accepting
an offer, i'm assuming signed a contract, and only weeks later you turned them
down. while i agree with some of the posts that that's life, that the company
had failed to provide you with a fair valuation/compensation package, but at
the same time, i doubt the original company was looking to low-ball you,
that's quite possibly what they could pay you given their salary ranges. you
did the right thing by not trying to re-negotiate with the first company, that
would be completely disrespectful.

i highly suggest trying to bridge this relationship with the first company,
tell them your intent clearly, that you're retracting your acceptance, but be
prepared to answer because they will ask why. personally i usually give the
truth, but that's up to you. remember, you want to treat people how you expect
to be treated.

and overall, let this be a lesson learned, given that i realize the job market
is not in the best shape, but i believe that you were a bit eager to take on
the first company's offer. a little restraint and negotiation could let you to
stretch that offer while not accepting and looking for something else that's
more fitting.

------
MenaMena123
First off you did nothing wrong at all! Its a good thing people are after you,
it happens and companies know what happens and knows the best offer wins.
Nothing new here. Always pursue the best offers around, its a game these
companies play, Google vs. Facebook for example.

The hiring game as nothing to do with you, its a game played between
companies. Just be sure to call the person tomorrow and tell them you have a
better offer. No need to feel bad, feel good people are after you. Its not the
first time this happens. If they really want you they may match your other
offer. Good Luck and feel good.

~~~
veyron
"First off you did nothing wrong at all!" <\-- That's a dangerous statement.
He [guessing gender] did something wrong by agreeing to be in the employ of
the first company and then agreeing to be in the employ of the second company
without first notifying the first company.

There is nothing wrong with fishing for offers, but its wrong to accept two
offers without rescinding one. Accepting two offers is like marrying two
people in a country/state that bans polygyny or polyandry.

~~~
MenaMena123
Like I said below only in a perfect world, it happens all the time. Its
nothing new and just business. No hard feelings on any side, the employee and
companies know all this and don't see it as anything bad or good, just the way
the market is. When your in demand - your in demand. :)

~~~
andrewstuart
You're probably too young to have had many people treat your hard work and
money with disrespect. You'll think about it differently further down the
track when you learn that it's worth trying to do the right thing when you
can.

~~~
MenaMena123
Nobody disrespected anyone, that's just business sometimes you lose, sometimes
you win, which ever side your on you just keep going. No right or wrong here,
if it was that case always do the right thing, in this case the other business
just lost talent, they wanna compete they can by offering or matching it.

Just business.

~~~
andrewstuart
Many people think that it costs nothing to anyone to recruit a person into a
job. I think the recruiter would not agree with "no right or wrong" - they put
in the effort to find this guy, shepherd him through the recruitment process,
is now not getting paid and has missed the chance to put someone else into the
job who would have stayed. I suspect that recruiter might feel somewhat less
circumspect about the outcome.

