be smart
Okay, lemme keep this short, because this is HR101. You should provide them with the necessary severance documentation in front of at least two witnesses. It should be signed and dated, with a space for them to sign to show they received the documents, and space for the two witnesses to sign that they saw the documentation delivered.
Why? Let’s take an example interaction:
Manager: “You’re fired. Leave.”
Smart Worker: “I will, the moment I get my paperwork indicating that the employment relationship has been terminated.”
Manager: “No, you’ll leave now.”
Smart Worker: “No, I won’t, because the moment I leave you’ll pretend this conversation never happened, and when I don’t turn up tomorrow you’ll write me up for dereliction of duty, and turn this random firing into a firing for cause. This means I won’t get any unemployment or severance benefits, which will save you money, but will suck for me. So I won’t leave until I receive the paperwork you are legally obliged to give me.”
Manager: “I’ll call security to escort you out.”
Smart Worker: “Excellent. I’ll take their names and list them as witnesses in my complaint to the department of labor [or whatever the local equivalent is if you are not in the United States] that you refused to provide me with the appropriate documentation on my firing.”
Okay, more detail. This “You’re fired, leave!” trick is a favorite of slimy managers everywhere. They say you’re fired on the day, but the next day they “forget” and then start writing you up for non-attendance at work.
After three or so days of this (the precise number of days/shifts you need to miss varies) they then write up the documentation saying that you were fired for cause (i.e. not attending work).
In most places if someone is fired for cause the company is off the hook for severance pay, unemployment pay, etc.
Another variant is that the manager simply claims you quit, and cites your non-attendance as proof. Same result, same financial implications for the company – no severance or unemployment costs.
Without any documentation showing that you were fired (or didn’t quit), you’re going to have a very hard time proving anything.
So a smart worker doesn’t just say, “Yes Boss!” and disappear. No. They keep “signing in” every day until that documentation arrives. It could be as simple as going to the company every morning and taking a photo in front of the building with the caption, “Arriving for work on time!”
If the police are called? Excellent. Explain the situation to them – the boss hasn’t provided the necessary documentation to legally document your firing, and you’re reporting for work. Could you please have a copy of their report to add to your growing stack of evidence that you did not quit, and that you did report for work on time as usual.
What I suspect is going on here is that the manager hasn’t provided the correct documentation attesting to the firing, and so the worker (legally and correctly) views the employment relationship as ongoing. Barring any documentation to the contrary the boss has zero evidence to present to show that they fired the worker or that the worker was aware they had been fired.
Therefore the solution to this problem is to provide the worker with the documentation so that the worker can get on with their life, claim unemployment and severance, and possibly even sue the company for unlawful termination.
… and this is where the rubber hits the road. This tactic is ridiculously common in companies where the employer knows they’re on legal thin ice and wants to muddy the waters by claiming that the employee quit or was a no-show (which thereby neatly side-steps the firing of protected classes of employees).
I once had a friend who was told she was fired when she was 7 months pregnant. They clearly didn’t want to pay for her maternity leave. They promised to fax her the documentation. It never arrived. So nice and early the next morning she got up and went to work to get the documents. They claimed they weren’t ready.
The next day she was outside the building at 8am reporting for work. The manager got angry and called security, who understandably didn’t want to manhandle a very pregnant woman out of the building, but escorted her out gently.
The next day the same thing. The police were called. She explained the situation to them. The police put her in the back of their car in the air conditioning and went and had a “word” with the manager. She got a copy of their report.
This continued for a week. Until eventually she got a copy of her documents, which contained numerous irregularities (for example they were only signed on that day, not a week earlier), and listed her firing as for cause.
She handed all the documentation to the department of labor, and six months later after they completed their investigation (yes, I know, very slow, but this is government) she got a cheque that amounted to 2 years of pay and the company got fined by the department of labor.
The bottom line here is that if there isn’t documentation of the firing then it didn’t happen. The old saying, “A verbal contract is only as good as the paper it is written on” applies to firings too. If you don’t document it then it didn’t happen.