Interesting situation

Ok, I have never had to be in this situation before and I am assuming some of you might have experienced this before.

My current employer has sent me to a couple of training classes that were paid for by our training budget in my department. Also my employer has given me tuition reimbursement. My question is does anyone know if my employer can require me to pay that back if I leave the company within 12 months of the last disbursement?

The reason I ask is I have just been called out of the blue and been offered a job that is intending to pay 10-15k more a year in addition to training opportunities, tuition reimbursement and the same health coverage I currently have but I will be paying about 1/2 the price for my monthly premium. All in all the job I have been offered is an incredible opportunity for me and I am just curious how I should handle this type of situation. Hope you guys have some ideas.

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Comments

nato76

Did you sign any type of contract?

zenlakin

Not that I know of for the training portion. All I had to do for that was sign up and pay for the class they wanted me to take with my corporate card.

dynamik

Like Nato said, you might want to reread anything you signed. It might not have been obvious or important when you originally signed. You should also look over your employee handbook, but I don't think that alone would hold. Every time I've seen someone have an issue with it here, there has always been a contract involved.

zenlakin

ok, thanks for the info guys.

Kasor

Read those "FINE PRINT" from the bottem or small font letter.

Read them again and again or have someone read it, too. This is to ensure that the statement mean the same to everyone. Usually there is some type of term that you need to agree with. Come on... There is no free lunch. U know

eMeS

zenlakin wrote:

Ok, I have never had to be in this situation before and I am assuming some of you might have experienced this before.

My current employer has sent me to a couple of training classes that were paid for by our training budget in my department. Also my employer has given me tuition reimbursement. My question is does anyone know if my employer can require me to pay that back if I leave the company within 12 months of the last disbursement?

The reason I ask is I have just been called out of the blue and been offered a job that is intending to pay 10-15k more a year in addition to training opportunities, tuition reimbursement and the same health coverage I currently have but I will be paying about 1/2 the price for my monthly premium. All in all the job I have been offered is an incredible opportunity for me and I am just curious how I should handle this type of situation. Hope you guys have some ideas.

I have heard of many cases where employers have tried to, but not been successful. I knew a guy personally whose employer tried to do this and was unsuccessful. My understanding is that training is a risk undertaken by the employer.

As far a tuition reimbursement, this is in most cases a benefit just like any other. An employer asking someone to pay that back would be akin to an employer asking an employee to pay back the last 6 months of health premiums that the employer paid on his behalf.

MS

1MeanAdmin

eMeS wrote:

I have heard of many cases where employers have tried to, but not been successful. I knew a guy personally whose employer tried to do this and was unsuccessful. My understanding is that training is a risk undertaken by the employer.

As far a tuition reimbursement, this is in most cases a benefit just like any other. An employer asking someone to pay that back would be akin to an employer asking an employee to pay back the last 6 months of health premiums that the employer paid on his behalf.

MS

+1

My employer offered tuition and exam reimbursement at the time of the offer. Now, 7 months later he wants me to sign a paper saying I will pay him back for my exams if I quit within a year (from the beginning OR from the last exam reimbursed, I'm not sure). I will politely say that this is in fact a "downgrade" for my already negotiated salary and ask him whether he has a valid reason to "downgrade" my compensation.
I was also promised an evaluation in 6 months because I agreed to an offer that was %25 lower than my target salary (I needed a good experience). The employer said that if I do good work, there is a chance that he may meet the original salary requirements. The evaluation is over a month overdue for me and a couple of other people. I know it is a long shot now, but the starting point in my negotiations will be my target salary.
I know my empployer is not going to like it, but I feel confident: once I negotiate my new salary, I'll try to use the "downgrade" point to an additional advantage.

After all, rules are rules!

sprkymrk

Don't forget to read your HR department's Employee Handbook. It might be spelled out in there, and it's typically something they give you the first week of employment, have you turn to the last page and sign that you read the whole thing. I got nailed on a similar situation when I refused to take a 6-9 month out-of-town assignment for an employer once. I lived in Iowa and the assignment was in Denver. I refused, the employer told me if I don't show up in Denver the day the task started, don't show up at all. I took that as being let go, collected 6 weeks unemployment before the employer contested and won my right to collect unemployment, and I had to pay it all back. There was a "travel" clause in the Employee Handbook stipulating that travel might be required at times, and yes, 4 years earlier I had read and signed the handbook.

dynamik

You all may wish to review this thread as well: http://www.techexams.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=32080

While this wasn't the main point of his post, it does touch on some of these issues.

famosbrown

Yep...like other said...find any and everything that you signed and dated in relation to your employment and read every word to ensure this isn't included. I'm using Tuition Assistance for Graduate School, and after every approval, I have to electroncially sign that I agree to get above a certain grade and will not terminate employment within 3 months of end of course.

If you never signed any agreements or handbooks stating the penalty for leaving after receiving paid training/tuition reimbursement, you should be golden.

Good luck!

nel

like others have said, i would read any legally binding document you have signed. from my experiance companies have only asked people to sign it additionally as a seprate document from there contract - im NOT saying no one includes it in the contract, i am just saying this is how i have seen it done.

Personally though i would not sign anything where i would have to pay costs back for courses, exams etc because of the stupidly high course fee's and i see it as the company gaining a better skilled worker from it in the end which will benefit them the most.

If they asked me to sign i would politely say no and i would rather self study. This is just the way i feel about things like this hanging over your head.

Mishra

I think its fair for an employer to want you there for some time if they are going to invest money in you. I would probably ask the same thing if I was a business owner.

Forced training is a totally different story.

1MeanAdmin

Mishra wrote:

I think its fair for an employer to want you there for some time if they are going to invest money in you. I would probably ask the same thing if I was a business owner.

Forced training is a totally different story.

You, as a business owner, would ask for it at the time of hiring, would you not?
What if you were promised to be reimbursed without any limits and later forced to sign the agreement without any bump in salary?

Mishra

midiman wrote:

Mishra wrote:

I think its fair for an employer to want you there for some time if they are going to invest money in you. I would probably ask the same thing if I was a business owner.

Forced training is a totally different story.

You, as a business owner, would ask for it at the time of hiring, would you not?
What if you were promised to be reimbursed without any limits and later forced to sign the agreement without any bump in salary?

Would I ask for an employee to sign an agreement that training requires a contract of X time? I may put it in an employee handbook or something. Tuition reimbursement is different as other has mentioned.

Unless you signed a previous contract, your employer can't come back and force you to sign an agreement for something you already have gone through. It would be like a bank coming back and saying that your interest you made in your savings account has to be repaid unless you stay with the bank for another 3 years would it not?

1MeanAdmin

Mishra wrote:

Unless you signed a previous contract, your employer can't come back and force you to sign an agreement for something you already have gone through. It would be like a bank coming back and saying that your interest you made in your savings account has to be repaid unless you stay with the bank for another 3 years would it not?

Mishra:

LOL, exactly my point!

I just disagree with the following:
"I think its fair for an employer to want you there for some time if they are going to invest money in you. I would probably ask the same thing if I was a business owner."

If I was an employer, I would ask the same thing too, BUT at the time of hiring. Since this is Zelankin's topic, I assume your post was addressed to him. Zelankin apparently did not sign a repayment agreement or an Employee Handbook, so no, it is improper for an employer to ask for money already spent.

It is still morning, so if I misunderstood you, I'm sorry.

dynamik

I think it's fair that they ask that you be there for a certain amount of time or be reimbursed for the training. It wouldn't be fair to the employer to have them **** thousands into your training only for you to leave as soon as your training is completed. If a better opportunity presents itself, just pay them for your training and move on. This should all be decided up-front though; retroactively is just absurd.

1MeanAdmin

dynamik wrote:

This should all be decided up-front though; retroactively is just absurd.

+1.

HeroPsycho

Agreed. Unless there's a broad policy in place like in your handbook, they can't have you take the course and THEN have you sign it.

To be honest with you, you'd even have a decent shot of signing it then and still not have to pay it back. You could contest that you were forced after the fact to sign, and therefore it's null and void. As long as the date is after the training, you'd probably win in court. This is similar to non-compete agreements where the employer makes you sign it after you come aboard and left your previous job. That's a no-no and employers in those situations lose in court if it ever makes it there every time.

zenlakin

Hey guys, just thought I would update my situation. All of my professional training courses and expenses don't count towards what I have to payback but I will have to payback the tuition reimbursement I receive for the pas 12 months. but all in all I ended up increasing my salary by 30% and I got a 4k sign on bonus as well. I am definitely happy with the outcome!!!

dynamik

That's awesome! Congratulations!

hetty

Congrats! It all worked out good for you!