In my previous post, I wrote about hiring staffs under the topic Dealing with Staffs in Business thanks to everyone who took their time to read the post. If you missed it, you can go read it here. I will be looking at another interesting part when dealing with staffs in business, which is firing staffs. How do you fire a staff without getting into a court case with the staff after firing?
Some staffs might be very frustrating and might be a risk to the company and you may be tempted to fire them immediately only to be sued by your ex-staff for illegal firing. You might want to avert things like this, it is advisable to always document the problems first. It is true that an employee can be fired but creating a paper trial or query can help you when you fire them. Document every transgression and offence done by an employee in writing, then give the employee a letter to explain what they did wrong, also let them write what they can do to reverse their transgression, and have them sign it. Keep this at heart that you cannot fire an employee because of discrimination or retaliation, or when they have a long term contract without repercussion, expect a termination suit from the employee.
If you are about to fire an employee (except for cases of discrimination or retaliation, or when they have a long term contract) and do not want an ugly, expensive and wrongful termination suit, I will be giving an idea to the issues you should consider before you fire an employee.
Before making a decision, you need to analyze if the offence is the fault of the employee or your business work policy. If it is your business problem, then firing them isn’t the right way to solve the problem.
Make sure every offence is properly written and kept safely. And make sure the staffs/employees has answered a written query before firing them.
Be sure previous employees haven’t done the same thing. If it has happened previously, you need to do an internal check then find solution
Before firing your employee, be sure to always consider the employee’s health and age group
Be sure you aren’t firing your employee on the basis of personal offence and/or retaliation for exercising some legal rights.
Be certain the staff doesn’t have a long term serving contract with the company either written or implied. If they had a long term serving contract with the company, firing them must be on a just reason such as illegal behavior, excessive absenteeism, sexual harassment, incompetence, and other cases which have been properly investigated.
As a business, limiting every risk is your major priority so in letting go of an employee, necessary measures is advised to prevent legal actions against the company. After firing an employee, ensure you make changes and the access of the employee is changed in cases where he has security clearances. Be sure the employee was handed a termination before leaving the premises of the company and make sure it is properly documented.