Hello fellow members,
I wanted to direct this question to HR Managers in particular.
At times employees when they resign come to you and say i dont want to serve the notice period as a policy and are not willing to give 1 month salary in lieu.
1. What should be appropriate way to enforce 1 Month notice period to employee and making sure who ever resigns next serves the notice period ?
2. To What extend a company should go to make sure the employee follows it ?
3. Should Management and Leads be involved ?
4. What should be HR Responsibilities in this case ?
5. Suggest a best policy and procedure to make sure everyone serves it.
Thanks
From Pakistan, Lahore
I wanted to direct this question to HR Managers in particular.
At times employees when they resign come to you and say i dont want to serve the notice period as a policy and are not willing to give 1 month salary in lieu.
1. What should be appropriate way to enforce 1 Month notice period to employee and making sure who ever resigns next serves the notice period ?
2. To What extend a company should go to make sure the employee follows it ?
3. Should Management and Leads be involved ?
4. What should be HR Responsibilities in this case ?
5. Suggest a best policy and procedure to make sure everyone serves it.
Thanks
From Pakistan, Lahore
Hi,
For those who are unwilling to pay salary in liue of notice period you can withheld their relieving letter till the receipt of dues from employees.
For the ones who are ready to pay off the notice period, you have to issue the service certificate. Best way to make this clause deterrent is to make employees aware of the notice period caluse. Lay down the detailed hand over / KT procedure. Verbally refuse to relieve them prioir to completion of notice period. Still if they are do not want to wait, you can add a comment in their relieving letter to such effect for e.g. - you have not served the notice period and it is an unprofessional behavior. However as per the terms of employment we are relieving you etc.
Following of such strict measures will slowly bring in the awareness and discipline
\Nilesh
From India, Mumbai
For those who are unwilling to pay salary in liue of notice period you can withheld their relieving letter till the receipt of dues from employees.
For the ones who are ready to pay off the notice period, you have to issue the service certificate. Best way to make this clause deterrent is to make employees aware of the notice period caluse. Lay down the detailed hand over / KT procedure. Verbally refuse to relieve them prioir to completion of notice period. Still if they are do not want to wait, you can add a comment in their relieving letter to such effect for e.g. - you have not served the notice period and it is an unprofessional behavior. However as per the terms of employment we are relieving you etc.
Following of such strict measures will slowly bring in the awareness and discipline
\Nilesh
From India, Mumbai
You should s[pecifically mention a clause wrt the notice period in the appointment letter and at the time of induction you should communicate once again on your own and make it mandatory for the HODs to communicate to the employees.
As far as I am concerned if you have an alternative better to relieve the resigned employee at the earliest if he is ready to buy the balance notice period because once the employee submits his resignation their attitude and interest towards organization changes and there is every possibility of nonperformance. The other employees who are in to system are also looking at him and the outgoing employee may disturb and influence them also.
Those employees who are not ready to serve and buy out are not to be given the final settlment amount / relieving letter / no due certificate & service certificate in addition to this you should categorically send a notice to the employee and as well as the prospective employer saying that he has not completed the handing over formalities etc., and even go for a legal action, with this other employees will also have the information and comply with the formalities.
Regards - kamesh
From India, Hyderabad
186As far as I am concerned if you have an alternative better to relieve the resigned employee at the earliest if he is ready to buy the balance notice period because once the employee submits his resignation their attitude and interest towards organization changes and there is every possibility of nonperformance. The other employees who are in to system are also looking at him and the outgoing employee may disturb and influence them also.
Those employees who are not ready to serve and buy out are not to be given the final settlment amount / relieving letter / no due certificate & service certificate in addition to this you should categorically send a notice to the employee and as well as the prospective employer saying that he has not completed the handing over formalities etc., and even go for a legal action, with this other employees will also have the information and comply with the formalities.
Regards - kamesh
From India, Hyderabad
Hello,
You have raised a fundamental question.
The employer-employee relationship is governed by the contract of employment (aka Letter of Appointment containing Terms and Conditions of employment).
Subject to the provisions of this contract, it is clear that contractual commitments have to be performed by each party. The notice period clause was not inserted for fun! While the management has a right to waive certain conditionalities, this descrition should never be used indiscriminately to make a mockery of the same. Therefore excetional cases apart, the company may consider following options to underscore the seriousness of such a clause.
1. Obtain a security deposit while recruiting itself or gradually recover such amount from the salary of the employee over first few months and by his consent. This amount will be recovered if he does not honour notice period obligations and will be refunded with full and final settlement of his employment dues if he honours the commitment.
2. Block his settlement of dues barring of course the statutory ones like PF, Gratuity etc.
3. Refuse to issue a service certificate and/or resignation acceptance letter.
4. Inform the future employer about the unprofessional conduct of such an employee.
5. Prosucute the employee in a civil court for breah of settlement.
More alternative ways can be thought of but one has to remember that any chosen approach will be dependent on:
1. Company culture and adopted HR philosophy.
2. Impact such an action would have on future employees and company's image in the employment market as also on the existing employee morale.
3. Being morally right and also legally right at the same time could be very tricky but one may have to take a call in the long term interest of the organization.
I am NOT recommending any of these. The choice has to be made by the employer in each case. If Iam asked to select an approach, my choice will depend ont e facts and circumstances of the given case.
You are welcome to generate more arguments on the subject. If you need further clarifications, please share your responses.
Regards
samvedan
December 20, 2011----------------------
From India, Pune
You have raised a fundamental question.
The employer-employee relationship is governed by the contract of employment (aka Letter of Appointment containing Terms and Conditions of employment).
Subject to the provisions of this contract, it is clear that contractual commitments have to be performed by each party. The notice period clause was not inserted for fun! While the management has a right to waive certain conditionalities, this descrition should never be used indiscriminately to make a mockery of the same. Therefore excetional cases apart, the company may consider following options to underscore the seriousness of such a clause.
1. Obtain a security deposit while recruiting itself or gradually recover such amount from the salary of the employee over first few months and by his consent. This amount will be recovered if he does not honour notice period obligations and will be refunded with full and final settlement of his employment dues if he honours the commitment.
2. Block his settlement of dues barring of course the statutory ones like PF, Gratuity etc.
3. Refuse to issue a service certificate and/or resignation acceptance letter.
4. Inform the future employer about the unprofessional conduct of such an employee.
5. Prosucute the employee in a civil court for breah of settlement.
More alternative ways can be thought of but one has to remember that any chosen approach will be dependent on:
1. Company culture and adopted HR philosophy.
2. Impact such an action would have on future employees and company's image in the employment market as also on the existing employee morale.
3. Being morally right and also legally right at the same time could be very tricky but one may have to take a call in the long term interest of the organization.
I am NOT recommending any of these. The choice has to be made by the employer in each case. If Iam asked to select an approach, my choice will depend ont e facts and circumstances of the given case.
You are welcome to generate more arguments on the subject. If you need further clarifications, please share your responses.
Regards
samvedan
December 20, 2011----------------------
From India, Pune
Thankyou samvedan, kamesh333, nileshsawant2011
What if employee come to you that he has this much of remaining leaves and can certainly leave without serving it how would you make sure employee does not misuse this element by constantly being on leaves one day or after 1 or 2 days to avail his leave balance.
I believe such elements are very serious concerns for employer and i m sure many among us have faced it.
Thanks
From Pakistan, Lahore
What if employee come to you that he has this much of remaining leaves and can certainly leave without serving it how would you make sure employee does not misuse this element by constantly being on leaves one day or after 1 or 2 days to avail his leave balance.
I believe such elements are very serious concerns for employer and i m sure many among us have faced it.
Thanks
From Pakistan, Lahore
Hello,
Remember Leave is a privilege and not a right in the sense that leave, to be an authorised absence has to have pre-sanction (and only in exceptional case, a post-facto sanction may turn unauthorised absence into an authorised absence.
Having said that, if the employee has some leave to his credit and wishes to use it for adjustment of Notice period, the employer may, using discretinery power agree and releive theemployee so much eary but the employer is not obliged under any law to do so!
Therefore if the employee misuses his balance leave as you suspect, you have every right to refuse to sanction same. This means he loses salary for such days, has to complete the entire notice period and will still suffer in credibility and dignity BUT all that cannot prevent him from misbehaving and he is already in a frame of mind that he does not care what the employer may think of himyou may have to choose one of the ways suggested in my earlier post!
Eurther questions, if any are welcome!
Regards
samvedan
December 21, 2011-------------------
From India, Pune
Remember Leave is a privilege and not a right in the sense that leave, to be an authorised absence has to have pre-sanction (and only in exceptional case, a post-facto sanction may turn unauthorised absence into an authorised absence.
Having said that, if the employee has some leave to his credit and wishes to use it for adjustment of Notice period, the employer may, using discretinery power agree and releive theemployee so much eary but the employer is not obliged under any law to do so!
Therefore if the employee misuses his balance leave as you suspect, you have every right to refuse to sanction same. This means he loses salary for such days, has to complete the entire notice period and will still suffer in credibility and dignity BUT all that cannot prevent him from misbehaving and he is already in a frame of mind that he does not care what the employer may think of himyou may have to choose one of the ways suggested in my earlier post!
Eurther questions, if any are welcome!
Regards
samvedan
December 21, 2011-------------------
From India, Pune
Hi,
I am working as an HR in small company where I interacted with similar kind of problems. We have open door policy where an employee can be relieved immediately. However its mentioned in appointment letter that if an employee is on Probation period i.e. 1 year and resigns from company then he/she has to serve 1 month notice period or else their basic will be deducted in full& Final as per appointment letter but nobody was following such policies because previously policies was not strictly implemented. Hence so many employees were joining and leaving the company very frequently. I have analyzed that some of the employees had worked only for 15 or 1 month.
Now I strictly started following clauses of offer letter and deducted basic amount whenever any employee was leaving the organization without serving the notice period and surprised to see the result in past 3 months that their is a slight drop in employees leaving the organization. They are leaving but at least with proper knowledge Transition(KT) and we are also getting time to hire a new employee of our choice. So its mandatory to strictly follow the policies.
If still some employee is leaving then a company can stop their experience letter. and as per my concern an HR alone can handle these things. even a legal action can also be taken against employee with prior notice.
In my opinion you need to revise your appointment letter because an employer can change policies of offer letter according to their own discretion after taking signature of all employees.
I hope this will be helpful to you.
Regards,
Garima
From India, Bhopal
I am working as an HR in small company where I interacted with similar kind of problems. We have open door policy where an employee can be relieved immediately. However its mentioned in appointment letter that if an employee is on Probation period i.e. 1 year and resigns from company then he/she has to serve 1 month notice period or else their basic will be deducted in full& Final as per appointment letter but nobody was following such policies because previously policies was not strictly implemented. Hence so many employees were joining and leaving the company very frequently. I have analyzed that some of the employees had worked only for 15 or 1 month.
Now I strictly started following clauses of offer letter and deducted basic amount whenever any employee was leaving the organization without serving the notice period and surprised to see the result in past 3 months that their is a slight drop in employees leaving the organization. They are leaving but at least with proper knowledge Transition(KT) and we are also getting time to hire a new employee of our choice. So its mandatory to strictly follow the policies.
If still some employee is leaving then a company can stop their experience letter. and as per my concern an HR alone can handle these things. even a legal action can also be taken against employee with prior notice.
In my opinion you need to revise your appointment letter because an employer can change policies of offer letter according to their own discretion after taking signature of all employees.
I hope this will be helpful to you.
Regards,
Garima
From India, Bhopal
I am desperately looking for solution of how to really make employees understand their sense of responsibility. We have amended lots of clause in the appointment letter but still few people are leaving with just 1 day notice. Unfortunately they are not in need of release letter, acceptance letter or experience certificate. Very recently we had such an incident where an employee for 4 years just walked out because he got an offer almost 1.5 times higher - But the worst problem is the companies which are recruiting - they are not following the HR policies as per the industry.
Seems it has been a Social problem. It is rather affecting the small companies like us more.
Can anyone address this problem when the employee leaving is not in need of any final documents and submitts his resignation after getting his salary - What can be done.
From India, Calcutta
Seems it has been a Social problem. It is rather affecting the small companies like us more.
Can anyone address this problem when the employee leaving is not in need of any final documents and submitts his resignation after getting his salary - What can be done.
From India, Calcutta
Hello,
Kindly refer to my first post in this thread.
If the leaving employee is NOT in need of any documents there is no way practical or wise to try and stop him/her. Seeking damages for breach of contact is a civil matter and could take many years before the employer gets his pound of flesh as it were.
Under the conditions you describe, even of such an employee stays back to fulfill "notice period" obligation, what use will you have for a reluctant employee, if at all? Further what is a guarantee that such an employee, in such a period will conduct himself in a dignified manner? He may end up vitiating organizational atmosphere which no employers would like!
My first response in this thread has a suggestion regarding collecting a "security deposit" from all new employees and to confiscate the same if the employee does not fulfill his contractual obligations while leaving employment! In suggesting this I am aware that I am not entirely above board in matters of ethics & values! But when you have to conduct an economic organizations, charity cannot be your guiding motive!
Kindly respond if you feel the need to ask more questions or to express further opinion
Regards
samvedan
June 17, 2012
------------
From India, Pune
Kindly refer to my first post in this thread.
If the leaving employee is NOT in need of any documents there is no way practical or wise to try and stop him/her. Seeking damages for breach of contact is a civil matter and could take many years before the employer gets his pound of flesh as it were.
Under the conditions you describe, even of such an employee stays back to fulfill "notice period" obligation, what use will you have for a reluctant employee, if at all? Further what is a guarantee that such an employee, in such a period will conduct himself in a dignified manner? He may end up vitiating organizational atmosphere which no employers would like!
My first response in this thread has a suggestion regarding collecting a "security deposit" from all new employees and to confiscate the same if the employee does not fulfill his contractual obligations while leaving employment! In suggesting this I am aware that I am not entirely above board in matters of ethics & values! But when you have to conduct an economic organizations, charity cannot be your guiding motive!
Kindly respond if you feel the need to ask more questions or to express further opinion
Regards
samvedan
June 17, 2012
------------
From India, Pune
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