Need Help..Conformation Letter Is Necessary Or Not

Dear Seniors,

I am working in a Retail Sector as an Associate Manager - HR. It's a 2-year-old company. We have a manpower strength of 250 employees. Employees are segregated in two ways: 1. HO Staff 2. Store Staff.

The problem is that we have not given a confirmation letter to any employees who have completed their probation period. According to the appointment letter, HO Staff has a notice period of 1 month, and Store Staff has a notice period of 15 days. However, employees are resigning by giving only a 1-day notice period. When asked to serve the notice period, they reply, "Where is the confirmation letter? We are not confirmed employees."

Please suggest to me, is it compulsory to give a confirmation letter to the employees, or do they automatically get confirmed after 1 year? There are employees in our company who have been working for the last 2 years without a confirmation letter.

What to do??

Need help :( :(

Regards,
Smita Uppal

Dear,

That is absolutely right. If the employee is not confirmed, he can do that. But it also depends on the notice period policy. I think there is no harm in issuing the confirmation letter. I have worked in this type of industry, and we used to issue confirmation letters to the employees. Please issue the letters.

Regards, Vipin:icon1::icon1:

I partially disagree with Adi Manav. Issuing confirmation means acknowledging employees' satisfactory performance leading to their confirmation. Even if you do not issue a confirmation letter after the probation period served by an employee, they are deemed to be a confirmed employee; there are many Supreme Court judgments on this. Confirmation is not mandatory because it depends on the internal administrative procedures and systems of companies. What system supports cross-verification for eligibility for certain benefits. If there is a policy to calculate some benefits from the date of confirmation, then this becomes a system and procedure requirement but not a necessary requirement of the law.

RashidBhai

You are right, Mr. Rashid. A confirmation letter is an administrative requirement, not a legal requirement. The law only considers the terms of appointment during and after the completion of probation. An employee is automatically confirmed in the services if no extension of the probation period is provided in writing on or before the last date of the probation period.

If no such extension or further notification is given, the employee's employment status becomes that of a regular employee. In other words, they are considered confirmed or permanent employees. Additionally, there are many such terms that exist but are not explicitly mentioned in employment or labor laws.

In the private sector, many individuals work for years without receiving confirmation letters. However, this does not mean that these individuals are deprived of their lawful rights. The law distinguishes between permanent tenure of employment with regular nature of work and casual or intermittent nature of work, which may result in breaks in services or employment.

Badlu

Dear Mr. Badlu,

I too agree that for the management's benefit, a confirmation letter should be provided. If you do not issue a confirmation letter, then legally, after a certain period, employees may claim the benefits of confirmation. However, if they leave the service, they may argue that they were never confirmed. Therefore, in my view, it is essential to issue confirmation letters.

Thank you.

JS Malik

Dear All,

Thank you very much for providing me with information. Special thanks to Mr. Malikjs and Mr. Badlu. I will give a confirmation letter to all the employees. However, I also need suggestions in case the management is not ready to provide confirmation letters to employees. How can we convince the employees that they are confirmed once they have completed the probation period?

Another issue is that employees may not be willing to serve the notice period. Please provide valuable input to help me with these challenges.

Regards,
Smita Uppal

Dear management,

It is good for us if you inform management about the situation. If you need to remove someone and haven't confirmed their status, they can claim permanency based on their service in the company. However, if management does not agree, there's no need to worry. It is better to issue a confirmation letter.

Thank you.

JS Malik

You can add a clause in your appointment letter that "your probation will be for X months, and you shall be a confirmed employee of the organization unless otherwise specified in writing."

Thanks

Dear Smitha,

As an organization, you need to adopt certain methodologies and standards. Issuing a confirmation letter is a mandatory thing, mainly in the IT sector. Some tasks are assigned only after serving the probation period. For example, a fresher joins as a trainee and is to be promoted as a software engineer. In this case, until you issue a confirmation letter, they cannot be promoted. Therefore, according to the appointment letter, you have to issue it.

Regards,
Valli

Mr. Talli,

You have described an internal management system that works on the principles of management-approved police guidelines, which vary from company to company. This does not mean it's mandatory for all companies to follow your policies, procedures, and systems. Therefore, we discuss here what is globally and universally practiced or within the context of government-enacted labor laws.

Regards,
Abraham

Mr. MalikJS & Mr. Badlu

What if there is a clause in the appointment letter that "You will be on probation for a period of X months, which may be extended purely at the discretion of the management and shall continue to be on probation until your services are confirmed in writing by the management. In the absence of such a letter of confirmation, it will be deemed that your services are not confirmed."

Shall the employee be deemed to be the confirmed employee if the confirmation letter is not issued.

Dear Mr. Prasad,

You have to ascertain the validity of such a clause in light of the facts and circumstances of each case to justify that there is no misuse of the law or malafide intention of the employer. If an employee was working on probation beyond 6 months, it was not justified in any court of law that even after completion of probation, you are neither confirming his services nor terminating him. That means your intention is malafide to exploit this clause in favor of management as per convenience.

This practice is illegal, and no court will accept this argument if you cannot justify why the employee is not issued confirmation in writing after the so-called clause "until services confirmed in writing."

Because it's not the employee who will decide to confirm his own employment, but it's the employer who has to honor his commitment to confirm as per the clause after the probation period is over.

But the employer, after the probation period is over, did not confirm in writing the services of the employee, and the employee continued in services for even years. In such a case, do you mean he is not a confirmed employee just because he is not confirmed in writing?

That is ill-thought because the law does not support this contention and argument that our HR Department forgot to confirm the employee; therefore, he is not confirmed because he does not have our confirmation letter.

I would like to add that you cannot keep an employee on probation for an indefinite period until management discretion or in writing. You must have a specific period of probation. Can you justify keeping an employee on probation for 2 years to 10 years... which court will accept this?

Do you find any logic in this?

I think you got my point, and for details, please refer to many case laws wherein all court cases have gone in favor of the employee. Therefore, a Confirmation Letter is the employer's responsibility, and the employee need not bother if he is continuing after probation without any official communication for an extension of probation.

Badlu

I think it is better to have a "Deemed Confirmation clause" in the Appointment Letter itself. Your term of probation is X months, and after the completion of X months, you will be deemed confirmed if no probation extension letter is issued before the completion of the probation period.

Furthermore, I think this will not require the approval of Management and will meet the requirements.

Regards,
Anshulavi

Dear,

It will be beneficial if you provide the confirmation letter to the employee because after that the employee's motivation level will go high automatically. Then they will not think to leave the company. The company will be able to maintain accuracy with experienced persons.

I think to solve this confusion, in case a company does not desire to issue confirmation letters, a clause should be added to the appointment letter stating that the employee would be on probation for six months (or 1 year, whatever the case may be). Beyond this period, he/she would be considered confirmed if no written communication is received within 3 working days after the completion of six months (or 1 year).

Whatever the decision of the management regarding probation, extension of probation, and confirmation for the employees, it should be clearly stated in the appointment letters. This transparency will provide clarity to the employees, and the management will also have a clear stance.

Regards, Shaoli

Dear Friends,

I work for a multinational company. My confirmation was completed in March 2009, but I have not received any confirmation or extension letter. My other colleagues who joined with me have received their confirmation letters. I have asked the HR department, but they did not reply properly. Please help me and guide me.

Thank you.

Hi Smita,

It appears that you yourself are not very clear and convinced of the fact that if you have not given them the extension of probation letter, then they are deemed to be permanent employees. First, you need to keep this in mind. A confirmation letter as such is not compulsory by law, but such things do affect the morale of the employees. Even if they have been working for two years with your organization, somewhere they feel that the organization does not care for them and just wants to utilize them. In such scenarios, it becomes difficult to win the loyalty and respect of the employees towards the organization. You need to explain this to your management and show them how these employees are leaving in one day. Probably, just by giving one letter, it can be changed to the maximum.

Also, add the notice period for the probation period, like for HO 15 days and retail 7 days.

Anjali

Dear Smita,

I have gone through your problems and also the proposed suggested solutions by our friends. I need the following things to give a clear opinion on your issue:
- A sample copy of the Appointment letter for HO staff and Store staff.
- Are there any standing orders applicable to you? Are there any certified standing orders, or if not, then model standing orders are applicable?
- Where is your office located where these 250 employees are working?

Kindly send the above information so that I will be able to provide concrete solutions to you based on legal aspects and best practices. You can send it to the following email id: himanshupathak@torrentpower.com.

With regards,
Himanshu
9227233315 - Ahmedabad