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back to article IT pro screwed out of unused vacation pay, bonus by HPE after judge rules: The law is a mess but it's still the law

A "highly skilled IT professional" has lost his fight to be paid his unused vacation days as well as a non-trivial bonus, after a judge stuck to a law he admitted was outdated. Matthew White joined Hewlett-Packard in 2013 and left in July 2015, just months before the company split into HP and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE). …

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  1. Will Godfrey Silver badge
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    Bar Stewards

    It's cold comfort, but he's better off out of there, and hopefully the publicity will act as a warning to other employees to quietly keep their eyes open, and gather as much printed information as they can about any contract changes.

    54 0 Reply
    1. Warm Braw
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      Re: Bar Stewards

      hopefully the publicity will act as a warning

      I note that you've expressed no hope that a forward-thinking, citizen-friendly government might set some standards that can't be overwritten by an employment contract whose implied contents you have to cross a continent to have sight of.

      Sounds like the future of Britain stripped of all that EU red tape.

      56 14 Reply
      1. James Anderson
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        Re: Bar Stewards

        Junkers Law!

        FFS its a story about an evil multi national screwing over an overpaid over entitled employee. What The F*** has it got to do with the EU.

        22 48 Reply
        1. Anonymous Coward
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          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Bar Stewards

          "FFS its a story about an evil multi national screwing over an overpaid over entitled employee. What The F*** has it got to do with the EU."

          Hmm ... lets see ... the poster was looking at US worker's rights (as dictated to the government by large companies), and seeing it as how things were going where they live, given the public statements by people like Andrea Leadsome? Most of our employee's rights laws are based upon EU directives, and it's no secret some of them are unpopular with companies/Westminster.

          60 4 Reply
          1. James Anderson
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            Re: Bar Stewards

            The U.K. had much tougher employment laws before we entered the Common Market as it was then. These have been slowly eroded since then by various UK governments, till we got to the present situation of zero hours contracts, unpaid internships, and importing cheap labour from Eastern Europe.

            Being a member of the EU has down nothing to stop this exploitation of the poor by the rich.

            So I re-iterate this story has nothing to do with the EU.

            21 39 Reply
            1. yoganmahew
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              Re: Bar Stewards

              Plus the UK has in the past used its opt-out from EU workers rights law. Workers rights in the UK are a function of British law only, based on the opt-out.

              19 3 Reply
              1. Anonymous Coward
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                Anonymous Coward

                Re: Bar Stewards

                Working time directive?

                5 2 Reply
                1. James Anderson
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                  Re: Bar Stewards

                  Toothless regulation.

                  Your employer just has to stick an opt-out agreement under your nose and hand you the pen, while musing about staff cuts.

                  15 0 Reply
              2. jabuzz
                Reply Icon

                Re: Bar Stewards

                If you believe that I have a bridge to sell you. My source of information on the subject is my brother who is a salaried employment tribunal judge, and he tells me that it's basically all EU law.

                12 2 Reply
                1. yoganmahew
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                  Re: Bar Stewards

                  Yes, but initially was opted-out by the yuk and only later adopted by the yuk parliament, so as I said, it is within control of your most excellent parliament of high-minded worker lovers to control employment law in the yuk. The opt-out still exists, any yeu employment law can be opted out of and anyway, the yuk is part of the commission that builds the laws in the first place.

                  1 2 Reply
              3. Anonymous Coward
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                Anonymous Coward

                Re: Bar Stewards

                The UK hasn't opted out of EU workers rights. The opt out grouping was the social chapter which was opted out of by the Conservative party but was brought back in by Labour. Currently the UK is opted in to the Social Chapter under the Treaty of Amsterdam

                6 0 Reply
            2. Warm Braw
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              Re: Bar Stewards

              The U.K. had much tougher employment laws before we entered the Common Market

              It really didn't. Holiday pay, limits on working hours, rights to an employment contract and a slew of other stuff are very much post-accession. Zero hours contracts and unpaid internships are not the result of changes in the law, they're the result of the law not keeping up with shady practices that have really only become possible as a result of changes in the benefit system - in the past people would have stayed on the dole. Britain has worked assiduously in Europe to prevent laws being strengthened, all in the name of a "flexible" labour force (ie one that can't say no).

              My real sadness at the original post was the simple acceptance that employees had to watch out for themselves - there was no expectation that the situation could be changed, and certainly not the imbalance of power. That does seem to be the fundamental point of the whole EU debate - it's the powerful who want to "take back control", but in both directions: from the EU and also from the great unwashed. The issue is not that we're leaving behind the EU, it's that we've reached a situation in which workers have been persuaded that their own rights are somehow a foreign plot that must be dismantled. That's the wonder of populism, but I suspect it will all end in tears.

              46 2 Reply
              1. James Anderson
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                Re: Bar Stewards

                But the basic point is this is and has always been a domestic UK issue.

                The EU does not offer any effective protection to workers in the UK. Germany, France and the Benelux have effective and enforced working hours restrictions because their various socialist/social democratic parties at least pay lip service to the idea of representing working population.

                2 10 Reply
              2. CountCadaver Silver badge
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                Re: Bar Stewards

                Hell I remember my first job, supermarket at 16, no holiday pay (early 1998), EU holiday pay ruling came down and I get 4 weeks holiday issued to me, VERY grudgingly, with the attitude from management (who still demanded to be called Mr this and Mrs That and only changed after being swallowed by a larger concern) that I didn't deserve it and if it was up to them I wouldn't be getting them.....

                4 0 Reply
    2. n10cities
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      Re: Bar Stewards

      Agreed. Could be still working for DXC <shudder>..

      15 0 Reply
    3. big_D Silver badge
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      Re: Bar Stewards

      Do you not get a signed copy of the employment contract, when you sign in America? Over here, both parties get a copy, so just handing over his copy should have resolved the issue...

      15 0 Reply
      1. yoganmahew
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        Re: Bar Stewards

        Clearly the lesson here is - if you work for HPE and don't have a signed copy of your contract, get one.

        10 0 Reply
        1. macjules
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          Re: Bar Stewards

          the judge sided with HPE, arguing that it was White's fault that he didn't get hold of the original HP policy earlier on in the case if he wanted to prove his point.

          Remind me never to work in the USA ...

          14 0 Reply
      2. JetSetJim
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        Re: Bar Stewards

        I suspect part of that contract states "pay will be according to current HP(E) policies kept by HR and available on request", rather than bundle loads of "policies" (some of which may not be relevant) into the contract verbatim. Shitty, but equally he/his lawyer were clumsy in their discovery

        21 0 Reply
        1. big_D Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Re: Bar Stewards

          That wouldn't be valid here. For an employment contract, you can only sign for what is in the contract, any additional clauses regarding remuneration, holiday etc. have to be in the contract or they are null and void.

          Any changes to the conditions need to be signed by both parties, before they can become binding.

          At one takeover, some employees were on very good conditions (E.g. one months salary for each year of service, in the case of redundancy) and the new employer wanted to use standard terms (one week per year of service, after 2 years, up to 10 max years, ISTR). For employees with 20 - 30 years service, that was a huge reduction in redundancy compensation, so they refused to sign new contracts and carried on with the old ones. It was very expensive, when they finally had to make some of them redundant.

          15 0 Reply
          1. JetSetJim
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            Re: Bar Stewards

            I suspect some policies can be referred to as long as they are easily available. Others may need to be in the contract, the set of which may vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

            > one months salary for each year of service, in the case of redundancy

            Assuming you are UK based - redundancy is a tricky one and I've seen the same scenario in places I've worked. There is not usually anything in an employment contract determining redundancy pay - this *can* be varied. However, if the same terms have been offered for multiple rounds of redundancy then such terms can become an implied contract. Also, if someone has been refused redundancy on the more favourable terms, but at a later point is up for being made redundant, then the terms cannot be reduced, and also terms must be the same for all folks being made redundant. Lastly, that "month per year" is the maximum amount awardable by a tribunal, and so there is no point any employee contesting being made redundant as they won't get any more cash.

            Companies will try and cover their arses with standard messaging about "we are looking at what terms to offer, and they may vary from last time", but suspect it's a bit difficult to vary for larger companies due to the above - in theory as long as they say it's evaluated specifically each time, then they can vary the terms.

            All the above is not legal advice as IANAL, it's what I've cobbled together having been through 10 years worth of cuts prior to finally succumbing a few years back

            3 0 Reply
            1. big_D Silver badge
              Reply Icon

              Re: Bar Stewards

              The old employer had it in the employment contracts that those were the redundancy conditions (a great employer to work for!) and the company that took over was more services orientated and wanted to keep conditions to the legal minimum where possible, so they tried to remove those redundancy conditions from the contracts of people transferring over. Those of us relatively new to the company (I'd been there less than 2 years) accepted the new contract, as we didn't have anything to lose, those with years of service and a high payout in view refused to sign and got the redundancy payment for their service in the old company paid at the old rate, as far as I can remember.

              One manager was made redundant after 35 years of service, got his massive payout, then the new employer worked out he was the only person with any knowledge of around 30 different systems in the company, so he came back for around 18 months on a good contract to teach up a replacement! Nice money, if you can get it.

              11 0 Reply
              1. JetSetJim
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                Re: Bar Stewards

                The old employer was indeed nice! The new one less so, if the takeover was covered by TUPE (*) then suspect they might have been violating some laws by saying "here's your new terms, or you're out".

                (*) tricky question to answer...

                4 0 Reply
                1. big_D Silver badge
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                  Facepalm

                  Re: Bar Stewards

                  It was under TUPE, but they didn't do new terms or out. Those on the old contracts were with the new employer for several years in some cases. The manager I wrote about above was made redundant about 18-24 months after the takeover - he took voluntary redundancy and nobody did due diligence on his role before signing off!

                  3 0 Reply
            2. Derezed
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              Re: Bar Stewards

              "I suspect some policies can be referred to as long as they are easily available."

              Once you leave a company, nothing is "easily available"...nothing. Also how can you sign a document that links to documents you have no sight or control over that are "easily available"? This case is tragic.

              7 0 Reply
        2. gbshore
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          Re: Bar Stewards

          Uhhhhhh if HP was not split when he signed how could it state the HPE entity...??? Lol

          2 1 Reply
      3. T. F. M. Reader
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        Re: Bar Stewards

        handing over his copy [of the employment contract] should have resolved the issue...

        This is not about the employment contract, but about company policies. The employment contract most likely says that the employee must act in accordance with the applicable company policies at all times, and that said policies may be updated from time to time as the company sees fit and at the company's sole discretion, and that failure to follow policies is an essential clause of the contract and may be grounds to immediate dismissal with prejudice and without severance pay, etc. I worked for a few American companies - something like the above was the usual formulation.

        A large company such as HP may have a very brief contract basically stating the employee's position and pay grade, and the rest is policies. I used to work for Big Blue - that was the case.

        Yes, policies may change, and I would agree that specifying every single policy in place at the time of signing is not workable - you will have a situation where policies will not apply uniformly but will depend on when every individual employee joined the company.

        HPE look like total d..ks in refusing to provide the policies just to win a case that they should not have won (otherwise they would just provide the policies and point out that the employees were properly informed and it is the plaintiff's fault he didn't pay attention).

        And herein lies a lesson to all employees (not just HPEs): if/when a policy change is announced download the appropriate files and stash them away from the company's storage. Just in case there is no announcement or in case you may have missed one download all the policies you know of periodically (say, every 6 months). Also - read them.

        3 0 Reply
        1. cdrcat
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          But the documents are confidential

          And you have signed a non-disclosure agreement with teeth...

          0 0 Reply
      4. Dal90
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        Re: Bar Stewards

        1) LOL ... employment contract in America?

        Most folks are deep into six figures if there is a contract with an individual.

        2) LOL ... a signed copy of anything? Last physical employment *offer* I got was 1997. Docusign away by clicking online forms. You have to chose to print it out yourself.

        3) Company policies are often (not always) held to be implicit contracts that favor the employee in court -- i.e. you can sue the employer for violating it, all the company can do is fire you for violating the policy; plus ambiguity is read against the party who drafted it. The employer can, of course, sue you for malfeasance that exists outside of the contract -- fraud is fraud, but they have no legal address against the employee if you flip your boss the bird one day, declare you quit, and walk out the door even if the company policy mandated two week notice. OTOH if they policy says you get two weeks severance on termination that would be enforceable by a court (and probably just by the state labor department before it even got to the point of involving a lawyer).

        The problem here is the company policy changed, and the party suing (I'm guessing self-represented since I'm not sure many lawyers would take on HP for a 1/3rd share of $10,000 or $20,000) failed to utter the right legal incantation at the right moment to get a court order to force HP to turn over a copy of the original policy.

        2 0 Reply
        1. big_D Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Re: Bar Stewards

          Thanks for clearing that up. It doesn't sound like a very healthy environment.

          Makes me kind of glad I don't work in the US.

          1 0 Reply
  2. Shadow Systems

    They fucked with Milton's red Swingline stapler.

    He may not be an employee any longer, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have access to a can of lighter fluid & a book of matches.

    Not that I'm condoning such a thing mind you, oh no not at all.

    *Hands Milton some Napalm, Semtex, & Thermite*

    20 3 Reply
    1. The Nazz
      Reply Icon

      Re: They fucked with Milton's red Swingline stapler.

      https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-48611424

      Or indeed, consider a "Not only not condemned but actually defended by the BBC" battery acid attack.

      5 15 Reply
      1. David Nash Silver badge
        Reply Icon
        FAIL

        Re: They fucked with Milton's red Swingline stapler.

        Why quote the actual truth when some made-up anti-BBC half-truth will serve your presumed purpose better?

        What the BBC defended was the right to make provocative jokes about battery acid and indeed stated explicitly that they were "not intended to be taken seriously"

        They did not defend a battery acid attack as your comment suggests.

        14 1 Reply
  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    What HP did to ME....

    So, I worked for a company that was purchased by HP. Part of the purchase, that I had IN WRITING, was that HP was to award me 1000 shares of stock. Well, as soon as the deal was done and we went to work for HP, I get a "Stock Option Award" of 1000 shares of stock at an option point of that day's end price... which were essentially worthless within a week. So, I went to HR, and they basically said, "Tough shit. You can sue us, or you can quit if you want. "

    I needed the job, but I NEVER gave HP 100%... EVER. They are not an honorable company, they do not honor their commitments, so I did not honor mine. I guarantee that they lost WAY more by giving me the shaft then they would have by simply honoring their commitment.

    55 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: What HP did to ME....

      I needed the job, but I NEVER gave HP 100%... EVER

      Kind of like IBM deciding to make a 10% reduction in what they were paying for contract work (which the contracting company obviously passed to to us lowly contractors). My response was I would just have to make 10% less effort (although with how things were, adding another 10% less on top of my existing indifference was really difficult).

      43 0 Reply
    2. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: What HP did to ME....

      > was that HP was to award me 1000 shares of stock. Well, as soon as the deal was done and we went to work for HP, I get a "Stock Option Award" of 1000 shares of stock at an option point of that day's end price... which were essentially worthless within a week

      Do I understand you right: you were told you'd get 1000 shares, i.e. a gift, but actually you got an option to buy 1000 shares at that day's price? Surely that was worth suing over?

      37 0 Reply
      1. JetSetJim
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        Re: What HP did to ME....

        Possibly it's all in the legal definition of the wording of what HP wrote about the award...

        4 0 Reply
      2. Anonymous Coward
        Reply Icon
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: What HP did to ME....

        I think the OP would have had an option to buy 1000 shares fixed at that day's price for a certain length of time into the future.

        Therefore, say it was a 12 month option, you could buy 1000 stocks at 'day 1' price any time in those 12 months and profit on the increase in price, sort of like a no lose gamble. However if the stock price fell in that period you'd never exercise that option so the offer would be worthless.

        Very different to the promised 1000 free shares that could be cashed at any point, including day 1 for a tidy profit.

        7 0 Reply
    3. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: What HP did to ME....

      I share the feelings of the OP AC.

      I was working on a critical path development and wanted to take a week's holiday with TOH. It was critical path because of multiple fuck ups by the system architect and project manager - I was critical path because they left me to fire fight their fuck ups with a small watering can. In short they repeatedly said the specifications were fully written and complete until me and one or two others shot so many holes in their spec there was nothing left. It took them 14 revisions to get the supplemental spec right - so much for complete and finished!

      Anyway. I ended up working two straight days of my holiday debugging problems remotely so the project could proceed towards customer demo in my absence. When I got back I asked for one day of my paid holiday back which I thought was a fair compromise. The EVP who had to make the decision said, "No, and if you don't like it complain to HR" - basically fuck you with knobs on. I then got fucked over in my annual review as I was held responsible for all the failings by the sys arch and PM.

      I won't go into details but I've made sure they've lost more than the cost of that days holiday, and that'll continue. What I find staggering is companies always think they gain by fucking over their employees for what must be relatively trivial amounts in the corporate scheme of things and never realise their employees often get their own back.

      Posted AC because I don't want my current employer to find out my feelings until I've sorted something better.

      24 0 Reply
      1. Anonymous Coward
        Reply Icon
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: What HP did to ME....

        I could write an astonishingly similar account. Your penultimate paragraph is spot on, and IMO the reason the place is stacked from top to bottom with people taking it very easy, riding it out, making it tough to get almost anything done. HR seem to be expert in where they can cadge a few notes out of employee's pockets, and absolutely NOTHING else. It's incredible it still exists.

        3 0 Reply
    4. hoola Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: What HP did to ME....

      Stocks and shares carry a risk, they can go up as well as down. The assumption here is that they would only go up and could be cashed in for a tidy sum in the future. Whilst I do not agree what was done was necessarily in the spirit of giving shares to employees, that is the reality.

      There are endless adverts now on radio about how if you had certain types of investments that are/were based on shares and you lost money, said company will get you compensation. The only way I can see this working is if nowhere does it say in the original blurb that "investments based on stocks and shares can go up or down and you may not get back the original sum invested".

      0 1 Reply
  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Reciprocity for new hires?

    > under the law, White could only get hold of the relevant policies if he turned up, in person, to the company's official human resources headquarters – which is on the other side of America in California, roughly 2,500 miles away.

    So if you can only get hold of your contract by physically going to CA, will new hires be flown at HPE's expense to CA to receive a copy of their contract to sign?

    No, I thought not.

    38 0 Reply
    1. waldo kitty
      Reply Icon
      Facepalm

      Re: Reciprocity for new hires?

      > under the law, White could only get hold of the relevant policies if he turned up, in person, to the company's official human resources headquarters – which is on the other side of America in California, roughly 2,500 miles away.

      So if you can only get hold of your contract by physically going to CA,

      read that again, please... i've bolded the key words...

      hint: "relevant policies" are not "the contract" ;)

      0 0 Reply
  5. Erik4872

    Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

    I don't work for HPE, but this sounds like HPE used the opportunity of a spin-off to change policy, at least for the vacation days. Lots of companies are adopting an "unlimited vacation" policy. This means 2 things -- (1) you don't accrue any vacation payable on separation, and (2) your management and colleagues will guilt you into never taking any of your unlimited vacation. I've fortunately not had to deal with this yet, but have many stories recounted to me. Either the manager is in total crisis mode all the time and refuses to let you go even for critical stuff, and/or the new grads who haven't been beaten down by a big company yet are putting on a big show doing 70 hours or more a week. At the same time they're insinuating that anyone who works a normal workweek is a slacker and not committed to the team.

    Side question -- other than a fire-at-will contractor, what "highly skilled technical professionals" have an actual employment contract in the US? The article said this guy actually had his compensation including bonuses and options spelled out for him.

    14 0 Reply
    1. Jim Mitchell
      Reply Icon

      Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

      Yes, this is confusing. Was the guy a contractor with an actual contract, or a hired employee with a "contract"? Seems the later, contractors don't usually get "vacation days".

      3 1 Reply
      1. Twilight
        Reply Icon

        Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

        I took this to mean he was an employee and the contract is the employment agreement (which is a contract).

        10 0 Reply
        1. Jim Mitchell
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          Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

          Your "employee agreement" might legally be a "contract", yes. In my experience, they don't cover things like benefits and "HR policies". Things like initial pay and signing bonuses would be in the official offering letter, signed by a hiring manager and hopefully legally enforceable. You might hire on based on current benefits, etc, but expecting them to not change for the worse would be unwise.

          0 0 Reply
    2. ps2os2
      Reply Icon

      Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

      Forty years ago, I started work at a company that (at the time) only sold magazines. I was given 4 weeks vacation time a year plus a liberal time off for hours worked policy I couldn't figure out in the beginning what to do with 4 weeks off. Pretty soon, I was spending a fair amount of time on sandy beaches and fell back in love with reading. The last 9th year, some heavy duty politics was occurring in the Corporate HQ. This started a domino effect of the company buying a lot of other companies. This also led to a fight over IT and where it should be centered. I was invited at the time to help the HQ migrate from one OS to another.

      I started to hear about the shenanigans that were being done. One of the funnier ones was that the HQ wanted to send over to another state their IT. They hired the most inept experts I have ever heard of, the gist of one suggestion was to find a city in a neighboring state to put everything. The idiots chose a town that did not allow working on a Sunday, imagine an IT department not working on Sunday. Someone in the IT department spoke up at the last moment, and the place was discarded as an option. The next squirmy thing they did was to sign a lease for a place that they did not measure first to figure out if the MF could get in the doors. Of course, when the MF arrived, they could not get it in the building going through doors. So, they popped out some windows and hired a crane (at $50K US for a day) to put it in the Data Center. I shortly went back to my DC, and then the corporate stuff started in. They fired the IT manager and brought in someone that had no IT management experience. In fact, he was a person that delivered listings between buildings. This guy was unbelievable, he started to fire people because of their sexual orientation and other things like where they lived. In this day and age, it would never be allowed to happen, but at the time they knew they could get any with murder as all the judges were corporate friendly. I decided to leave. Shortly after I left, they moved everybody to Florida where wages are low, and politicians can be bought off. I miss my 4 weeks but not enough to go back ever into a rats nest.

      23 2 Reply
      1. Kabukiwookie
        Reply Icon

        Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

        4 weeks of paid holiday is the legal minimum in most European countries.

        36 0 Reply
        1. Dal90
          Reply Icon

          Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

          >4 weeks of paid holiday is the legal minimum in most European countries.

          2017 Average annual wage, PPP followed by average tax burden of single worker at average wage:

          US: $60,558 31.7%

          Germany: $47,585 49.7%

          France: $43,755 47.6%

          UK: $43,732 30.9%

          In the 90s I worked for a French owned company (Fortune Global 50 size). One of senior managers on my site was on rotation from France, and while we were both working late one evening he commented while the salaried staff had a lot more vacation days in France, they also worked much longer days on average than their American counterparts in the company and in the end the number of hours were similar.

          2017 Average family insurance plan, unsubsidized, in the U.S.: $18,764

          I can't say either the numbers or my anecdotal story paint a full picture of the nuances, but when folks state "In Europe they start at four weeks of vacation!" or decry "how expensive insurance is while the NHS is free" it's important to understand there are some really fundamental differences that need to be considered to make comparisons.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_average_wage

          https://taxfoundation.org/comparison-tax-burden-labor-oecd-2018

          https://www.kff.org/report-section/ehbs-2017-section-1-cost-of-health-insurance/

          0 2 Reply
          1. hammarbtyp
            Reply Icon

            Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

            While useful (and thanks for providing the links), such stats like this can be misleading. Firstly averages only tell part of the story. What is the spread of wages. For example a few very high earners can skew averages compared to an economy where the wealth is more widely spread.

            Secondly health care costs. One important point is that in Europe, health care insurance through taxes travel with the person and are guaranteed. US healthcare tends to be connected to the employment. This has a great affect on the level of control an employer has on a employee, because removal of medical insurance through redundancy is a big thing especially to those with families or older workers. That in turn restricts the ability of employees to unionise etc

            Also it does not cover pensions, which again tend to be connected with the employer rather than through a social tax

            In the end it is complicated and you cannot just make black and white comparisons

            2 0 Reply
    3. DontFeedTheTrolls
      Reply Icon

      Re: Beware spinoffs; they allow HR policy changes

      This is one reason the UK ( part of the EU regulations), has TUPE (Transfer of Undertakings Protection of Employment).

      Essentially if an employer splits, spins off, or outsources a role, the employee has protection of their existing conditions.

      1 0 Reply
  6. David 132 Silver badge

    I feel that HPE have shot themselves in the foot here.

    For the sake of a piffling $10-20K or so - a lot to Mr White, but less than a rounding error to HPE - they have sent out a message, loud and clear* to all prospective hires: "Don't work for us, we will treat you like sh*t and pull a fast one on you with our HR policies at every opportunity we get**." Well, that'll have people queueing up to work for them, won't it?

    *yes, I know... as if the message wasn't already obvious from all the other HPE stories we've seen.

    ** yeah yeah, just like every other large company out there... oh, you cynic...

    31 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      I'm shocked, SHOCKED

      that HPE sucks....

      Was a great company back in the day but their products and ethics have been crap for quite some time now.

      16 0 Reply
    2. Notas Badoff
      Reply Icon

      Re: I feel that HPE have shot themselves in the foot here.

      "they have sent out a message, loud and clear to all prospective hires"

      I bet that message doesn't get heard in India, Malaysia and other outsourcing 'in' places. "Opportunities overseas" mean lots and lots of people to shaft.

      11 0 Reply
    3. James Anderson
      Reply Icon

      Re: I feel that HPE have shot themselves in the foot here.

      It's what we should call "The Ginny Manoeuvre" which has been so successful at IBM.

      Make your employees so miserable they leave of thier own accord and save you a ton of money in redundancy payments.

      11 0 Reply
    4. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I feel that HPE have shot themselves in the foot here.

      TBH - HPE give local managers a *lot* of flexibility. If your 'local' management chain is comprised of actual humans then it's not a bad place (!= good) to be - while you're in employment. As soon as you aren't then you are at the mercy off the HQ asshats who will screw you unmercifully.

      Also - HR are a couple of low paid contractors in India 'maintaining' some chatbot scripts.

      Anon - for obvious reasons.

      3 0 Reply
  7. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    Unofrtunately...

    Unfortunately, the judge is right from what I gather from the article. Not morally, but legally. In the US, trials follow distinct phases, a "pleading stage" (initial complaint is filed), pretrial stage (discovery, all info is collected), trial, and post-trial (closing statements and the jury (for jury trial) or judge make their decision.) The IT Pro (or his lawyer) should have told the judge *during the discovery phase* "Hey, I requested my original contract from HPE and they want me to go to this physical address across country to get it." Very likely the judge would have ordered HPE to fax over a copy of the contract (legal profession in the US still seems to favor fax over E-Mail..) Unfortunately, waiting til near the end of the trial is far too late to bring this up, the judge is bound by then to base his decision on the facts presented (which only include HPE's current contract. It's easy to argue HPE's current contract doesn't apply, but you then have no contract whatsoever to make a legal decision on since no other contract was presented to the court.)

    This is greasy -- REAL greasy -- on HPE's part though. I'm sure the contract is sitting in some system and they could have dug it out and sent it to him in a matter of minutes. And these companies wonder why they have trouble getting people to work for them...

    (I don't know what happens in reality if, as happens so often on TV court shows, some shocking new evidence turns up late in the trial... if the judge uses some leeway to introduce this evidence "out of cycle", or if they must dismiss the case and either start it over (so new evidence can be introduced at discovery) or not start the trial over (if the evidence shows the trial is not warranted.))

    9 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Unofrtunately...

      Agree, seems the whole thing has hinged on not bringing that up properly at the right time. Makes some sense - because if you hold a big trial with loads of people and try to rely on something you really ought to have brought up earlier - who's paying for that? - but makes the headline and result not good reading.

      1 0 Reply
  8. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    "Side question -- other than a fire-at-will contractor, what "highly skilled technical professionals" have an actual employment contract in the US? The article said this guy actually had his compensation including bonuses and options spelled out for him."

    This'll vary by state, but in my area you can be fire-at-will but still have a contract. Usually it's to let you know you aren't getting anything. But often times how much time off you have, retirement plan possibiliies, etc. etc., are indeed all in a contract. It is I think fairly unusual to have accrued vacation paid off and such but not unheard of.

    One place I worked for provided a (their words!) "generous 2 days a year of PTO" (paid time off). Paid time off included vacation and sick leave. There was not unpaid time off after that; you'd get a write up and stern talking to on day off #3 and fired on #4 (whether you called in or not.) I used up 2 days PTO recovering from a cold, and quit after #3 like 3 or 4 months later... I called in to say I couldn't make it due to blizzard conditions (there were already several foot snow drifts like 2 or 3 hours into what was supposed to be about 15 hours of snow...), instead of consdiering closing the place for the day or at least not expecting everyone to come in, they wrote up everyone who didn't show up whether they called in or not. The next day when I asked some people who came in "how did it go?"... The people who did go in found at the end of shift that they were snowed into the building, the doors would not open due to being drifted shut. After about 30 minutes when they got the doors open, apparently one person with a 4x4 Jeep tried to leave and got stuck maybe 20 feet outside the parking lot in a snow drift; they found they could not leave the parking lot for about 3 hours (until the lot and streets were plowed out.)

    12 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      (From the point of view of a European) Wow. Just ... wow.

      26 0 Reply
    2. Sykowasp
      Reply Icon

      Americans loves being slaves.

      That's all I can take from that.

      What's the point of living to work when you have no time off to have a proper holiday?

      [Non-Ruling-Class] Americans Are Slaves. Prove me wrong.

      12 2 Reply
      1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge
        Reply Icon

        "The land of the free" where worker's rights are practically non-existent, and 2.5% of the adult population are in prison (the highest per capita incarceration rate, and highest prison population of any country where it is measured).

        12 2 Reply
        1. midcapwarrior
          Reply Icon

          Highest incareration rate depends on how you measure

          In China and some other countries, however, data limitations make direct comparisons with the U.S. tricky. The World Prison Brief notes, for instance, that China’s total excludes inmates being held in “administrative detention” – a type of confinement that may house more than 650,000 additional people. Adding an additional 650,000 inmates to China’s total would place it ahead of the U.S. in terms of total incarcerated population.

          https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/05/02/americas-incarceration-rate-is-at-a-two-decade-low/

          1 0 Reply
          1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge
            Reply Icon

            Re: Highest incareration rate depends on how you measure

            Adding an additional 650,000 inmates to China’s total would place it ahead of the U.S. in terms of total incarcerated population.

            This may well be true, it takes China's prison population to around the 2.3M mark, a little above the US at 2.1M

            It still leaves China a long way behind the US in per capita prison population, as China's population is more than 4 times that of the US.

            These are measured per 100,000 people, and taking China's population as 1.38 billion, this adds 47 to that number (bringing it to 165 per 100,000, still well short of the US at a staggering 655). Note that these figures are the adult prison population per total population. My original figures were a bit off - I think the 2.5% is the adult black incarceration rate. The adult incarceration rate for the population as a whole, (22.6% are under the age of 18) is 846 per 100,000, or 0.846%

            1 0 Reply
      2. BigSLitleP
        Reply Icon

        I worked for an American company many years ago. The HQ was in Austin, Texas. It was the year when Austin was evacuated because of a storm. I called my opposite number's phone for a laugh while the storm was going on and was shocked when he answered. I asked him why he was there when the storm was about to hit, his answer was "Well i guess i'm just not that smart".

        He'd been told (not asked) by his boss to man the NOC during the storm. Fsck working in America.

        8 1 Reply
      3. Cxwf
        Reply Icon

        While the law may allow companies to be downright evil, there are plenty that choose not to be, and stories like these make me appreciate my own employer much more. We get actual time off, pay for unused time off in case of separation, pay for extended time out due to disability/sickness etc, and they treat us like real people.

        Then again, wife’s company is currently reminding us that their policies are considerably less employee friendly. Can’t win ‘em all.

        5 0 Reply
    3. David Nash Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Sick leave?

      Being sick is not "time off" in the usual sense. You can't help being sick and limiting sick time and counting it like holiday is immoral. By all means require doctor's notes and the like for more than a couple of days but to have an allocation of days when you are allowed to be sick makes no sense.

      Also encourages people to pull fake sickies because they think they're entitled to them.

      4 0 Reply
  9. Neoc

    And managers wonder why Company Loyalty is flagging.

    23 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous South African Coward Bronze badge
      Reply Icon

      And managers wonder why Company Loyalty is flagging.

      Replace managers with manglers or damagers, and you'll get the drift...

      7 0 Reply
    2. Reg Reader 1
      Reply Icon

      No, they don't. It's part of the plan of moving all this work to lower cost centres and/or finding people who'll work ridiculous hours for peanuts.

      2 0 Reply
  10. big_D Silver badge
    Paris Hilton

    Copy?

    Whenever I sign a contract, there are always original signed copies for each party involved. Surely all White had to do was show the judge his original employment contract, signed by HP and himself?

    2 0 Reply
  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Sounds like he needs a better lawyer.

    How a US company can weasel out of paying legitimate entitlements astounds me...

    9 0 Reply
  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'm glad...

    ... that I work in a country where a law more favourable to the employee always supersedes whatever is in a contract.

    5 0 Reply
  13. Aladdin Sane

    I sense an appeal in 3...2...1...

    0 0 Reply
  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    ‘... employees working across the world, often at home, and that the policies are likely readily available in an internal cloud.‘

    I wish they’d update our file server to an ‘internal cloud’. It sounds super cool.

    0 0 Reply
  15. JaitcH
    Happy

    Bad Luck But At Least He Has The Satisfaction That HP . . .

    got screwed big time when it bought Autonomy Corporation PLC.

    2 0 Reply
  16. waldo kitty
    Boffin

    he really needs to appeal this decision... if he can afford it, that is...

    0 0 Reply
  17. ukgnome

    HP are run by Vogons

    1 0 Reply
  18. Grinning Bandicoot

    I have not used an HP labeled in twenty years because of HP's gaming the system. If a piece of equipment predates 1999, it can be considered worthy of trust when in calibration. Then came the split brought about by those wily short sighted accounting types and quality reflected badly on the quarterly bottom line. Let the customer do the testing and use the warranty if problems should arise stonewalling the entire period. This behavior can only exist if one returns for more punishment and this type of problem not openly aired. Soon because of the bad aura the quarterly reports show declines and the firm must go looking for a new fish to fillet. As David 132 noted this fish is now temporary contractual staff.

    Why the case was filed in Maine rather than California is a wonder. California courts rule more often then not against the deep pocket party.

    "A verbal contract is not worth the money it is written on."

    "You're not paranoid if they are really out to screw you."

    "Policies are controlled by Finagles Constant used by the numbers people."

    0 0 Reply

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