Cancelled contract by Agency

[surfer40]

I am a seasoned travel RN, however never been presented with this situation. I live on the east coast but signed a contract to work on the west coast. After I loaded down my truck and turned in my key, said my good byes. I get a call from my traveling agency that I will not be able to start my contract as planned because they did not get all the paperwork needed for me to start. So they needed me to move up my start date for 3 more weeks. What??? However they were really, really sorry !! I was suppose to be on the road in less than 9 hours.... And worst of all I was planning on getting paid in 2 weeks, not 6 more weeks loosing out on $6,000 that I certainly needed. The last conversation I had with both the recruiter and QA team, was they would call me tomorrow and let me know what they could do. I never heard back from them and I left them both numerous messages. Do I have any rights? HELP !!!!!!

[NedRN]

They are most certainly in breach of contract no matter whose paperwork is deficient (if even true). Whether you have any rights or not depends on your willingness to litigate, and the specific language in the contract regarding termination and contract dispute resolution. Potentially, you could sue for the balance of the contract less mitigation from any work (earnings) during that contract period. Or should you accept a three week deferment of start date, you could sue for three weeks lost wages.

None of that helps you now. First task tomorrow (Monday) is to call lots of other agencies and get the ball rolling with Plan B and Plan C with priority to rapid response jobs with an ASAP start date. Second task is apply for unemployment now - eligibility is not retroactive to your last day of work, it only starts the day when you first contact unemployment (in any state you've worked in the last 18 months).

Of course call the offending agency as well. The tone you take will depend on what your contract tells you. They won't feel any urgency on their end because from their perspective, the assignment you have agreed to take doesn't start for four weeks!

If you want to explore your legal options, go to nela dot org and search for a contract employment lawyer. Generally most lawyers will give you a free 15 minute or so telephone conversation to try to establish if going forward will be useful. So for an initial consult, the state isn't terribly important. Depending on what your contract says about contract disputes, you may have to file in their location, if not, strategically it will be best to file at home. If the contract says binding arbitration, hiring a lawyer may or may not be in your best interest. In any case, legal options are usually not practical considering the time and money they will cost. I filed one once (against a hospital) and while I won and collected (usually the harder half), it was barely worth it other than to salve my anger (the reason most suits get filed). But if in fact a lawyer determines you are owed the balance of the contract and is willing to work on a contingency basis, of course you should. But the amount of money involved is only on the order of a few thousand to 22K at best, so it is difficult for most lawyers to work up much enthusiasm.