First a few background facts: I just finished my second week working in a private physician's office as a staff nurse. It is an office based surgery center and has recently added another RN and surgeon. I am still in orientation however no mention was made of signing a "contract" when the offer of employment was made. I took a significant pay-cut to take this position however the idea of no call, holidays or weekends was too good to turn down for this single mom.
After I came back from lunch today, a 12-page contract was sitting on my desk with a post-it note on it telling me to sign it. Here's where it gets interesting:
1. the contract had none of the blanks filled in (rate of pay, start date, etc)
2. the contract states there will be a 90-day probationary period, however I was told by the office manager when I accepted the job offer and rate of pay, that it would be only 60 days and then have a re-evaluation. She made it sound that my pay would be adjusted at the end of that time frame
3. the second page of the contract states that, "the employee is a valued and integral part of the employer and the loss of her services to the employer would cause sever(sic) hardship and economic loss to the employer.............employee agrees to permit employer to insure his/her life under policy of life insurance........name the EMPLOYER (!!!) as sole beneficiary.........submit to all necessary physical or examinations to effect such policies of insurance."
I am a nurse and as such, there is no loss of revenue to my employer in the event of my untimely death and no justification for him to insure my life and be the policy's sole beneficiary. He could simply place an ad in the classifieds and replace me with another nurse. Is it just me or is this bizarre? The other employees who signed this are in their 20's, uneducated and I have to wonder if they even read what they were signing. Who in their right mind would ask someone to sign a contract like this? Especially when all the blanks are not filled in by the employer? I understand signing "at-will employment agreements", "non-competition clauses", "confidentiality agreements" and the usual legalese..........but this other stuff doesn't seem legal and I have a feeling if I don't sign it, I will be terminated. I didn't think I could be made to take a health exam after I already accepted an offer of employment and started working.
Where would I find information regarding employment law for something like this? Wouldn't this also violate HIPAA? revealing my medical information would be a condition of continuing my employment due to this employer's demand to take out a life insurance plolicy on me and make himself the sole beneficiary?
