What Happens If You Cancel Your Contract?

213812 · Aug 15, 2010

Since quitting your contract, did you take another assignment with the same company, or have you had any trouble getting another job in your area. Do you include this assignment in your resume or tell future employers @ it. Just curious.....

breeziRN · Aug 16, 2010

I have not put it on my resume..I did tell my future employer about it and let them know that I had a family emergency and I had to opt out of the contract...i got another job!!! FT at home..traveling doesn't work for me!! :yeah:

tdbRN · Aug 27, 2010

I am working on a contract but it is per diem but in my recruiters emails she said that I would be working 32 hours but my contract says "based on census" so I have worked 2 shifts in the past 3 weeks that I have been here because I have been cancelled every morning!

I want to break my contract but I am afraid of those freakin penalty fees of $700! I told her that I am not even working so how can I have a contract for no work. She is very nice but I am thinking if I should just change my numbers and all contact info and Run! or tell I had a family emergency or something.

My friend said he broke 3 contracts, that he just up & ran and never called again and he never had to pay a dime!

Does anyone else have input?

Argo · Aug 27, 2010

Did he get his last paycheck when he took off?

breeziRN · Aug 27, 2010

I got my last paycheck because I called in sick till payday then I sent my recruiter an email and like you said kristinetdb...I changed my numbers and have been very happy since. I have me a FT job in Dallas and I am making twice the money I was making with the travel agency...it was a rip off...I was making like 20 bucks/hr because they were paying for my housing...it just wan't worth it to me...Plus I did have a true emergency at home, so once I came to take care of it..I decided not to go back to misery...I haven't heard not one word from them since I sent them the email explaining that I would not be returning...

bagladyrn, RN · Aug 27, 2010

It is behavior like that cited by the last few posters which is causing the rest of us experienced travelers to have to put up with ridiculous fines and conditions in our contracts! After experiencing a few travelers like that of course the agencies will take steps to protect themselves and hospitals will feel free to dump travelers.

There is such a thing as honoring your word as given when you sign a contract. If you don't like the contract then don't sign it and negotiate or don't go.

I'm really tired of paying the price for the crap that other people pull!

breeziRN · Aug 28, 2010

Well most of us sign the contract with good intention and I don't know about you, but I value my license and integrity and I am not going to work anywhere I feel like my license is in jeopardy or I am being treated like crap by being floated 1-2 times a shift and being paid $40 less than the staff nurses. And one is unaware of these conditions when the contract was signed. And if YOU honor your contract as signed then don't worry about the fines cause you wont have to pay them. I'm not into settling for bad situations and so if I feel like that's what my contract put me in then by all means necessary I'm getting out of it. So, Sorry if it affects you in someway, but if you like your contract and complete it, then it shouldn't affect you!! :cool:

tdbRN · Aug 29, 2010

Hi Breezi , Thanks for replying. I dont think that they will go after me. It makes no sense, have a contract and not have work but yet I am still on contract. At least you had a schedule and simply called off sick. I hate to put a blackmark on my resume so I was thinking of working shifts with them, if they dont cancel me, but then that means that my contract extends forever.

Did you change your bank account # too, bc I have direct deposit and Im afraid they will do automatic withdrawal. I had a interview at Kaiser San Francisco the other day which hopefully I did well, the nurse manager was sooo nice so crossing my fingers. I figured I could jus break the contract and stick with Kaiser.

The thing is with these contracts, you basically go in blind, you have no idea where you are going to be, what floor you are really going to be on, because you end up floating and how much you are really going to get paid or how much you should be getting paid. Travel nurses are always taken advantage of, they always float, they always give you the worst assignments, they always give you first admission. There was one traveler with 5 patients but she had 3 discharges and 3 admissions with no real help. We should have a right to walk away from this contract if we dont like it and why should we pay?!

Hopefully if Kaiser workd out, I will simply run from this contract and if they actually get lawyers or whatever then I can pay otherwise I will jus ignore them all.

thanks for your input.

tdbRN · Aug 29, 2010

Im sorry baglady, you feel that way.

Like I said you go into a contract blind, you get your phone interview and all your perfect numbers and then when you get there you get no orientation or barely an orientation, the worst patients, all the admissions and everyone is "too busy" to help when in CA you have five freaking patients!! and in NYC you have 8-10 then this is a walk in the park. You ask the contract to be changed a bit here and there and she says the VP has to look over it to approve the changes. You will always go in to a travel assignment blind, it is never easy breezy.

But tell miss bagladyrn, which agency do you work for that your assignments seem to be easy breezy? We have to protect our license and our patients as nurses and if that assignment sounds bad or that are not even giving you hours to work then your contract in null.

breeziRN · Aug 29, 2010

Thats funny because my contract was at a northern CA Kaiser...the Per Diem nurses there were making like $75/hr while I was making $20..and I had to float if not every day, every other day. I heard that they might try and withdraw money from my account so I might change it next week. If some people are happy traveling then Kudos to them and they shouldn't worry about fines and dues, but for us who ended up in a travel nightmare, we should be able to do what it takes to make self happy...well i'm gonna always make myself happy before I work somewhere that im miserable, underpaid and overworked.

madwife2002, BSN, RN · Aug 29, 2010

How can they take money from your bank account I would have thought that was illegal?

bagladyrn, RN · Sep 1, 2010

Im sorry baglady, you feel that way.
Like I said you go into a contract blind, you get your phone interview and all your perfect numbers and then when you get there you get no orientation or barely an orientation, the worst patients, all the admissions and everyone is "too busy" to help when in CA you have five freaking patients!! and in NYC you have 8-10 then this is a walk in the park. You ask the contract to be changed a bit here and there and she says the VP has to look over it to approve the changes. You will always go in to a travel assignment blind, it is never easy breezy.
But tell miss bagladyrn, which agency do you work for that your assignments seem to be easy breezy? We have to protect our license and our patients as nurses and if that assignment sounds bad or that are not even giving you hours to work then your contract in null.

Please note that I never said that all my assignments were easy. I've been a traveler for 14 years now and have run the gamut of types of issues. In that time I left one contract early - with the full support of my agency after attempting for several weeks to resolve an issue which truly endangered my license. I first attempted to resolve it with my clinical liason, the head nurse and the nursing supervisor. When that did not work my agency agreed with me that it was appropriate in this case to break the contract. Because I did this the proper way there was no penalty to me and the agency kept me in my housing until they could line me up another contract the next week.

As far as pay, shift, number of hours, unit, etc this should all be spelled out after negotiation in your contract. If you don't like the terms you should not have agreed to it. If an issue is important, discuss it BEFORE signing. Just because you find out that someone else is making more money than you is not an excuse to break a contract - again you found the rate acceptable when you signed the contract. Talk to their agency before your next contract. If you agreed to perdiem and no guaranteed hours then that is what you get.

Unpleasant coworkers, getting "dumped on", less than great schedule are a fact of life at some contracts and again, not an excuse to break a contract. Sometimes it just sucks, so go on after your 13 weeks and be glad you don't have to go back there.

I'm sorry that some are offended by my post, but I strongly believe that once having given your word (by signing a contract) you should be honorable and fulfill it unless prevented by something truly catastrophic. Others obviously don't share this viewpoint, but it is what I live by (and probably why I have been with one agency for 14 years with multiple return contracts).