I was suspended at work for an error. Initially I thought I was fired. In fact I feel my employer may have kept me in the dark in order to be intentionally disrespectful. Right now I am waiting for the facility to schedule a time with me to come in and discuss the incident, but my boss is being very flaky with me in getting a time set. If you're curious about the circumstances you can read about them here (though it is irrelevant):
My question is this: what happens if I resign while suspended? I have no interest in remaining at the job at this point; the culture of the place is terrible and there are too many problems there for me to feel comfortable working there. I am thinking about sending a letter of resignation (I have been commuting 2.5 to 3.5 hours a day at this job so I am not keen on driving there for a one minute conversation.) I would ask it to be effective immediately, and if they accepted I could just take a job elsewhere immediately. My fear is that this might create negative job history for me, especially if they twist the details of my departure. For example, if HR from my dream job calls them six months from now they might say, "Oh he didn't quit. We fired him," or "He just quit because we were in the process of firing him."
Alternatively, I could drive there, resume working there, and give two-weeks notice on my first day back. If I did something like that, they might get irritated and fire me out of spite.
I can see a number of ways this could turn into a spiteful, "You can't quit, you're fired!" scenario. Also, it's possible they intend to fire me anyway, in which case my resignation could be construed as, "You can't fire me, I quit!"
I don't know why people insist on negating the accurate warnings given about employer references. As long as you suffer no adverse consequences from such, you can believe what you want to believe, myth or not. But as soon as you confer with an attorney to inquire about pursuing litigation because you can not get a job and you have reason to believe it is because you are being blacklisted, then you have first hand experience with what they can do and can't do, what they will do, and won't do. All it takes is one experience.
I have two attorneys in my family and one of them practices employment law in California. She told me that Federal Law prohibits your current employer from saying anything about you except dats of employment unless you give them express permission to do so.
There is no federal law that says anything of the sort so I'm not sure why your lawyer family member erroneously believes that...
caliotter3
38,333 Posts
I don't know why people insist on negating the accurate warnings given about employer references. As long as you suffer no adverse consequences from such, you can believe what you want to believe, myth or not. But as soon as you confer with an attorney to inquire about pursuing litigation because you can not get a job and you have reason to believe it is because you are being blacklisted, then you have first hand experience with what they can do and can't do, what they will do, and won't do. All it takes is one experience.