This question is very interesting to me. We all know a severance package is a relation between an employee and a company, and that there is no legal ground by which the company is obligated to provide severance. When going through the process of being laid off, do they condition the payout of the severance with signing a legal document in which a worker gives up the right to sue the company, should there be grounds for a lawsuit?
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There's a SEPARATE lawsuit against Oracle and they want to talk to me. I'm trying to remember the severance package info, but I THINK it's that I can't sue specifically to being laid off, but it excludes other lawsuits, does anyone know? Thanks!
You can decline the severance package - probably a bad idea - but this has no effect on health insurance. Your insurance ends on severance day. You will be mailed a packet in a few weeks that offers COBRA, which is the same plan you were on with Oracle, but you must pay the entire premium. It is retroactive to your severance day should you select it.
You are very unlikely to prevail in a lawsuit against Oracle. They know how to RIF people without breaking the law. The lawsuit could take years and costs tens of thousands of dollars.
Let it go, take the severance and move on. Afterwards if you want to test your legal theory hire a lawyer to take take up this matter with the Attorney General on your state to see if they want to litigate to stop this behavior. If they decide to go forward the state will be the plaintiff and pay the legal costs. Good luck!
ORCL holds all the cards at RIF time, the employee has none. This is contrary to all of those click-bait phony advice articles telling you to "negotiate your severance package". Ha. As an USA employee in most states, you and your attorney would have to be very brave, maybe foolish, to decline your severance especially since your health insurance gets cutoff at midnight on RIF day.
The rif process, along with signing away your rights to sue in exchange for a few months of severance pay, is standard procedure in Corporate America. Everyone does it, don't kid yourself.
The only employers who don't lay off are the ones with robust growth. Once that ends the music stops and it's just like everywhere else.
I asked my self the same question and i was advised by friends not to sue due to poor chance of winning against army of lawyers.
duh, yes they do - it's why Oracle has thousands of lawyers and have perfected the rfi process. Maybe that's the money maker - not cloud. We can franchise our perfect rif process and not get sued.