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Q: “We wrote to a man we had interviewed offering him a job. After two weeks we had heard nothing from him so offered it to someone else who accepted. Now one month after the original offer the first man has written back to accept. We phoned him. He said that he had been discussing his notice with his current boss who had tried to persuade him to stay but he had now left and is therefore free to take up the offer with us, which he insists is still valid. How do we stand?”
A: You have three options:
1. The safe option is to write to the man giving him notice to terminate the contract. The length of notice you give should be either:
- the notice stated in the offer letter or, if nothing was stated.
- the notice you would give to someone employed by you in a similar job with less than two years’ service.
You should pay the equivalent of net pay for that length of time plus the value of any lost fringe benefits such as company car for private use. You could choose to be generous and pay gross pay. Conversely, if the period of notice is long, say six months or more, and it is reasonable to assume that, with effort, he could mitigate his loss by finding alternative employment in that period, you could restrict payment to that shorter period of anticipated unemployment.
2. You could sit tight and argue that, as he has not responded to the offer nor been in touch with you within a reasonable time, the offer expired. He may go away or may choose to take legal action against you for breach of contract. In the latter case, if he succeeds, it is unlikely that he would be awarded more than the compensation outlined in one above.
3. You could have a friendly chat with him and persuade him to accept a modest sum of money from you on the basis that this is a goodwill gesture and without prejudice. You would be wise to have a solicitor frame a form of agreement to protect yourself.
To avoid similar problems in future put a clause at the end of any job offer stating “To accept this offer please let us have your written acceptance (or sign and return the duplicate copy of this offer) by xxxxxx 2006”.
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