If you\u2019re like many people who have lost a job, you suspect that your firing was an unfair dismissal \u2013 but what is unfair dismissal, and what can you do if it\u2019s happened to you?<\/p>\n
Unfair dismissal is another term for wrongful termination<\/a>, which is a legal phrase in California that refers to an employer illegally firing an employee. Although we live in an at-will employment state<\/a>, which means an employer or employee can terminate employment at any time, employers still have to stick to legal reasons when they let someone go.<\/p>\n What At-Will Employment Means<\/strong><\/p>\n According to the Department of Industrial Relations, Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, \u201cemployment may be terminated at the will of either party. Both the employer and the employee are free to end the employment relationship at any time, with no penalty being assessed to either. Unless the parties have previously agreed to the contrary, there is no notice required to be given by either party.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Employers can\u2019t terminate your employment based on your:<\/p>\n Employers can\u2019t retaliate against you for participating in a protected activity, either. Protected activities include:<\/p>\n If an employer did terminate you for one of these reasons, you may be looking at an unfair dismissal \u2013 and you could possibly have grounds to file a wrongful termination lawsuit<\/a>.<\/p>\n There are several federal and state laws that protect employees, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964<\/a>. The Civil Rights Act says, \u201cIt shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer\u2026 to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual\u2019s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.\u201d<\/p>\n Not all California employees are at-will employees. Many have employment contracts in place \u2013 and if that\u2019s the case for you, you need to know that your employer is responsible for holding up its end of the bargain. If it doesn\u2019t, you could have grounds to sue for unfair dismissal.<\/p>\n Many contracts promise an employee that he or she will be employed for a set period of time. Some contracts also include clauses that say the employer can only fire an employee for \u201cgood cause\u201d or for specific reasons (which would also be listed in the contract). Like any other contract, this is a legal document \u2013 and your employer is not supposed to break it.<\/p>\n An employment contract doesn\u2019t always have to be written. In fact, sometimes it\u2019s implied<\/em>. That means some actions or statements your employer made have established an employment contract. (One example is an employee handbook that says something about the employer only being able to fire workers for \u201cgood cause.\u201d)<\/p>\n There are other reasons that employers can\u2019t use to fire employees, as well. These are often called violations of public policy<\/em>, and that term refers to an employer dismissing a worker for doing something that exercises his or her legal right, or for refusing to do something illegal.<\/p>\n At-will employees are also protected from unfair dismissal when they:<\/p>\n Let\u2019s say an employee belongs to an activist group that lobbies the government for net neutrality, and she attends meetings and fulfills her role in the group on her own time \u2013 \u00a0and her employer doesn\u2019t like it. The employer can\u2019t fire her simply because she\u2019s in that group.<\/p>\n Now let\u2019s say an employee reports his employer for unfair hiring practices, or reports sexual harassment that he has seen or been the victim of. The employer can\u2019t fire him for either of those reasons.<\/p>\n Both of these cases could be unfair dismissal, and each employee could have cause to bring a lawsuit against the employer.<\/p>\n If you suspect your employer unfairly dismissed you, we may be able to help you get compensation. Call us right away at 818-230-8380 for a\u00a0free case review<\/a>\u00a0right now. If you\u2019re entitled to compensation, we can help you get it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" If you\u2019re like many people who have lost a job, you suspect that your firing was an unfair dismissal \u2013 but what is unfair dismissal, and what can you do if it\u2019s happened to you? What is Unfair Dismissal? Unfair dismissal is another term for wrongful termination, which is a legal phrase in California that refers to an employer illegally … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":952,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[5,56,3],"tags":[200,33,199,35,198,91,201,28],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/951"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yeremianlaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
\n
Contract Claims<\/h3>\n
Violation of Public Policy<\/h3>\n
\n
Do You Think You\u2019re the Victim of Unfair Dismissal?<\/h2>\n