Hello,

I apologize in advance for this long post.

My mother lives and works in Florida. She was recently let go by the company she has worked with for six years. English is her second language and while she gets by pretty well on a day to day basis, her general communication and written skills are poor, at best. I’d like to get some feedback as to what her options are and what resources are available to her.

Here are the details: My mom was the bookkeeper for the company. Her relationship with her boss has been extremely difficult throughout her time at this company. The boss verbally abused her almost daily. She has been overworked from the get-go, although this changed recently when an accountant was hired to work above her. She was essentially dismissed for recently uncovering a banking error in the company’s favor back in September. She should have caught that error months ago, but she claims she was so overworked that she didn’t have time to reconcile the accounts until recently. Even though the error was in the company’s favor, her boss felt it was an error that cost the company nonetheless and dismissed her.

She was told by her supervisor that she would be entitled to one week per year of service, plus all the vacation and sick days she had coming to her (8 weeks—she never takes vacation and never calls in sick). The offer she received in her separation package is, however, significantly smaller than that.

She is consulting a lawyer about the separation letter.

I think most of her frustration is that she feels cheated of what she believes she is owed. Not knowing Florida labor laws, I have no idea if she is owed anything at all. I also only know her side of the story, and she is very emotional about it--I'm sure there is more to the story than she is telling me.

I’d appreciate any ideas, feedback or being told of any resources she could consult. She lives near Boca Raton.

Sorry. Florida law does not require the employer to pay out vacation or sick pay at termination. Nor is severance pay required by law in any state except Massachusetts (I think it is), and then only in limited situations. Unless the conversation with her supervisor can rise to the level of an enforceable contract, I'm afraid she's not due anything over and above pay for time she actually worked. I see nothing illegal in your post. She should immediately file for unemployment compensation.

There are only three states where severance is ever required by law; Florida is not one of those states and even in these three states it would not be required in the circumstances you describe.

Florida law does not require payout of unused vacation time. No state requires the payout of unused sick time except in very limited circumstances which do not appear to apply here.

To put it bluntly, in Florida (and in about half the states) the only thing she is owed under the law is wages for all the time she actually worked. This presumes that there is no contract, union or otherwise, that guarantees some other benefit; I am addressing only what is required under the law.

If she was receiving health insurance benefits from the employer, she will be entitled to continue those benefits at her own expense (COBRA); however, they have up to 44 days to provide her with information about COBRA. This presumes that her employer has over 20 employees. (If fewer, but she worked over 25 hours a week, she is still entitled to continuation of coverage under state law.)

If she was participating in a 401k plan or other like plan, she will be entitled to information about her options there, but the plan document will determine how long they have to provide her with that information. It could be as soon as immediately or as far away as a year before that information is required.

Assuming that she is over 40, IF any severance is tied to a release of claims against the company (which is SOP in my experience) she is entitled to up to 21 days to review the agreement and have it looked at by an attorney.

I can't think of any reason why she would not be entitled to collect unemployment; however, only the state can grant or deny benefits. Her employer can contest, but it will be up to the state to make the final decision. I do not believe that FL requires them to make her aware of how to file a UI claim; rjc can correct me if I'm mistaken (which I may be; I haven't had an employee in Florida since 1999).

IF she has a valid reason to believe that she was fired BECAUSE English is her second language (i.e. national origin discrimination) she can contact the EEOC. However, since she did make a significant error that she failed to catch, unless she can point to a similarly situated employee of a different national origin who made a similar mistake and was not fired, I don't think such a claim has much of a chance to fly.

Otherwise, the attorney she is already seeing is her best bet for any options I may have missed.

Thank you for your replies; they confirm what we already imagined would be the case. She does plan on applying for UI.


"...Unless the conversation with her supervisor can rise to the level of an enforceable contract..." It may...I passed this on to her. I don't think she would pursue the matter if it were.

..IF she has a valid reason to believe that she was fired BECAUSE English is her second language (i.e. national origin discrimination) she can contact the EEOC. However, since she did make a significant error that she failed to catch, unless she can point to a similarly situated employee of a different national origin who made a similar mistake and was not fired, I don't think such a claim has much of a chance to fly...

I really don't think that is the case. I think her boss was often very frustrated with her inability to explain things to him clearly (she resorted to using an intermediary); he was extremely condescending to her, made her cry all the time from shouting at her. Whether that was discrimination, I can't say for sure. It's a very diverse work environment. Her beef is more that she feels she didn't uncover the error in time because of his constant refusal to hire an assistant for her, thereby making her workload unmanageable. But that's not a legal issue.

I will pass on the information about COBRA and her 401K. She hasn't mentionned those, except to say that her supervisor originally said she would be covered by the company plan for one more year.

I think at this point, she just wants to make sure she doesn't sign anything that would be compromising or to her detriment. They did give her 20 days to look over the separation package before she replies.

Thanks again for the replies. It's hard to advocate for someone when you don't live in the same country.