# Employer Rescinds Job Offer **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 8, 2015, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303 "2015-08-08T09:28:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![edwardcoast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cab0a1/32.png) [@edwardcoast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwardcoast)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/141 "2015-08-11T16:17:19Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Did you understand, at the second interview, what a ‘Contract Position’ is? > > I did them for 25 years - there are no benefits for contract. In the US, contractors get 1099’s not W-2’s. > It is NOT an version of ‘Employee’. You are not oon the payroll, you are on the Accounts Payable. > > Is this getting through? > > If, after being told that it would be a contract position, you still accepted, you have no right to bitch about ‘no benefits’. The difference between what the Engineer said and what HR said was inexcusable - he should have had budget in hand before making an offer. > It sounds like he thought he could get budget for 35 but was told he could get only a budget for 30. > > The bit about exceeding the original amount (which couldn’t be gotten) was nothing short of tone-deaf. > Had it been me, I would have dropped you and been thoroughly disgusted with you for that stunt. > You were expected to offer 32.50. If 35 was available, the original offer woould have stood. What, exactly, did you think a number higher would do? > > At least now you know what a contract job is. The whole thing smells of management at that company not having the authority to do or offer anything. It’s clear they didn’t even have authority to offer a full-time job with benefits considering it changed to contract with no benefits so quickly. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/142 "2015-08-11T16:19:00Z")
> [@Saint\_Cad](#): > > Why do we assume that a company that pulled this stunt would let him out of his contract despite any “promises” Not just that: taking off after four months will make him look like an unreliable employee. ---
**Author:** ![Poysyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Poysyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Poysyn)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/143 "2015-08-11T16:19:49Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > You’re assuming they wanted to go to the effort. You probably appeared somewhat hostile to them by not falling in line with their wishes. That probably became a strike against you. Add that to your demand for 37.50/hr, which became the second strike. They just did what was reasonable for them, they went to someone with fewer strikes thinking that this many headaches so far would only equal more in the future. > > As you said, it’s not a job seekers market there. That means you have to do a bit of sucking it in to get a job. The good news, you’re free to get another job, and probably, the market will change in the future. With your counter offer well above what they were able to do, you showed that you really weren’t playing ball. If you had been a little closer, who knows? Maybe it would have gone the same, maybe not… ---
**Author:** ![edwardcoast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cab0a1/32.png) [@edwardcoast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwardcoast)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/144 "2015-08-11T16:25:07Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Good gawd, even you don’t get it? > YOU are NOT a contractor - YOU are an employee. The two are not even close from a legal position. > You may act and look like a contractor, but you are an employee. You get paid even if you are not on a job. > Again: > 1099 vs. W-2 > AP vs payroll > > If you don’t get paid, there are laws about ‘theft of services’. > If a contractor does not get paid, all he can do is sue for breach of contract. The OP is in Canada and the job was being offered directly by the company, which should have been through purchasing. Before for some demented reason they had “HR” involved in this too. At least in the US, companies would go through a contract house for this, because they don’t want to get involved in problems with contractors claiming to be employees who are entitled to the same benefits other employees there get such as a stock options. The contract house marks up the cost of the employee and the employee is paid from the “employer” which is the contract house, not the client company. In this arrangement it is more often a W-2 than a 1099. But for the OP in Canada, this “client” company is directly treating the OP as if they were a direct employee but without benefits. It could be more bait and switch than this. Some US companies interview employees and then direct them to go to a contract house for the job. ---
**Author:** ![edwardcoast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cab0a1/32.png) [@edwardcoast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwardcoast)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/145 "2015-08-11T16:29:31Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > We don’t offer any money until we talk to HR. There are two possibilities - one is the manager is an incompetent moron, who has no idea or how the hiring process works and offered a rate out of his ass, or else HR approved $35 and then changed their mind, jerking the OP around one more time. Disgusted at the counteroffer? The manager should be ashamed of himself or the company. It’s just a negotiation - if you get disgusted by an offer during a negotiation you really should not be involved. If they wanted the OP he could have said $32.50 or something. > > I wouldn’t be surprised if the position really had disappeared, and if the OP had agreed to it he’d get mail rescinding an offer. That does happen sometimes, but cutting the quality of the job and then the pay is a shit move. I wouldn’t be surprised if after the OP was there a week they decided to eliminate the position entirely. The whole thing sounded bad and flakey. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/146 "2015-08-11T16:47:29Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > As a counterpoint, I’ve never negotiated with HR. They’ve set up interviews, checked references, and the like, and then afterwards do the paperwork to come aboard, but all of the actual offer process has been with the hiring manager. > > Probably it depends on industry, or the size/politics of the company. Based on posts at the Ask the Headhunter site there are lots of companies where HR rules, restricting managers from even talking to candidates unless it goes through them. I’ve always worked in tech companies where HR is smart enough to know that they can’t make hiring decisions, and instead arrange for interviews, do the paperwork, and prepare a suggested salary amount. You’d think O&G would be using this model. And this company seems to because the OP spoke to the manager. ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/147 "2015-08-11T16:50:18Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > And my experience is just the opposite: I’ve never been hired by HR, but by the person responsible for the interviews. When I’ve been involved in hiring, the offer to the new hire goes out from the lead person on the hiring committee. > > I really don’t think it’s possible to generalise. Different workplaces and industries will all have different approaches. > [@slash2k](#): > > As a counterpoint, I’ve never negotiated with HR. They’ve set up interviews, checked references, and the like, and then afterwards do the paperwork to come aboard, but all of the actual offer process has been with the hiring manager. > > Probably it depends on industry, or the size/politics of the company. Well, color me educated and somewhat surprised. HR should be much more knowledgeable about any policies and legal issues involved with hiring and, for that matter, firing of employees. I can’t imagine why a company wouldn’t use HR as a communication buffer in those situations. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/148 "2015-08-11T16:50:35Z")
> [@edwardcoast](#): > > I wouldn’t be surprised if after the OP was there a week they decided to eliminate the position entirely. The whole thing sounded bad and flakey. I’ve been at companies where candidates in the pipeline ran into massive cuts, and it isn’t pretty, especially for recruiting managers who spoke to candidates in good faith. Excellent points about setting salary and about contract status, by the way. As I said, all our contractors come from bonded companies, though we can get them to hire on people we want as contractors. We’d never try to downgrade a regular candidate this way - or I hope not. It’s never been suggested. ---
**Author:** ![edwardcoast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cab0a1/32.png) [@edwardcoast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwardcoast)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/149 "2015-08-11T16:53:30Z")
> [@Poysyn](#): > > Okay, I read your OP out loud to my husband, who works in Alberta, in a mechanical engineering field where he hires and fires people. We had the exact same thought. As a new grad, with limited experience, you should have jumped on the offer, worked at $30/hour and then continued to look for something else. You either would have found something better quickly, or the market would have rebounded and the company would have been delighted to offer you higher to keep you. > > In our collective opinion, a mistake. The market IS terrible right now for oil and gas, it won’t stay that way, but it sounds to us like they were trying to make it work based on their budgets (budgets are literally being be evaluated weekly at these companies right now, and shut downs are widespread). > > Probably not what you wanted to hear, sorry. But that wasn’t the offer the OP accepted. The OP didn’t play games and accepted the first offer, it was the employer who started in with the unprofessional nonsense. I guess I should move my company to Canada, where I can play games with employees like this and they just take it on the chin. Coming up with all kinds of justification that it’s OK to be treated unprofessionally by management. “I say $30.00 an hour? No, you don’t have experience here is your paycheck with the adjustment. It’s now $15.00 an hour and you are going to like it, because you will get all this experience. First, start off by emptying all the trash in the building.” ---
**Author:** ![edwardcoast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cab0a1/32.png) [@edwardcoast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwardcoast)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/150 "2015-08-11T17:02:02Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Don’t criticize my assumption with an assumption of your own. > > Sorry, can’t do 35 after all, but can do 30 > No > OK. let me know what you would accept > 37.5 > > If the world got to laugh at Tsipras, don’t be surprised if a summary of the ‘negotiation’ got passed around. > > The upper limit was 35, per the manager > The bottom was 30, by the OP > > Where the hell did 37.50 come from? > > That is a ‘strategy’ to be discussed in MBA schools for years to come. > > Still doesn’t top [Yanis Varoufakis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yanis_Varoufakis), but is a classic in its own right. > > p.s. OP title is wrong - it was not an Employer, it was a client. He still didn’t get it. $37.50 likely came after the OP calculated the actual value of benefits. It doesn’t matter, it was stupidly handled by a company you can’t trust. Benefits and then no benefits. A rate and then a lower one. Was the OP very experienced in handling this kind of situation, of course not. Someone with experience would have rejected further consideration of the job if they tried to change the terms after they were offered and accepted. As for having it in writing or not, you have to be able to trust people and if they are going to lie to you because it isn’t signed and notarized, then you need to find trustworthy people to work with. This company isn’t one of them. You people here criticizing the OP, would be the same ones that if the OP took the job and a year later run into problems there, you’d be the first to say “You shouldn’t have taken the job after they changed the terms of the offer after you accepted it. That was a red flag! I would have walked!”. ---
**Author:** ![edwardcoast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cab0a1/32.png) [@edwardcoast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwardcoast)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/151 "2015-08-11T17:07:34Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > Why are you assuming the job would actually pay $30/hr, given the company’s history to date? We have no reason to believe that this offer was any more “real” or binding than the previous one. Yes, but as we can see by several posters the OP should have accepted anything they offered. Even if it came with a daily beating, because to not accept a questionable offer is considered rude and unprofessional behavior. The second the OP decided not to get abused any further, the OP’s name was entered into the employer blacklist database and will never get a job again. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/152 "2015-08-11T18:37:22Z")
> [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > Well, color me educated and somewhat surprised. HR should be much more knowledgeable about any policies and legal issues involved with hiring and, for that matter, firing of employees. I can’t imagine why a company wouldn’t use HR as a communication buffer in those situations. But how can the HR drone know if the database administrator can tell a SQL query from a Resistor overflow partitioned anomaly procedural technician integer? If all you care about before you hire the person is that, yes, they really did go to such and such a school, and they really did work at the jobs listed on their resume, their references really do exist and really do recommend the candidate, and the candidate has the legal right to work in the locality in question, then HR can handle all that. But in, say, software development, there is no possible way this can work. The only person who can determine if the candidate has a chance of being able to do the work asked of them is the person they’re going to be reporting to. How else is it supposed to work? Yes, HR can set up interviews, and tell the hiring manager what salary range they’re allowed to offer. But the actual guys doing the actual work have to make the hiring decision, or the company can’t function. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/153 "2015-08-11T20:56:40Z")
> [@edwardcoast](#): > > the OP’s name was entered into the employer blacklist database and will never get a job again. 🙂 I realize you’re being snarky, but I swear such a thing does exist, at least regionally. I found this out after I left an employer involuntarily (but I know now that they did me a big favor in the long run), and I wasn’t the only person who was experiencing this. The lawyer I had to hire to get my unemployment was one of my sources. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/154 "2015-08-11T20:58:00Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > But in, say, software development, there is no possible way this can work. The only person who can determine if the candidate has a chance of being able to do the work asked of them is the person they’re going to be reporting to. How else is it supposed to work? Yes, HR can set up interviews, and tell the hiring manager what salary range they’re allowed to offer. But the actual guys doing the actual work have to make the hiring decision, or the company can’t function. And I am damn sure to add the weasel words in the “offer.” We want to hire you but nothing is certain until everything gets signed off. And like I said, I never talk money until everything has been signed off by HR and management with the proper signature authority. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/155 "2015-08-11T21:03:48Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > I realize you’re being snarky, but I swear such a thing does exist, at least regionally. I found this out after I left an employer involuntarily (but I know now that they did me a big favor in the long run), and I wasn’t the only person who was experiencing this. The lawyer I had to hire to get my unemployment was one of my sources. ☹ When you say involuntarily, do you mean as a result of a layoff or for what they considered as cause? I can see the latter but not the former, fair or unfair. But absolutely no one anyone would ever want to work for would put the OP on a blacklist for having the nerve to make a too high counteroffer. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/156 "2015-08-11T21:06:12Z")
> [@edwardcoast](#): > > At least in the US, companies would go through a contract house for this, because they don’t want to get involved in problems with contractors claiming to be employees who are entitled to the same benefits other employees there get such as a stock options. The contract house marks up the cost of the employee and the employee is paid from the “employer” which is the contract house, not the client company. In this arrangement it is more often a W-2 than a 1099. But for the OP in Canada, this “client” company is directly treating the OP as if they were a direct employee but without benefits. It could be more bait and switch than this. Some US companies interview employees and then direct them to go to a contract house for the job. **Poysyn** , could you ask your husband if this kind of contract house is used in the O&G industry in Canada? I’ve never heard of it before, and frankly it sounds like the kind of legal jiggery-pokery that I mentioned earlier, when an employer is trying to disguise that they actually have employed someone. If the contract house is just a flow-through for the salary, and the individual is really working for the employer, then it sounds like a sham to me. But maybe I’ve just never run into it. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/157 "2015-08-11T21:08:30Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > When you say involuntarily, do you mean as a result of a layoff or for what they considered as cause? I can see the latter but not the former, fair or unfair. > But absolutely no one anyone would ever want to work for would put the OP on a blacklist for having the nerve to make a too high counteroffer. I was in a “quit or be fired” scenario, and I believe to this day that my boss made something up, because it could have been easily documented with screenshots and they wouldn’t show them to me. It wasn’t just for jobs in my field, either. Any time I applied for a job, any job, the instant they saw I had worked at that particular place, the interview was immediately over. That was something else my lawyer said he’d heard multiple times from people who had left that place around the same time. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2015, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/158 "2015-08-11T22:43:42Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > I was in a “quit or be fired” scenario, and I believe to this day that my boss made something up, because it could have been easily documented with screenshots and they wouldn’t show them to me. > > It wasn’t just for jobs in my field, either. Any time I applied for a job, any job, the instant they saw I had worked at that particular place, the interview was immediately over. That was something else my lawyer said he’d heard multiple times from people who had left that place around the same time. That’s weird. But it sounds like it was the place, not you, since if your name was on some kind of list you wouldn’t have gotten an interview. And because it wasn’t just you. I won’t further hijack this thread by asking more but you got my curiosity aroused! ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2015, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/159 "2015-08-12T00:36:06Z")
> [@edwardcoast](#): > > I always looked for something better, did my home work, and I never ended up with a shitty job. If you had shitty jobs, it might be because you were willing to put up with abuse like this. I wouldn’t brag about having held a shitty job and it isn’t a badge of courage, because while you were working a shitty job many people were not. It could have been you working in a better job too, but you took a bad situation. Here the OP is not even employed there yet, and already they are totally screwing with pay and benefits in a dramatic way. It’s a total red flag and to ignore that and criticize the OP for not accepting it is totally misguided. I’ve been fairly continually employed through multiple recessions, and have only ever been unemployed by choice. I’ve chosen shitty jobs over being dependent on my parents or someone else (a boyfriend, God Forbid) before I had the means to say screw it. If you’ve always had the financial independance to be picky, you are more fortunate than I have been. It took me 30 years to get to the point that I could say screw it. And I certainly couldn’t afford it right out of college. ---
**Author:** ![Poysyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Poysyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Poysyn)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2015, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303/160 "2015-08-12T03:30:01Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > **Poysyn** , could you ask your husband if this kind of contract house is used in the O&G industry in Canada? > > I’ve never heard of it before, and frankly it sounds like the kind of legal jiggery-pokery that I mentioned earlier, when an employer is trying to disguise that they actually have employed someone. If the contract house is just a flow-through for the salary, and the individual is really working for the employer, then it sounds like a sham to me. > > But maybe I’ve just never run into it. We have never heard of anything like this outside of a temp agency. Most bigger companies have either in-house lawyers or legal on retainer to check out contracts. But things are also really weird in O&G right now, I can’t stress that enough. I would use an example from my own line - Government work - our civilian Hr process can be painful at best - we often offer candidates a temporary contract to keep them until we can get everything worked out. Sometimes companies can do the same. I was on a temporary contract at one of my first (corporate) jobs. I was seriously underpaid for what I was doing, even though I was maxed out with my temp agency (they charge the company 1.5 -2X what I was making). I bided my time, proved myself, then said I was leaving unless they brought me on permanently. It happened surprisingly quickly after that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/employer-rescinds-job-offer/727303.md?page=9)