Zales has stated she was fired for misbehavior and tried to deny her unemployment benefits on that basis.
From the New York Dept. of Labor website.
Zales would not or could not provide the required documentation to the NY DOL in support of their claim. After making the reason public, why not?
From the article I linked to before.
All that means is that someone working for Zales (probably* an employee of TALX) checked off “misconduct” on the notice of potential charges transmitted by the New York State Department of Labor.
What would happen next is that a questionnaire would be generated and sent to Zale’s agent (probably* TALX UC Services in St. Louis). If that questionnaire is not returned within a week or two, the claim would normally be determined in favor of the claimant based upon available information.
It would appear that’s what happened here.
Note that neither a Notice of Potential Charges nor a questionnaire would be a public document. Moreover, it’s very common for employers – particularly large retailers – to fail to return these questionnaires. For any number of non-nefarious reasons. The most common reason being that TALX handles hundreds, if not thousands of claims a week and many fall through the cracks. For example, if the TALX employee can’t track down and contact the claimant’s supervisor to get further information about the separation. Or if the case is flagged as having a potential for litigation, the employer’s legal department might decide not to contest the claim for unemployment insurance.
See above. The agency to whom Zales must respond is the EEOC (or the State Division of Human Rights). If Zales fails to provide information to those agencies, then yes, it may be reasonable to infer that they are in the wrong.
*when I use the word “probably,” I intend it in the normal English sense of the word, and not the Fear Itself / Guinistasia definition.
Your little schtick is no longer cute, and is quite tiresome. We get it already.
You think so? Do you think that if a lawsuit proceeds the company would not have to present this information? There can be no claim of confidentiality, since they would have already given it to her. I was involved in a case, in another state, where it would have been very helpful to have been able to refuse to provide information. Maybe our lawyer was dumb, but it was not even presented as a possibility.
She also has no record of any warnings or plans, or threw it away, or is lying to her attorney. Maybe, but not likely.
There are plenty of reasons for immediate termination for cause which could happen even to star performers - but which clearly wasn’t happening here. I have a hard time imagining that a madwoman, as described by one of the posters in the comments, could sell a million bucks worth of jewelry.
I’m surprised that Zales gave a reason. Usually they can refuse to give one to the press for reasons of confidentiality - but not to the person.
I’d bet they’d settle. Unless she was shooting up in full view of customers or something, there is precious little that would justify firing someone with a critical heart problem. Zales would lose a lot more in business there than they would ever save from not paying her. Publicly the company stands as one, while negotiations are going on, but I bet the moron who fired her is not going to get a good review.
In this case, since she worked in public, it should not be hard to get a bunch of her customers to testify what a nice person she is. One of the posters in the comments section did not have good things to say about the other workers.
I got the impression that she wasn’t given a reason. Zales I’m sure fires lots of people for very good reasons, and it boggles the mind that they don’t fully document legitimate causes. Not being able to document her firing - either to her or the DoL - stinks to high heavens. I see you agree.
Absolutely.
No, but there are a lot of advantages in delaying. For one thing, it’s helpful to keep the employee and her attorney in the dark when they prepare her EEOC charge. That way there is a better chance she will swear to something which is later contradicted by a document. Instead of being able to tailor her story.
For another, if you are an attorney, you want your client to tell his or her story as few times as possible. Even an honest person’s story changes a bit from telling to telling.
Was there a subpoena, a document request, or some other legal process requesting the information? Then yeah, you have to turn it over. But if it’s just a pissed off former employee asking for her file so she can explore the possibility of a lawsuit, a New York employer has no obligation to turn the information over.
You gotta be kidding me. People lie about these all the time. I’ve lost count of the number of people who claimed to have a clean disciplinary record, only to have an employer pull out a stack of writeups. Besides, where in the article does this woman claim to have a clean disciplinary record? I don’t recall such a claim.
Even if she did make such a claim, there is no reason to automatically believe her. Suppose she is saying she had a clean record. The employer is apparently saying that she did have a record. Why should we believe her and assume the employer is lying?
I don’t see how you can reasonably say that having only heard this woman’s side of the story.
I’m not sure what your point is here. 95% of employers in New York give a reason at the time of discharge to an employee who is fired. Usually it’s done orally.
That may very well be, but it doesn’t necessarily mean they are in the wrong.
That’s nonsense. Someone with a heart problem might be fired for any reason a healthy person might be fired. People get fired from jobs all the time.
What gives you that impression? The article doesn’t say, one way or another. As noted above, the vast majority of New York employers will give a reason at the time of discharge. Besides, the article could have quoted her as saying “and they didn’t give me any reason!!” But it didn’t.
You don’t know yet if a legitimate reason was or wasn’t documented. As noted above, the (apparent) fact that such documentation was not provided to this woman or to the DOL doesn’t necessarily mean anything. The question is whether such documentation is presented to the EEOC (or to the State Division of Human Rights).
No I do not. Please read my post above about unemployment insurance.
Who is “we”? Are you saying that you now admit that I was correct and reasonable to state that for me, “X is probably true” has a different meaning from “X must be true”?
Because if so, it would appear you owe me an apology.
Don’t know about the rest of the world, but you can count me among the “we” and I don’t even care who is right and who is wrong.
FWIW and I have no dog in this fight, it makes me want to skip over your posts.
I knew a man once who maintained that nearly all teenage boys were violent hateful vindictive antisocial little bastards. And nothing I could say or do would shake his conviction, which he claimed was derived from sad experience with a lot of them.
I finally found out what he did for a living – he was a guard at a juvenile correction facility.
Just saying’ –
I don’t understand your point, but if you think it’s reasonable to intentionally misinterpret my posts, then please, by all means, skip over them and do not respond.
Excuse me? I’m not intentionally misinterpreting your posts???
I find it tiresome when someone beats a dead horse- which is what you seem to be doing. Even if you are right, jeez Louise enough already. Obviously you are making a point, but sometimes debating style can turn a person off, even when that person is right.
All I’m saying is- you asked who the “we” are, and frankly I find your disclaimer dopey and juvenile at this point, which, frankly, lessens my interest in reading what you have to say. I’m sure the loss is mine.
That’s interesting. It reminds me of the story of a man who was quite credulous and trusting. He was an honest person and assumed other people were basically the same. Eventually, he took a position where his job was to help people who were the victims of various wrongs. Since he was a trusting man, he normally accepted the stories’ of those who came to him with grievances. But his job also involved follow up, so he had an opportunity to see the other side of the story, including the evidence supporting that other side. He eventually learned to be cautious and skeptical of peoples’ claims. He learned that most people (and corporations) will spin, exaggerate, or even lie when they tell their side of a dispute.
Just sayin’.
I don’t understand this.
I do you think you have a point here. However, you (and others) would go a lot further in convincing me that the horse is dead if you would actually concede that I was reasonable and correct in stating that for me, “probably” does not mean the same thing as “must be”
In any event, my disclaimer has the added bonus of (I hope) deterring similar shenanigans.
Duly noted.
I will concede that your use of “probably” is a weasel word at best, specifically chosen so that you can claim vindication if the circumstances turn out to support you, but maintain deniability if they do not.
Dude, at this point you need to just man up and admit you were wrong. Brazil84’s whole point is that people shouldn’t be leaping to judgment about which party is in the wrong based on a single, one-sided news story. “Weasel words” doesn’t come into it. People who aren’t mental midgets acknowledge the ambiguity of the world; maybe it’s time for you to step up and do so as well.
We are not amused.
(Dear GOD, you are so pork stupid.)
That’s not a concession at all. It’s an argument with “I concede” at the beginning, as far as I can tell.
Your claim is that “probably X” means the same thing as “must be X” for purposes of message board debate.
Until you concede that is wrong, it’s reasonable for me to tell people that when I use the word “probably,” I mean the normal English meaning of the word. As opposed to the meaning you wish to ascribe.
Anyway, I’m comfortable admitting that I don’t know who’s right and who’s wrong in this story. I think that more likely than not, the (ex) employee is in the wrong, but I don’t know it. If you want to call that weaseling, fine.
If it turns out Zales is wrong, I will concede that my best guess was incorrect.
Lol. I guess that means you won’t concede your horse is dead.
Why? If your argument is their interpretation of the word is the outlier and you’re using it in the typical fashion, why do you feel the need to explain that? Why wouldn’t you assume that the rest of us know the definition?
Because he seems to prefer semantic nitpicking to defending his point, one supposes. As he wishes to use such tactic to weasel.
Either way, it’s pointless arguing with him, as it’s just nothing more than the same old thing.
And yes, we GET what you’re saying, brazil. It’s just that, we don’t give a shit.
To make myself clearer; to heap well-deserved scorn on Fear Itself and Guinistasia, and to deter others from similar shenanigans.
Why should I? Numerous people in this thread have exhibited a strange lack of knowledge of the English language in interpreting “probably” and “pretty good chance.” Probably* they do know the definition but are ignoring it in their minds for rhetorical purposes.
*See my note about “probably” above.