Getting Terminated From A Bank

[danil70]

Hello,    My wife and I are going thru a very hard time.  She has spent the last 13 years being a bank teller for a bank that recently got bought out.  The new bank placed her in a very busy office and did not adequately train the old tellers in the new bank's rules.  When my wife brought up questions like "in the old bank they did it this way" she was told "don't talk about the old bank" even if what they did made sense(like putting holds on big checks).  She, as well as all the tellers were told by the head teller to let these checks go through    The new bank now is going through a rough time and had said that they were going to lay people off.  As if Murphy's law kicked in a business customer deposited a check for $19,000 at the end of the day when the head teller was away.  It was the custom of this branch to let these checks go through without hold to please good customers.  Well it turned out that the check was bad and the guy withdrew it and sent it to some scam.     The HRP person from the head office met with my wife and told her to giver her her keys and she was on paid leave for a day while they decide whether to fire her.  On their side they have the perfect opportunity to save money by eliminating her position and use her as an example(because all the tellers do the same thing - in fact were told not to put holds on these kinds of checks)    We face grave possibilities if they blackball her or give her a bad reference(before they said she was the best teller in the bank).  Would she qualify for unemployment insurance.  What can we do to make the best of this situation?

[Stan]

Don - I'm sorry to hear about what has been happening to your wife and her job.  Unfortunately, there is very little an employee can do when faced with termination, unless the employee has a written employment agreement or is in a union.  Most employees have neither protection.

People are eligible for unemployment if they are terminated for reasons that do not amount to misconduct or insubordination.  The facts you describe would seem to be such that she would be eligible for Unemployment Compensation benefits, as she was not violating a rule.  If she can get some evidence of the practice of cashing large checks, that would improve her chances of being awarded benefits. Employers may not give false information when asked for references, and if they do so, they can be sued.  The more likely scenario is that the bank, aware of the laws about slander, will only confirm previous employment and the dates of the employment - that's what most employers are doing these days to protect themselves from suits over unfavorable references.  Your wife's best bet is to explain why she does not want the bank used as a reference, or to find someone in management from the old bank and use them for her professional reference.