Fact Finding Form

SamanthaQ

We have an employee that we terminated in July of 2003. In the past (before my HR days at this business) this employee filed a claim with EEOC saying she wasn't getting promoted because she was in a protected class. The claim was dropped when she was shortly thereafter promoted.

We promoted her again a few years later and started training her on her new duties. We found a lot of unauthorized overtime and we had a lot of problems with the quality of her work. We progressively disciplined and documented everything and made clear our expectations. I consulted an attorney upon each disciplinary action including the termination. After talking with our attorney we agreed to not respond to anything in regards to unemployment to dispute her claim. (the terminated employee did not know this) They approved her claim and she collected the maximum she could with the unemployment.

Here we are in December of 2004. over a year later, and the unemployment office is sending a "Fact Finding Form" in regards to this former employee stating that a question of eligibility or qualification has been raised on this claim. There is a series of about 10 questions they want answered in relation to her termination (.i.e. reason for discharge, what was the incident, were there prior disciplinary actions, were other employees released due to this incident). The form still says that failure to respond will result in issuance of a determination based on available information (which we never provided). I'm confused as to why they are sending this fact finding form - should I be concerned? Should I respond?

I will mention that since her termination all her loans with us (we are a financial institution) have gone bad and we've done our due dilligence with collections in getting a judgement against her. On the judgement her response was that we wrongfully terminated her. She's also told other prospective employers that we wrongfully terminated her which they ask us about when they call for a reference.

Thoughts? Suggestions? I'm inclined not to respond but I don't want to make a big mistake here either. We didn't initiate any investigation into the claim.

mwild31

Okay - I did some quick research on Michigan's Labor site & well, thank goodness I live in Washington State x:-). When I typed in Fact Finding Form all of the references went to Act 312 which seems to be about automatic arbitration/union stuff. Anyhow, it doesn't make much sense to me, but here's my suggestion: Call the UI office and ask them, "Why the form and what does it mean"? I'm not afraid to call government agencies, but some are - so don't disclose your company's name if you are one of those - but don't ignore it. Once you find out what the form is about - make a judgment call - to call the attorney or not. Good luck!

Crout

Whatever you do, don't lie on that form. If you fired her for performance issues (as your post implies) go ahead and say that. The fact that you didn't respond previously doesn't mean anything. She probably would have received Unemployment benefits anyway....certainly in my state.

marc

I like the approach suggested by Mwild. I would also want to know who raised the question and what it is. You did not contest the original claim for UI - for them to come back on it now seems very strange to me.

Don D

Ignore the form. None of the 50 states has a mandated requirement that employers respond to those. More than likely this is the result of a random audit. In our state the group in the UI building who do that are called, guess what, The Random Audit Unit. They pull claims and audit them and analyze everything from the initial claim through the claims examiner's decision to the appeal, if any, to the weeks drawn, right up to the termination of benefits for whatever reason.

But, even if this is not the case, ignore the form.

<<The form still says that failure to respond will result in issuance of a determination based on available information (which we never provided). I'm confused as to why they are sending this fact finding form - should I be concerned? Should I respond? >>

What this means is simply that an employer (or claimant for that matter) deciding not to respond, will risk having the decision on the claim made based on the information presented by the other side. You have nothing to risk. The claim has already been awarded, eligibility has been decided in her favor by your non-response earlier and surely the claim ran its course half a year ago. If it's a new claim in a new benefit year, let it slide, don't worry about it. Trash the form.