leased employee

What is the name of your state? Florida

Hello,

Apparently I was a leased employee, my employer outsourced the HR department to a company and the place where I worked was called a Work Site. I worked for a bank. I was recently terminated and was instructed to contact this company for possible re-assignment. I was told that if I did not contact them within 48 hours of receiving a letter they sent, I would be considered as having voluntarily resigned and lose my unemployement benefits. This company enrolled all of the employees a few months ago, we had to sign a form which I did not feel comfortable with however I did not have a choice at the time, if we did not sign the form we would not have a job so we were converted to leased employees whether we liked it or not.

I find this very confusing. Is this legal? I equate leasing with property and find the term "to be leased" when referring to a person to be extremely derogatory. I am not property and I thought slavery was abolished.

I am very confused by this leased term and I don't even know if I am still employed, I mean who did/do I work-the bank that laid me off permanently or this company we were outsourced to? Can someone please explain what being leased means and what rights do I have. I have a feeling that something else is going on regarding this classification, something that proves profitable to this outsourcing company. Any insight is appreciated.

Thank you
C Dodson

Leased and/or contract employees are extremely common and have been for years. If you work in HR and are as completely unfamiliar with these terms as you claim, then you are waaaay behind the times. Same goes for outsourcing HR and other service functions in an organization. The majority of employers aren't dong this but it is an arrangement that has gained increasing popularity over the last four or five years. If you'd read the occasional trade journal, you'd at least be familiar with the concept and how it works.

Were you paid? Were you beaten? Did you have the option to quit at any time? Obviously it's hardly slavery and you had and have the same rights as any other employee.

In any event, what has happened is the bank has ended your assignment. You need to contact your employer (the leasing agency) and discuss a new assignment. If you don't like the arrangement then call them and tell them "no thanks" and look for a different job.

I didn't work in the HR department and the director of that department didn't understand what being leased meant either because she told me I did not have to report to the company that we apparently work for. It was only after receiving a threatening letter from that company that I realized the HR director does not have a clue. Even after I told her I got the letter she still insisted that she told them about my lay-off and not to worry. She didn't have to worry, she didn't have a letter in her hand threatening to cancel her only source of income.

So I report to this outsourcing company and they have a job offer. I turn it down which you have told me is my choice, my question is, do I still qualify for unemployment? Say this new job offer is at half my current (or what was my current) salary, no benefits and no future, so I decline. What is my status? Was I permanently laid off or did I voluntarily resign? What is really confusing is I have two letters, one from the bank I worked for saying I was terminated due to a permanent lay off and one from this outsourcing company I was leased to saying I have to report to them.

Regarding my comparison of being leased to slavery, I can only quote the following "contract by which the owner of property allows another to use it for a specified time, usually in return for payment" the property being referenced in the above Oxford dictionary's definition of the word 'lease' would refer to me. My analogy to slavery may have been slightly exagerated but it is a start when property refers to a person. I don't agree with your definition of slavery, people can be forced into labor through many means, ask any migrant farm worker however this forum isn't the place to debate our definition of the word.

I just wanted to know why it was legal to lease a person and treat them as property.

BTW the reason I am slightly angry (despite the fact that I was terminated after 6 years of loyal, hard work, given 1 week severance which in my industry is a slap in the face and not reimbursed for my earned vacation) is that when we were enrolling with this outsourcing company, we were told the contract was a benign formality, that all this company was really doing was taking care of the HR services such as payroll, benefit enrollment and tax reporting. The part about having to report really doesn't mean anything. This is what was literally told to us by the representatives. Needless to say we were mislead. It wasn't so bad though, they terminated me the day I came back from vacation which was thoughtful of them.

Thank you for your perspective, Beth3.

CJ

Whether or not you will be eligible for UC if you turn down an assignment from the leasing company will be extremely State-specific. It depends entirely on the specifics of the assignment offered and your State's UC reg's. Only an adjudicator at your area's UC office can answer that question and only if you provide all the details of the assignment you refused or are considering refusing. (The type of job, hours, wage, commuting distance, etc.)

As far as I can make out from the information you provided, the bank terminated your assignment. As you were no longer their employee, they could not terminate you or lay you off, just end your assignment with them. Your employer, the leasing company, is apparently prepared to offer you another assignment right away. Whether you accept it or not is up to you. Whether you will qualify for UC benefits if you turn it down will be up to the State.

And do give up on the slavery analogy. I can appreciate you weren't happy about the changes made in your employment status which you had no input but you were hardly being held in bondage.