Can we pursue legal action if my wife was forced to sign a letter of resignation before she could collect her paycheck?

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Can we pursue legal action if my wife was forced to sign a letter of resignation before she could collect her paycheck?

She did not know this was illegal and signed it. We would like to know if we can still pursue legal action?

Asked on July 6, 2015 under Employment Labor Law, Wisconsin

Answers:

SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney

Answered 8 years ago | Contributor

Yes, you can sue on the basis that an employer may not withhold the final paycheck or use it as leverage to get the employee to sign a letter of resignation. However, what are you suing for? If you wife was denied unemployment compensation to which she would otherwise have been entitled, that would be the measure of your damages--the amount of UI she should have received. There must be some concrete loss, because the law typically does not provide compensation for "abstract" injuries, like having your rights violated without some damage or loss coming from that violation. So if you wife was denied unemployment insurance, you may have a good claim. If she did not lose any money or anything from this, however, there would no viable claim, since there would be no damages, and so nothing to be compensated for.


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