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We have recently been given notice by one of our employees and she is now asking to be reimbursed for classes she took this past summer. I do believe think it is reimburseable since the classes began prior to the change. However in July of this year, our handbook was updated and included language that states the company reserves the right to approve or reject courses for reimbursement in its sole discretion.
Is this something that would hold up in California? While I know it is not a mandated benefit, our previous version did not have this language, but did have the statement that it reserved the right to revised, rescind or supplement any policies, etc.
Just need a sanity check.
Thanks!
Deb
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| Is it worth the time and effort to defend the after-the-fact change in your policy (assuming she takes some sort of legal action)? Probably not. I would reimburse the tuition or maybe meet her half way and reimburse 50%. Good luck.
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Hi there,
Thank you for the reply. Two additional details have been unveiled since yesterday: 1) she did not get all of the authorizations needed prior to registration (HR and Finance), 2) her request for a reduction in hours in order to accommodate her school schedule had been granted and have now discovered the the salary had never been adjusted. As such the total amount of money she was overpayed exceeds the tuition reimbursement, and the four vacation days she has due her.
Would you think the reply you sent still applies with this new information? I only found out about this today. Your prompt reply is very much appreciated as the employees last day is this week.
Thanks.
deb
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I agree with the earlier reply, Maybe, if she is informed of the facts that you have uncovered, she will not demand any more reimbursement. And with this new information, the question now is, would you want to recover any overpayment? How far are you willing to go to get it back?
You know this employee's character, do you think she will challenged your computation?
from my experience, Sometimes a mere mention that the employee will probably have to return some money, will make just make them go away and not ask for anything more.
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| I know this is after the fact but here are my thoughts - given the additional info. Based on the fact that the company already accommodated her schedule to attend school makes the issue about not obtaining necessary approvals irrelevant. The overpayment issue is a valid one unless she was an exempt employee where there could be an issue with reducing her salary, I'm not sure. I would check on the legality of that before attempting to recover the overpayment or using it as leverage against the tuition reimbursement. In any case, what action did the company decide on? Just curious.
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