I got terminated from my job for purchasing something using my employee discount and putting it on Social Media for resale. I had been with the company for almost 8 years without any problems. I think it was unfair and should have been handled differently. Does anyone know if I can sue them for wrongful termination?

You can try, but you will lose. Quickly.

"It's not in the handbook" is the lamest excuse for doing something that is clearly unethical. Does ANY handbook have a prohibition on peeing in the hallway? No? So that means you can't be disciplined for peeing in the hallway?

What you did was unethical, period. You took advantage of an employee perk and tried to profit from it. Now, I know that a bunch of people are going to scream "HR sucks!!" and "all companies do is screw over employees, so employees should do unethical things!", but the fact remains that you unethically took advantage of something the company provided to you and profited from it, or attempted to.

You have literally zero legal case here.

Respectfully, I think what is more worrying is your lack of self awareness. The whole point of a company discount is an incentive reward exclusively for their employees therefore your decision to resale on social media to make profit signals a lack of integrity and judgement. Rather than finding a lawyer to sue why don’t you use this time for reflection to see how you can do better. On a different point, if you need a reference from this company for another role, there is a chance it may not help you. You can try suing but I think a a lawyer would see this case as a way of making a quick buck knowing you have no case. It would good use of your energy to reflect of why you made such a poor decision that has now cost you your job and how you can do better in future. The key is learn the lesson and don’t repeat this type of poor judgement.

To me it seems you are focused on WFH employees in your initial posts, though, while stating it's not a binary concept. You state you trust no employee. Sad how you would only trust a non-human workforce. When leaders impose surveillance or strict controls to catch mistakes, it creates a culture of fear that can crush employee initiative and guarantees low productivity. IMO, focus on evaluating outcomes rather than activities. Give employees ownership over their tasks which will create a more rewarding environment for both the company and the employee. That's how excellence rises.

You undermined the profit margins and records keeping of the company. Also akin to shorting the cash register till. The swing of the pendulum sways closer to criminal charges than it does to dismissing the matter.

You did mess up, no way around that, but if they term'd you for that, it kinda sounds like they were looking for a reason. That's an offense, but hardly egregious enough to warrant termination. Oh, and no, you don't have grounds for litigation.

You basically stole from the company for your own gain. I would completely find for the company.

While I think using an employee discount to purchase items and then resell them for profit may be contrary to the intended purpose of the benefit, whether it constitutes misconduct depends on the terms and conditions of the discount, the employer's policies, and the surrounding circumstances.
As for whether the termination was lawful, that depends on the company's policies and procedures, as well as the employment laws that apply in your jurisdiction. If there are free employment law advisory organisations in your area, it may be worth checking with them. Some law firms also offer free initial consultations, and there may be organisations that provide free legal advice. Keep in mind that there may be time limits for bringing a legal claim, so it is worth seeking advice promptly.

See the beauty of working in the US is you can be fired because someone didn't like your religion, or that maybe you're female....normally "illegal" right?....ahh but they just have to claim you were really fired for being 10sec late that one morning. Welcome to the zoo.

You are given a perk and you own it from that moment. Shame is on the company for wasting resources pursuing actions as ethical are selling property is. It's yours and you own it and you have the full right to do whatever you want with it.

I have worked for multiple retail companies and every single one had a policy about reselling merchandise bought with a company-provided discount. It is a standard policy for employees not to do this and also just morally wrong. If you find a lawyer willing to take up your case, they are likely just interested in your money than anything else.

I genuinely don’t agree with the people saying it’s wrong if the employee discount is part of your compensation package. Companies use employee discounts as a way to decrease the amount of cash they pay employees. As a case manager we got almost minimum wage, but the benefits and employee discounts were super good, and there was zero shame in buying the PS5 and reselling them - my employer at least was super supportive of it. The more their employees used the discount sites the better their rate would be the next year.

Lot of you people really on your high horses here, it’s a company, they don’t care about you.

No rational judge would see it that way. I would imaging the employee manual covers that exact problem and states "up to and including termination" as part of the company comments. You rolled the dice and lost.

If it was not in any policy.. It is not lawful for them to treat you that way especially if you have been with them for over 8 years.

Let me know if you need any help

@Human Resources Director 1 Sounds like you're not an HR director at all and you're just looking into a document and arguing with only the legality that supports this decision. However the actual HR would consider all the options to handling this matter before going into a termination. Because the next thing they want is a PR crisis, and being in the wrong. Whatever the employment contract says, the labour laws surpasses any company policy and in many countries the Labour law's protect the employee from wrongful termination. Normally in many countries before termination 3 Warning letters should be issued and if nessesary implementing a probation period for the employee to improve/correct their conduct, and during that period and even after the 3 warnings the employee is still unable to follow and rectify the misconducting behavior and has ignored the warnings, then you have grounds for termination. An HR professional with dacades of experiance would obviously be aware and have had experiances handling many similar cases. You don't sound like you've been there or have sufficient qualifications, and your intention seems to be insulting the CEM and trying to scare him with all the legal terms that you can find, so either you're from his former employer, or just a HR intern who is still learning the handbook. Nothing, no contract, no policy will ever surpass Labor Laws. CEM Talk to Lawyer that specializes in employment law, handling issues like wrongful termination, wage disputes, workplace discrimination, and contract negotiations in your country. Thoroughly go through your employment contract and go through the labour laws in your country. If they immediately terminated you without an investigation, proper warnings you have grounds to fight for wrongfull termination, If you're in India and If you prove wrongfull termination Under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, (For Workman) you can get Reinstatemen, Full Back Wages,Continuity of Service and for higher level managerial and white collar employees the roles that are governed purely by Indian Contract Act principles can get Notice Period Pay,Unpaid Wages & Gratuity,Damages for Mental Anguish and Legal Costs. Talk to a Lawyer and see what your options.

I'd say it depends on what it was. Retail clothes store workers in some shops are expected to buy products all the time and are provided a discount so they can maintain the latest styles. They are expected to do this CONSTANTLY. Obviously they do not have an endless wardrobe to store stuff, so selling secondhand seems reasonable here.

If it was a niche industry specific item at high cost that you undercut the company on, that's a different story.

My larger question is, "Who the hell at work is snooping in on your social media?" Even if you are publicly sharing, who at work both:

1. Took the time to dig into your posts?
2. Decided to call HR to rat you out?

Maybe what you did was unethical, IDK, but you worked with at least one shithead.

If you bought it on a discount, with the intention of selling at a higher price to make a personal profit from a perk of your employment, that is straightforwardly unethical.

Even if you resold it at the discounted price (not making a profit) they might still look at it like you were doing them out of a possible sale, by selling the item basically new for cheaper than someone could buy it from them.

If you bought it and didn't want it anymore very soon after, you might have been able to return it for the same value. If you had explored this option, you might have had a better argument here.

If it were a high value item, you couldn't return it and you wanted to make your money back, your next step ought to have been to ask for permission to resell it.

Yes, everyone has the right to sell their own things, but not necessarily if that item was purchased using a company perk.

Companies have a right to protect themselves from misuse of company perks. If they give you a pass, then what's to say they wouldn't have a rash of other employees suddenly doing the same, and at a scale that would start affecting their profit margins?

A discount offered for the purpose of personal use is just that. It's not for you to use to create profit, which is unethical, and you should also do everything possible to avoid the _appearance_ of unethical behaviour.

If you behave in a way which looks like it's detrimental to the interests of the company you work for, and receive no consequence, that could serve as encouragement to others to engage in detrimental behaviours which, at scale, could really mess with the company's function or outcomes. This is why they would not tolerate such a thing.

One could argue they ought to have written an explicit policy for this eventuality, and stated that permission must be sought in x fashion, but they don't have to.

Unfortunately, it is on you the employee, to think through the rammifications of actions like this and ask for clarification if needed, _before_ you do them.

I'm sorry you've come off badly here, it's a really tough way to learn a lesson.

Wishing you the best of luck with getting a new job and navigating these kinds of issues in future.

As someone who worked at Starbucks and has gotten countless cups with discounts and stars. I can tell you many companies do not allow you to resell stuff you bought on a discount that were exclusive to the business. They take it as you're profiting on their loss and honestly it also comes off very scummy to do when say a customer could have bought for the retail price but you sell it on the secondary market. Now say if you left the business you bought the item from for another job and your no longer considered the previous jobs employee. Then sell to your hearts content. But never try to sell exclusive company items on the market place while you still work their as many places have it in their employee handbook that this is a termination risk.

This is typically a loss prevention policy assiciated with your enployee discount. You should have had some training on this. I have seen other employees terminated for this.

Let me pose this question. Let's say I'm a collector and I was able to acquire something at a similar price as my employee discount without using my employee discount. Then I acquire the same thing using my employee discount and sell 1 for profit so that there's a wash and I essentially purchased 1 for no cost to me. Which one did I sell? Is that unethical? This is literally every business practice at play. I haven't read through most of this thread and idk if there was more context provided, but I don't think the response from the company was sensible if the situation was something like this. And firing someone for this won't prevent others from doing it in the future. It'll just deter people from reselling on social media.

I would be very surprised if there is not a "Retail Policy and Procedure" document, other than employee handbook. detailing this behavior. Otherwise you could just open your own store online continue to purchase their inventory at a great price and resell it.
I've been in retail 40 years for quite a few different companies, written P&P, and every one of them had a P&P that addresses this specifically.
Live and learn, you are not the victim here.