Employee Termination

Our recommended employee termination procedure

The employee termination form can be a strong line of defense if you become involved in litigation about terminating an employee. Far too often employers lose on these claims simply because they failed to document the reasons on a termination properly.

Documenting all relevant information in an accurate, honest and specific manner will ensure you can prove a termination is not part of any illegal purposes, such as discrimination. An employee termination form can help to ensure you do not leave out any information.

How You Use an Employee Termination Form

One of the first areas of information that you should cover when terminating an employee is documentation of all problems on the employee’s job performance. This information should be as specific as possible and include dates about any prior oral and written warnings.

Let me explain.

Such information will serve to back-up the termination and prove you based the termination on solid reasons and not influenced by any suspect reasoning. You should further back-up the employee termination form by added documentation such as copies of relevant written warnings and employee evaluations, as necessary.

The written documentation about the termination should ideally include a series of progressive discipline actions. To make a valid case of rightful termination, such a series of progressive discipline actions should detail oral warnings that have then progressed to written warnings, followed by suspension and then termination.

An employee termination form also helps to ensure you do not fire an employee on impulse. Terminating an employee based on emotion rather than sound reasons can result in serious penalties including devastating lawsuits.

Take the time to gather necessary documentation, including an employee termination form, and call the employee in for a conference when tempers have had a chance to cool off.

There's more for you to consider.

And you can use an employee termination form even when you are not firing an employee. In the instance where an employee is resigning, being laid off or retiring, this form can help to document the reason for separation from the company. When both supervisor and parting employee sign the employee termination form during the exit interview, with reasons for separation soundly documented, the employer is far better protected from later wrongful claims than he or she would be without such documentation.

What you must know before terminating any employee