Crook Legal Group

Official Crook Legal Group Twitter Account. Utah Employment Law, Utah Real Estate Law, and Utah Business Law. Retweets are not endorsements.

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Most employers won't strike an arbitration clause entirely. They will negotiate carve-outs, cost-sharing, and neutral rules like AAA or JAMS. The clause stays. What it covers doesn't have to be one-sided.

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Waiving your right to a class action rarely gets discussed at signing. But many arbitration clauses do exactly that, meaning a wage violation affecting hundreds of employees gets fought one case at a time.

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Arbitration clauses favor employers in measurable ways: fewer discovery tools, no jury, awards that tend to run smaller than court verdicts. Read the clause before you assume it's boilerplate.

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A new restriction on your future deserves a good answer to one question: what am I actually being paid for this? If the severance payment isn't adequate, the non-compete may not hold up.

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Employers sometimes use severance to introduce restrictions they never secured at hiring. You are not obligated to accept expanded terms just because they appear in a new document. Read what changed, and why.

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Did they pay you enough to give up your career freedom? A non-compete needs consideration. If it first shows up in your severance agreement, the payment alone may not be enough to support it. That's a real legal vulnerability.

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Auto-renewal clauses aren't good or bad. They're neutral. They work in your favor if the terms are strong, and against you if they aren't. Either way, the notice window doesn't wait for you to decide which.

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An evergreen clause doesn't ask permission before it renews your contract. It just requires notice within a set window, often 60 or 90 days out. Miss it, and the decision gets made for you.

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When did you last reread the back pages of your employment contract? Auto-renewal clauses sit there quietly, and missing the notice window can turn a one-year deal into a multi-year commitment. Find the clause. Calendar the deadline.

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Your severance agreement asks you to release every claim against your employer. Most people treat that line as boilerplate. It isn't. If your termination raises a red flag, that release may be the most expensive concession you sign.

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A severance release doesn't just end your employment. It can end a discrimination claim, a retaliation claim, or a wage claim you never got to raise. Once signed, that leverage is gone for good. Review the timeline of your termination before you review the payment.

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What did you unknowingly give away when you signed your severance? Every release waives claims tied to your termination. If a complaint, accommodation request, or protected leave came right before, that release may have cost you real leverage. Ask before you sign, not after.

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When your attorney negotiates your severance, your employer hears from a professional, not from you. The personal history disappears. What's left is a business transaction between two parties who understand the process.

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Most professionals hear "non-negotiable" and stop. Experienced counsel hears it and sends a specific, professional counteroffer. The outcomes are very different.

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Before accepting a severance offer framed as non-negotiable, remember: the offer isn't final until you sign it. What happens between now and your signature is entirely up to you.

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First pass reviewing your employment agreement: flag everything unfamiliar, broad, or that survives the end of employment. Second pass: prioritize by financial stakes. Make sure you understand what you’re signing.

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Most professionals review an employment agreement once, quickly, and sign it. The clauses that cost them most are the ones they didn't know to look for.

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The goal isn't just to read your employment agreement more carefully. It's to know what you're looking for before you start reading.

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Severance is a transaction. Your employer is asking you to accept career restrictions in exchange for a payout. If they initiated the separation, the case for broad restrictions is harder to make—and harder to enforce.

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A non-compete that only activates upon voluntary resignation is a fundamentally different restriction than one that applies regardless of how the relationship ended. That distinction is worth negotiating.