Should You Fire Missing Employees or is that Even Legal?

When you have an employee that fails to report to work and also fails to contact anyone to let them know what is going on, most employers will want to terminate them. Before you can fire a missing employee you must first determine if it is even legal to do it.

The first thing you need to do is to learn the laws in your state in regards to a missing employee and terminating them. The best way to learn this information is to ask an attorney what the laws are. You can also research online to learn more about the laws in your particular state.

The next thing that you must do is to investigate why that employee if failing to show up for work. There are many reasons why they could be missing such as hospitalization and medical conditions.

These two things can be tricky to deal with and you won’t be able to legally fire that employee until you know exactly what is going on. If you find yourself in this position with the employee then contact your attorney to be sure no laws get broken, but so that the situation can be resolved.

It is legal to terminate an employee if they have been missing for at least three days, but only if you have taken time to investigate. Not investigating and then just terminating them can land your company in a lot of legal hot water later on.

That is why it is imperative to understand exactly what the laws are so you can be sure to follow them for terminating the employee that is missing. Send out a registered letter to the employee or contact them on the phone. If you can’t find the employee for some reason, you can use a third-party service to do an employee locator search. Just surf employee locator for this service.

If you get a reply from the employee, then be sure to put their response in their HR file. If there is no response, then also put that information in their file.

Be sure and make notes about what actions were taken by your company to contact the missing employee because this may be needed in the future if you terminate an employee and then they contest that termination in a court of law.

You will have proof that your company made every attempt possible to contact them and this can save you from legal troubles you don’t need or want.

It is definitely legal to fire missing employee, but only after you have taken the proper steps to be sure that it is being done legally and that there are not circumstances that prevent you from firing them. Always do your investigating first before taking any action so you can be sure you are not breaking any laws in your state for firing a missing employee.