Summary
holding that employee had good cause to leave where employer did not follow through on express promise that employee would get a pay raise
Summary of this case from Vermette v. H M EnterprisesOpinion
No. 298-76
Opinion Filed September 12, 1977
Unemployment Compensation — Employment Termination — By Employer With Good Cause
Where employer promised a pay raise but never gave one, employee's quitting work amounted to good cause attributable to the employer, and he was entitled to unemployment compensation benefits.
Unemployment compensation case. Employment Security Board, Davidson, Chairman, presiding. Reversed and remanded.
Alan P. Biederman, Vermont Legal Aid, Inc., Rutland, for Plaintiff.
David M. Wilson, Montpelier, for Defendant.
Present: Barney, C.J., Daley, Larrow, Billings, and Hill, JJ.
The plaintiff was denied unemployment compensation on the ground that he left his employment voluntarily without good cause attributable to the employer. The facts concededly establish that the employer expressly indicated that the plaintiff would get a pay raise. After several months passed from the first raise request, punctuated by various temporizing promises, as well as a firm statement of intent to give a raise from the employer, the plaintiff was told that he would not get any increase. He thereupon quit.
The department analogized this case to a situation where there was an expectation of a pay raise, rather than a promise or contractual obligation. See DeSantis v. Board of Review, 149 N.J. Super. 35, 372 A.2d 1362, 1364 (1977). The findings of fact clearly place the expected raise into the class of an employer's promise. The department's claim of condonation because the plaintiff worked at the lower wage for a period of time awaiting fulfillment of the promise cannot stand because the employer induced the expectation that led the plaintiff to continue his service.
Since the facts acknowledged to be applicable by the department compromise the conclusion reached by the board in this case, the judgment must be overturned.
Judgment reversed and cause remanded for computation of benefits.