A Contractor is Not an "Employee," even though they are "Employed"
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Earlier I wrote how the dear john letter for a fired employee is a critical part of running a business. As I mentioned, failure to document the fact an actual "firing" took place can create several adverse results, not the least of which is an unemployment insurance claim.
The flipside of that situation can cause as much angina. And that's because "fun with words" becomes anything but in the legal world. What do you call employee who is not an "employee"? A "contractor". However, if that distinction is not put into writing at the outset, over time the repeated innocent use of the word "employ" that creeps into emails and other documents may blur that line. So while you meant "employ" in the sense of "engage" or "employee" in the sense of "contractor", when it comes time to let that person go they may not see things in the same light.
We've unfortunately seen too many situations where a contractor did not have a contract and upon termination that contractor filed an unemployment claim. Moral of this short story: in any relationship from dating to human resource management, having the other party know where they stand will keep the visits to the medicine cabinet few and far between.
The flipside of that situation can cause as much angina. And that's because "fun with words" becomes anything but in the legal world. What do you call employee who is not an "employee"? A "contractor". However, if that distinction is not put into writing at the outset, over time the repeated innocent use of the word "employ" that creeps into emails and other documents may blur that line. So while you meant "employ" in the sense of "engage" or "employee" in the sense of "contractor", when it comes time to let that person go they may not see things in the same light.
We've unfortunately seen too many situations where a contractor did not have a contract and upon termination that contractor filed an unemployment claim. Moral of this short story: in any relationship from dating to human resource management, having the other party know where they stand will keep the visits to the medicine cabinet few and far between.
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