Did Your Employer Go Against the Contract That You Both Signed?
If you’ve been wrongfully terminated from your previous job, you may enlist the help of a Los Angeles workplace lawyer to sue your former employer. You’ll be suing for what is called damages. In most of these cases, the only type of damages that get awarded is monetary.
While this may be what you’re looking for, it’s essential to realize that a jury isn’t just going to award you a lot of cash for no reason. Monetary damages are meant to make the plaintiff whole again after being fired. The monetary amount will be enough to compensate you for what you’ve lost due to the actions of your former employer.
What Exactly Are Damages?
All Los Angeles wrongful termination lawyers will tell you that wrongful termination falls underneath the civil sector of the law. These types of civil lawsuits have two main parties.
Plaintiff: the party usually seeking compensation from a negligent employer or company.
Defendant: the party held accountable for their actions, responsible for paying damages to the plaintiff.
Many people think of damages as compensation. It’s the amount of money that a plaintiff gets compensated if the termination was considered wrongful in a court of law. Now, you must have a valid listing of the types of losses you suffered and a reasonable amount for each.
That is where lawyers for unlawful firings in Los Angeles can come into play. They can assist you in coming up with the appropriate amount of damages to request. Before presenting your case, it would help if you had a proper breakdown of compensation. Here are some of the critical elements that you can include with your monetary damages.
Lost Pay
Any lawyer for unlawful firings in Los Angeles will tell you that lost pay will be the first area of compensation that you’ll need to calculate. Think of this as, essentially, the pay you would’ve gotten had you been still employed. You’ll also want to include any back wages, overtime, or other forms of earned compensation that your employer has not compensated.
Lawyers who handle wrongful termination in Los Angeles will always consider the amount of money you earned after your termination from another employer. This amount of money should get deducted from the total lost wages calculated in the previous step. If you were re-hired after the wrongful termination, you’d need to subtract that pay as well.
One specific scenario that people can run into is being re-hired by the company. However, they end up receiving a lower pay rate than they once were. You can still file for lost wages during your re-hiring period. To do so, deduct what you currently made from what you would’ve made at your old salary level.
Lost Benefits
The next area of damages that your Los Angeles workplace lawyer will look into calculating is the amount of benefits you lost after termination. Since benefits don’t come with a direct face value, it’s essential to consult an experienced unjust termination at work lawyer in LA to help. They can use their years of experience and knowledge of previous cases to construct an actual dollar amount for each item in your settlement. Expected benefits include dental insurance, medical insurance, 401k plans, profit sharing, and stock options.
Emotional Distress
Emotional distress is one area that your Los Angeles wrongful termination lawyers will likely try to get damages for. In most cases, you’ll need to enlist a mental health professional to provide expert witness advice to your lawsuit. They will assist your attorney in proving that the firing greatly affected your mental state.
Most times, damages for emotional distress only get awarded in cases where employers have acted egregiously. It’s hard to predict the exact amount of money that a plaintiff will be awarded for pain and suffering as it’s entirely up to the specific jury presiding over the case.
Punitive Damages
Punitive damages are those that are inflicted on the defendant as a way to punish them and deter them from practicing a similar behavior in the future. These types of damages are not commonly instituted in wrongful termination cases. Punitive damages will not reimburse the plaintiff for any losses they incurred from their wrongful termination. They’re solely meant as a form of punishment for the defendant.
Money for Lawyer Fees
Did you know we could incorporate attorney fees into your settlement? Many lawyers take wrongful termination cases on a contingent fee basis—that is, no win, no fee. An attorney will address their fee structure and how much money they would expect from the settlement after the consultation.
At our employment firm, we provide you with an initial consultation for free. An initial consultation is an excellent idea to consider to get a decent ballpark of what your damages will likely be. No lawyers that handle wrongful termination in Los Angeles are going to be willing to take on your case without wanting a commission. Most will charge about 10 percent of your case winnings as their commission fee.
Things To Consider When Filing A Lawsuit
Before pursuing a lawsuit, you should ensure that it is worth it. It would be best to exhaust all other options to resolve the issue before getting involved legally. Legal suits are expensive, time-consuming, and emotionally draining.
The company that you are suing will fight back. Even with the best wrongful termination lawyers on your side, it is a risk. However, they will increase your chances of getting a reasonable settlement; they cannot guarantee it.
If you were wrongfully terminated from one job but quickly found another—for the same pay—then you may want to avoid litigation. If this is not the case, filing a lawsuit may be a prudent move if you have suffered material loss.
If you have faced wrongful termination, turn to a legal team with a high success rate, like Mann & Elias. We want what’s best for our clients!