Employee handbook | Drew Capuder's Employment Law Blog

Part 2 of a series on West Virginia employment law

This article follows up my prior blog article, The Employment at Will Rule in West Virginia. In that article, I explained the basic contours of the employment at will rule.

With the employment at will rule radiating in the background, there are many ways it can be modified or bypassed. All claims relating to discrimination and retaliation, for example, modify the rule to the extent an exception is created by which the employer may not terminate the rule for a specific reason, such as age.

Scenarios: handbooks and other promises

But this article focuses on contractual or contract-like limitations on the employment at will rule. The parties (employer and employee) can enter into a formal employment contract that modifies the employment at will rule. But I am not addressing that formal contract in this article. I am really trying to focus on two scenarios:

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Part 1 of a series on West Virginia employment law

This blog article is the first part of a series I will write on employment law in West Virginia, with a focus on litigation issues relating to alleged wrongful discharge.

I will start with the employment at will rule, and will carry through with articles on the numerous exceptions to the employment at will rule.

What is the employment at will rule?

The courts have long had a love-hate relationship with the employment at will rule. West Virginia, like virtually all other states, adheres to the rule.

So, what is the employment at will rule? For convenience, I will define it in terms of the right to end or terminate the employment relationship, but more about that definition in a moment. And more below about the big qualification on the rule.

One way to state the rule is that both parties to the employment relationship, the employer and the employer, have the right to terminate the employment relationship at any time and for any reason (but not for an illegal reason, and that is discussed below). It is important to understand that those are the two essential attributes of the rule: to terminate the employment relationship (1) at any time, and (2) for any reason. Both sides (employer and employee) have that right, although the right is almost always examined in terms of the employer’s right in wrongful discharge litigation.

West Virginia’s description of the rule

In the context of termination (more about that later) the employment at will rule has been described in West Virginia this way: the rule allows an employer to terminate an employee for:

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