Colin Wilson wrote:

The courts are generally unwilling to enforce clauses restricting
employees' ability to change employment.
Six months *anywhere* is probably too wide-ranging to be
enforceable; six months *within 20 miles* is probably enforceable
- depending on where you are, if you only have one major town
within 20 miles it might still be too restrictive.

IANAL and just thinking out loud...

Should there not be some sort of remuneration agreement in such
cases for the interim period - without such, could a previous
employment contract be enforced ?

It's part of the original contract, so presumably the consideration is
included in whatever the employee receives while working at the
company.

Stu

On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Marco wrote:

My wife's employment contract has a clause which can be interpreted
(the wording is not very clear) as saying that if she leaves the
company she cannot work for a competing firm for a period of six months
afterwards. Would such a clause be legally enforceable?

I worked for a company which had such a restriction in place for the
same period. It was found to be unenforceable and was struck out of
everyone's contract. I think it was because it would have unfairly
restricted people, who were skilled in a particular field, from working
in that field.

--
Chris

"Owain" wrote in message
...
Marco wrote:
My wife's employment contract has a clause which can be interpreted
(the wording is not very clear) as saying that if she leaves the
company she cannot work for a competing firm for a period of six months
afterwards. Would such a clause be legally enforceable?

The courts are generally unwilling to enforce clauses restricting
employees' ability to change employment.

Six months *anywhere* is probably too wide-ranging to be enforceable; six
months *within 20 miles* is probably enforceable - depending on where you
are, if you only have one major town within 20 miles it might still be too
restrictive.

I used to work in market research. There was an IT whizkid, Ed Ross, who had
been working in market research who we were waiting for to come back on the
market.

He was unable to work in the market research IT field for one or possibly
two years.

My boss and others eagerly awaited his release from purdah.

http://www.triple-s.org/sssauthr.htm says that Ed Ross started Quantime Ltd
in 1978, which _subsequently grew to become probably the largest supplier of
survey software and was sold to SPSS in 1997_.

Clearly his former employers were right in this case to recognise his
brilliance.

The bizarre thing is that he looks very little different to how I remember
him nearly 30 years ago ie an old hippy.

Nick

On Wed, 8 Nov 2006 00:30:06 +0000, "Nick"
wrote:


"Owain" wrote in message
...
Marco wrote:
My wife's employment contract has a clause which can be interpreted
(the wording is not very clear) as saying that if she leaves the
company she cannot work for a competing firm for a period of six months
afterwards. Would such a clause be legally enforceable?

The courts are generally unwilling to enforce clauses restricting
employees' ability to change employment.

Six months *anywhere* is probably too wide-ranging to be enforceable; six
months *within 20 miles* is probably enforceable - depending on where you
are, if you only have one major town within 20 miles it might still be too
restrictive.

I used to work in market research. There was an IT whizkid, Ed Ross, who had
been working in market research who we were waiting for to come back on the
market.

He was unable to work in the market research IT field for one or possibly
two years.


That would certainly not have been enforceable.

It is too wide, and too long a period.



--
Alex Heney, Global Villager
FIGHT BACK! Fill out your tax forms with Roman numerals.
To reply by email, my address is alexATheneyDOTplusDOTcom

As it's a contract of employment, when your employment ends, doesn't the
contract too! Just wondered like...
And in any case, what would/could happen? They sue you for damages of some kind?

Yes but certain things continue, like company or government secrets.
Employees when leaving us have to sign to say they acknowledge these
things must be kept secret after they leave.

Tommo wrote:
Mike wrote:


As it's a contract of employment, when your employment ends, doesn't the
contract too! Just wondered like...
And in any case, what would/could happen? They sue you for damages of some kind?

Their primary remedy that they would seek would probably be an
injunction, but damages also.

The effect of such clauses does not only depend on whether they are
enforcable or not. The prospective new employer can easily be scared
off employing the person just by the thought of having to devote time
to a legal action.

Robert

Owain wrote:
The courts are generally unwilling to enforce clauses restricting
employees' ability to change employment.
Owain

Is this called "Restraint of Trade"? Our MD bangs on about this, that
you can't stop a person from earning a crust, even though you may want
to!

I had a slightly similar situation to the OP when I joined my current
employer from a competitor. Previous employer wanted me to carry on as
a "consultant" for them for 6 months after leaving whilst my
replacement became experienced, for which they would pay me.
A condition of this was that I must not tell my new employer about this
arrangement.
I was unhappy about doing something behind my new employers back and
wanted to do this only with their perrmission.

I consulted my solicitor who told me the previous employer's condition
was totally unreasonable as it could have jeopardised my trust with my
new employer, and would be unenforceable.

He advised to sign contract with old employer saying I wouldn't tell
new one, then go and tell new one! This I did and there was no
problem, but probably because old employer never found out!

Alex Heney wrote:
On Wed, 8 Nov 2006 00:30:06 +0000, "Nick"
wrote:


"Owain" wrote in message
...
Marco wrote:
My wife's employment contract has a clause which can be interpreted
(the wording is not very clear) as saying that if she leaves the
company she cannot work for a competing firm for a period of six months
afterwards. Would such a clause be legally enforceable?

The courts are generally unwilling to enforce clauses restricting
employees' ability to change employment.

Six months *anywhere* is probably too wide-ranging to be enforceable; six
months *within 20 miles* is probably enforceable - depending on where you
are, if you only have one major town within 20 miles it might still be too
restrictive.

I used to work in market research. There was an IT whizkid, Ed Ross, who had
been working in market research who we were waiting for to come back on the
market.

He was unable to work in the market research IT field for one or possibly
two years.


That would certainly not have been enforceable.

It is too wide, and too long a period.


For an 'normal 'employee', certainly. However, if this guy set up the
company, grew it to be a market-leader and then sold up, it could be
that it was a term of the SPA (Sale and Purchase Agreement) of the
business that he would stay out of competition for 1 or 2 years. In
this context I think the Court would see the legitimate reason for the
clause and would uphold it.

"Chris Lawrence" wrote in message
osys.wlan...
On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Marco wrote:

My wife's employment contract has a clause which can be interpreted
(the wording is not very clear) as saying that if she leaves the
company she cannot work for a competing firm for a period of six months
afterwards. Would such a clause be legally enforceable?

I worked for a company which had such a restriction in place for the
same period. It was found to be unenforceable and was struck out of
everyone's contract. I think it was because it would have unfairly
restricted people, who were skilled in a particular field, from working
in that field.

When I was offered one of these my solicitor said tojust sign it, as it was
totally unenforceable.

"Tommo" wrote in message
oups.com...

Alex Heney wrote:
On Wed, 8 Nov 2006 00:30:06 +0000, "Nick"
wrote:


"Owain" wrote in message
...
Marco wrote:
My wife's employment contract has a clause which can be interpreted
(the wording is not very clear) as saying that if she leaves the
company she cannot work for a competing firm for a period of six
months
afterwards. Would such a clause be legally enforceable?

The courts are generally unwilling to enforce clauses restricting
employees' ability to change employment.

Six months *anywhere* is probably too wide-ranging to be enforceable;
six
months *within 20 miles* is probably enforceable - depending on where
you
are, if you only have one major town within 20 miles it might still be
too
restrictive.

I used to work in market research. There was an IT whizkid, Ed Ross, who
had
been working in market research who we were waiting for to come back on
the
market.

He was unable to work in the market research IT field for one or
possibly
two years.


That would certainly not have been enforceable.

It is too wide, and too long a period.


For an 'normal 'employee', certainly. However, if this guy set up the
company, grew it to be a market-leader and then sold up, it could be
that it was a term of the SPA (Sale and Purchase Agreement) of the
business that he would stay out of competition for 1 or 2 years. In
this context I think the Court would see the legitimate reason for the
clause and would uphold it.

I doubt that the previous company was his own, rather that he was an
employee - albeit a whizkid employee.

The market research industry was at that time a very small one and everyone
knew everyone else.

I think that the fellow who is American would have been aware of his legal
rights - I imagine he was also a sharp businessman.

He knew that his product was a worldbeater but whilst he might have been
working on it at home, he might have had difficulty testing his ideas
because pre-PC he would have needed to test it on a mainframe.

Indeed the reason I knew of his purdah was that I heard my boss talking
about him before the time was up - he clearly had a high reputation and once
his purdah was up my company were knocking on his door.

In those circumstances, why upset people - and time did tell.

I left the company shortly afterwards and when I visited a few years later
(1981) all the researchers had a terminal on their desk and were editing
questionnaires themselves. This was before the PC revolution and was a
foretaste of things to come.

Naturally I don't know whether it was enforceable.

Nick