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Comment by ggregoire | Hacker News Reader

I'm always amazed with these stories.

Here in France, and probably lot of places in Europe, a 3-months notice period is required after informing your employer of your resignation. During this period, you finish the things you started, they find your substitute, you train your substitute, they write all the legal papers properly, you prepare for your next job and so on.

3 months can be long but the working conditions become super cool (e.g. 10-4 instead of 9-5).

The same conditions apply if your employer fires you (which is relatively rare, unless you commit serious misconduct). You stay 1 or 2 more months in the company after being informed, so you can find another job before leaving.

(Note: during the first months in the company, you are in a trial period so these rules don't apply. You leave when you want and they fire you when they want.)

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And as a consequence employers in France are reluctant as hell to employ people in permanent positions (indeterminate length contracts), because employment is basically marriage.

(I have a fairly biased view, half my colleagues are people who have left France partly because they preferred the freer job market here.)

Here in Canada in certain professions there are additional requirements. As a licensed engineer you cannot just leave at any time; you cannot put your projects in jeopardy. (Software devs / "engineers" are not generally licensed engineers.)

It's a decent system, for a lot of jobs 3 months is too much.

The 3 month notice period doesn't make it difficult to dismiss staff.

The rules about dismissing staff make it difficult to dismiss staff, and aren't much affected by the notice period.

I'm a frenchman who left for the US.

The 3-month long notice period does indeed sound insane, but it's not the reason it's hard to hire people. In fact, you got cause-and-effect the wrong way around.

It's hard to fire people, which is why employers are hesitant to hire (and why the contractor business is so large). So as an employee, you're relatively safe. In return, the employer is relatively safe from an employee up-and-leaving, thanks to the 3-month notice.

Of course, the secondary effects are huge: because the hiring market is less fluid, people will stick around bad situations longer, both employees and employers, with expected consequences. I won't detail them here, in case my anecdotal experience doesn't entirely match country-level trends. For example, it can be argued that if you're more strongly tied to a job you'll make more effort to improve things rather than just leave.

> It's hard to fire people, which is why employers are hesitant to hire (and why the contractor business is so large)

Yes that's precisely what I meant. I said employers were reluctant to hire, not that it was hard. Not sure what made you think I disagree with this.

>Here in France, and probably lot of places in Europe, when you make the decision to leave, you have to stay 3 more months after informing your employer.

Seriously? You are required to stay for three months? That seems like it could be suffocating in some instances.

Yes it's required but you can negotiate a shorter notice period.

If your employer refuses to apply the notice period, you are entitled to financial compensation (3 months of salary).

https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F2883

Not required at all. Most contracts in the UK have a 6 week period, although 3 months is fairly common. It is usually easily negotiated down.

Wouldn't negotiating down this delay make your employer think that you plan to leave the company shortly after joining?

it can. You also have to keep in mind that the shorter delay counts for both sides, so they can fire you faster as well

It depends on seniority and sometimes the length of employment.

As "Junior Developer" in Britain my notice period was one month, it increased to three months when I was promoted, and has stayed at three months in successive jobs.

If my employer wants to make me redundant, they legally must give one week's notice per year employed. However, my contracts have increased that to one month (Junior) and three months (after). It's their decision whether they make me come in to work or not.

(Also, paid holiday still accumulates, so 3 months probably gives another 3-4 days holiday.)

The only exception is gross misconduct, e.g. assaulting another employee, or stealing from the business. Employees can be dismissed immediately in this case, with zero notice.

http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=4096

In the UK its usually either 1 or 3 months. Depends on the contract.

In france; its 3.

Understand that trade was made for greater job security. His employer must also provide him with a similar level of notice in exchange. Business leaders in the US opted out of such protections in order to be able to fire more easily.

It can be, but in the same time it leaves everyone some time to handle the transition. You can always negotiate the 3month period.

Very common clause in Norway.

That's not inconsistent with OP's case though.

It sounds like France has a national (presumably minimum) notice period. In the UK, and I imagine many places (but then, I'm sure we all imagine 'many places' are like our own...) it varies, and typically is longer the more senior you are or time spent at the company (as obviously there's more 'wrapping up' to do, like you describe).

OP describes having given notice, pushed back by a week in order to finish the project, and it still not being due for completion on time. We don't know how much notice they gave initially, perhaps 3mo exactly as you're accustomed to, perhaps not.

Every case I've seen it (about 10y ago) essentially turns into a light-work and ultimately a severance package (ie, 1mo for transition, 2mo collect a paycheck don't come into the office).

Required? How's that work? What happens if you absolutely must be out of there right now? Slavery is illegal in most civilized countries. In the US, 2 weeks is fairly standard, but as a professional courtesy. You are perfectly free to just stop coming in whenever, though it's kind of a jerk move to your current employer.

The same way all contracts work in every civilized country. If you sign a contract and violate it you are penalized in some way, usually that way is specified in the contract (e.g. fined a certain sum of money). Not sure how this can in any way be equated to "slavery".

I looked this up a while back out of curiosity. Based on what I read, if you just stop coming in, the company is entitled to come after you for damages although, in practice, this probably doesn't happen.

If you have any accrued benefits you can lose them this way, they may not need to take any action.

For example, in New Zealand many employment contracts have an abandonment clause that basically says if you don't show up for 3 days, the contract is terminated and you've forfeited any accrued leave or other benefits they might have owed you otherwise.

I've sort of wondered about European required notice periods - what happens if you just stop going?

But more seriously, how do they hire a replacement in that time period if the replacement also (presumably) needs to give three-months notice?

Dane here. I have to give current month + 1 month notice (the result is that everybody gives the notice on the last workday of that month) and I have 3 or 4 months of warning if I am being laid of.

However, there is an out in that I can be terminated immediately if I commit a serious infraction (steal from the company, forge documents, or something of that nature) or if I don't show up at all.

Longer notice periods can be agreed on, but then it has to be mutual, e.g if they double my notice period, their notice period is also doubled.

UK based so soon to be not Europe, but I'm used to 1 month.

I've also seen +1 month for every 5 years of service, so 9 years = 3 months, 11 = 4 etc.

3 for front-line staff seems excessive

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