Working for client afterwards

sultan123

I have been approached a for a role in a company that provides services to a number of clients. This company are very keen to get me on board.

The company have said any clients that work with the company have a clause in that if they were to try and employ me in future, it would mean they would have to pay the company 12 months worth of my wages as essentially a fine. 

As the client base is very broad, even if I wanted to move on I would not be able to really. Is there a way of asking the company to put something in my contract allowing me to work for a client without any fines should I ever wish to move on.

Grumpy_chap

sultan123 said:

I have been approached a for a role in a company that provides services to a number of clients. This company are very keen to get me on board.

The company have said any clients that work with the company have a clause in that if they were to try and employ me in future, it would mean they would have to pay the company 12 months worth of my wages as essentially a fine. 

As the client base is very broad, even if I wanted to move on I would not be able to really. Is there a way of asking the company to put something in my contract allowing me to work for a client without any fines should I ever wish to move on.

It is a fairly standard type of anti-poaching clause / finders fee.
It would not be you paying the fee, but the end Client.
It also only relates to you taking a job with the end Client you are engaged and providing services for.

Sultan is employed by Consultant A.
Through Consultant A, Sultan provides a regular service for Client B (or, maybe Clients B, C, D & E).
Consultant A also has Clients F, G, H, I, J, K & M

Sultan could leave the Consultant A and take employments with any of the Clients that Sultan has not worked for via Consultant A.
Even for the Clients that Sultan has worked for through Consultant A, the constraint is often only applied to the same role but direct rather than via the Consultant A and not broad enough to cover any and every role at the Client organisation.  For example, say Sultan provides services to the NHS via Consultant A.  The NHS is such a large organisation that the "poaching" would usually only apply to the same part of the NHS, not the whole organisation.

sultan123

Grumpy_chap said:

sultan123 said:

I have been approached a for a role in a company that provides services to a number of clients. This company are very keen to get me on board.

The company have said any clients that work with the company have a clause in that if they were to try and employ me in future, it would mean they would have to pay the company 12 months worth of my wages as essentially a fine. 

As the client base is very broad, even if I wanted to move on I would not be able to really. Is there a way of asking the company to put something in my contract allowing me to work for a client without any fines should I ever wish to move on.

It is a fairly standard type of anti-poaching clause / finders fee.
It would not be you paying the fee, but the end Client.
It also only relates to you taking a job with the end Client you are engaged and providing services for.

Sultan is employed by Consultant A.
Through Consultant A, Sultan provides a regular service for Client B (or, maybe Clients B, C, D & E).
Consultant A also has Clients F, G, H, I, J, K & M

Sultan could leave the Consultant A and take employments with any of the Clients that Sultan has not worked for via Consultant A.
Even for the Clients that Sultan has worked for through Consultant A, the constraint is often only applied to the same role but direct rather than via the Consultant A and not broad enough to cover any and every role at the Client organisation.  For example, say Sultan provides services to the NHS via Consultant A.  The NHS is such a large organisation that the "poaching" would usually only apply to the same part of the NHS, not the whole organisation.

Thanks for this.

However the client may be put off with having to pay a fee. Also I will be doing some form of work for all clients of the company. Also my role is very specific so if the client wanted me it is 99.9% likely to be for same role I am doing for company.

Is there a way of asking company to put something in my.contract which says I am free to work for clients. Company really want me but if it doesn't work out, I don't fancy being out of job

MalMonroe

You said - "The company have said any clients that work with the company have a clause in that if they were to try and employ me in future, it would mean they would have to pay the company 12 months worth of my wages as essentially a fine. "

As Grumpy_chap has said, above, it's fairly normal for a company who introduces an employee to clients to charge a fee. I've worked for temporary agencies in the past and have been offered permanent posts with the clients I've been sent to but the agency has charged said clients an introduction fee. And some of them can be pretty steep charges, too, so I have been flattered in the past by the faith that employers put in me.

However, you would be basically asking the company to treat you as a special case and not charge clients if they wanted to employ you on a permanent basis. You can always ask them not to include that stipulation in your contract, there's no harm in trying but it's doubtful that the company would want to forfeit any introduction fee if you were to be offered a job by one - or more - of the clients you were working for. Any client may be put off by having to pay a fee, that's understandable but if you are that valuable to them, they will be willing to pay it. 

Grumpy_chap's illustration, above, is spot on. 

But it seems that you will need to have a proper meeting with the company to discuss exactly what it is that will be expected of you - since you say 'it is 99.9% likely to be' for the same role - and it doesn't appear to be quite clear - and also ask if they would consider not charging the client a fee. They may be willing to negotiate a fee that isn't quite as much as 12 months' salary but you won't know if you don't ask.

Good luck.

DullGreyGuy

sultan123 said:

I have been approached a for a role in a company that provides services to a number of clients. This company are very keen to get me on board.

The company have said any clients that work with the company have a clause in that if they were to try and employ me in future, it would mean they would have to pay the company 12 months worth of my wages as essentially a fine. 

As the client base is very broad, even if I wanted to move on I would not be able to really. Is there a way of asking the company to put something in my contract allowing me to work for a client without any fines should I ever wish to move on.

What does your personal contract state? Some companies double dip and have something in both the client and employees contracts. If there is anything in your contract then you have the potential to try and negotiate it away.

Most likely each client will have signed a Master Service Agreement which will have the anti-poaching terms and then sign a Statement of Work for each engagement they have. You'll have almost no chance of getting your potential employer to renegotiate every MSA to put a carve-out  in it for you unless you are a senior executive or leading expert 

Businesses are used to paying fees to recruitment agencies, consultancies etc, the reality will be there will be negotiations were a client to want to take you on directly... if the contract value is worth £5m per annum to your employers they are unlikely to be willing to give that up just to get the £100k finder fee (or whatever 1 year of your salary is) when the client says they'll look elsewhere for the services. 

DE_612183

It's a standard clause, however the company you work for may not want to annoy one of their clients - if a client poaches you, the company may still have lucrative contracts with that client that they would not want to lose.

I've been in this position, and even though the company were slightly annoyed, they didn't want to rock the boat as they got quite a lot of work from that company.

Grumpy_chap

sultan123 said:

Is there a way of asking company to put something in my.contract which says I am free to work for clients. 

Yes, you can ask for anything.
If I understand the position correctly, you are not yet employed by the Consultant "A" and are finalising the contract with them.
I don't understand why the Consultant "A" would consider your request to provide a uniquely one-off contract.  The message I would take if I was the employer was that you were simply using their period of employment to raise your profile and provide you with contacts to whom you can seek a higher salary a little while down the line.  If I received that message, not only would I not agree the change to the standard contract, I would withdraw the current offer also.

sultan123 said:

I will be doing some form of work for all clients of the company. Also my role is very specific so if the client wanted me it is 99.9% likely to be for same role I am doing for company.

If your skills and experience are so unique, I assume you are already a "name" in your field and therefore unsure why you are not already directly in contact with the end Clients who should be flattered by your willingness to consider providing your services to them and fighting to secure your service over their competitors and you are able to name your price.

Marcon

Why not pay for some proper legal advice, from a solicitor who has seen the contract, and on whose advice you can rely (not least to be covered by PI if it's wrong).

sultan123

Slightly diff question but how hard is it to enforce anti competition clauses. For example if I work at a place where you do 3 months nice and 3 months more not to work at competitior

Bobbobbobingalong

You might consider it this way, in comparison to them how deep are your pockets if it comes down to a fight between you, your legal team and theirs?

Marcon

sultan123 said:

Slightly diff question but how hard is it to enforce anti competition clauses. For example if I work at a place where you do 3 months nice and 3 months more not to work at competitior

Depends. Asking on a free website where nobody is insured to answer you and hasn't got any of the relevant facts isn't going to give you an answer you can rely on.