HN Explorer

Ask HN: I quit my job and my employer won’t take their equipment back

22 points by claviska ↗ HN
I quit my job effective April 19th and I still have the laptop, two monitors, and a box full of random peripherals (all unopened) the employer sent to me when I started. I should note that I explicitly asked them NOT to send me monitors and other hardware before I started, but they were sent anyway as part of an automated process I guess.

I’ve since asked multiple times to send these items back so I’m not held financially responsible for them. I finally got the company to send a box/return auth for the laptop, but when asking about the rest of the equipment, they responded with:

> Currently, our IT team is unable to accept items larger than laptops. Once offices have been deemed safe to re-open, Employee Experience and IT will communicate the next steps via your personal email address.

I don’t want the financial responsibility or the physical burden of storing and protecting this equipment anymore, but they refuse to let me send it back. What recourse do I have?

I just sent them an email with an ultimatum to either accept the items, forfeit them, or pay for me to insure and store them off site within 30 days. I don’t know if that will be enough to make them take their equipment back. Do I have any legal obligation to continue storing these items for an undetermined amount of time months after I’ve left the company? (The company is based in the U.S.)

50 comments

[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 103 ms ] thread
sarcasmatwork
Send a certified letter to the address/HR with what you said in the email. If nothing happens in the time frame its your equipment.

Once they accept that letter, it confirms they got it and can be held up in court from my understanding. With email, it's easy to say I did not get it or see it etc. Good luck!

paulcole
> If nothing happens in the time frame its your equipment.

The reality of this is going to vary wildly depending on local laws. Also, I’m guessing the employer has more lawyers than the person asking this question, so even being technically right can be costly/annoying.

sarcasmatwork
Solid point here that did not cross my mind at the time.

Also never hurts to see if you can get a free consult from a lawyer from your area.

cosmodisk
Let's be realistic here too: it will cost the company more just to use a lawyer to draft a letter than to abandon two monitors that probably cost a few hundred bucks tops. From the sound of it,nobody wants to deal with it in the company.
paulcole
Yeah I agree with this. But companies are used to wasting time and money. It’s much less of a disruption to the company than to an individual. The guy with the monitors/computers/whatever has less time, less money, and less knowledge — he’s got more to lose here.
ipaddr
He has more time, a record of attempting to give the unit back, no attempt from company at recovery on record and he probably has more knowledge because they probably forgot about the monitors.

A big company might fight you because they have a department a smaller company just used you to depose of equipment.

mardiyah
Why don't simply ask them to have legally signed written agreement that all the wares, at that final time point, will belong to you as they refused to take back
ksnape
Yeah, as stated -- either they take ownership and responsibility for the hardware, or it becomes your property if they fail to claim it. This sounds like a slippery slope to accidental situations involving damaged equipment returned months out of employment.

edit - To be frank, most Remote companies just write off the accessories. You return the big hardware, the laptop. The rest is yours, usually as it's budgeted and paid out differently than wage / bonus would be, so to claw it back is to get into hazy tax territory too.

claviska
> if they fail to claim it

Makes sense, but what is an acceptable threshold here? A month? A year? That’s the question.

version_five
I'm curious about this too. Exactly the same thing happened to me, and it took three months with multiple follow-ups for me to finally get the laptop (it was just a laptop for me) returned. I was about to move and like you was wondering what obligation I had to keep carrying this thing around with me. Luckily I got it resolved.

Personally, I would encourage remote companies to partner with groups that take laptops as donations for people that need them, and let you "return" it that way. My company paid for the laptop to be couriered across the country, plus I had to liase with 3 different people to organize the return. They'll still have to wipe it and whatnot when it gets back, and then they'll have a used laptop. Would be much more useful in the hands of a local kid or something.

Turing_Machine
I have no idea how the law stands here, but it is definitely a good idea to have everything in writing (certified mail, etc., as another poster said).

When I was in grad school, a professor I was working with left to take a job at another school. The university demanded that he account for a computer he'd been issued in 1985, which they had no record of him ever returning. They threatened to charge him several thousand bucks if it weren't returned. He noted that 1) 1985 was 15 or 20 computers ago and 2) even if he did still have the computer, it wouldn't be worth anything like the 1985 price (if it were worth anything at all). I believe he finally had to get his lawyer to bark at them to get them to back down.

So... yeah, make sure it gets taken care of some way. I wish I had some advice, but definitely don't let it slide.

readonthegoapp
i would imagine you can keep them, sell them, etc.

they're prob worth about $100 total, and shipping them would prob cost $300, so sell them or give them away, ideally to some poor kid.

someone at an acquired startup i was at said 'just keep it' about the macbook air i was using. nobody cares.

claviska
The cost of both monitors is over $700, and I’d estimate another $200-300 in peripherals that are new and unopened (I used my existing personal periphs). That’s market price. Their price may be higher, so I want to turn them in properly or at least get clear permission before donating them.
sloaken
A company I worked at 8 years ago, stopped tracking monitors as an asset. It was felt the cost of tracking exceeded the value. I assume because no one ever bothered to steal one.

If the total market price is $1000, I would assume they got a deal and paid ~500.

How much would it cost to just ship them back yourself? Because that is basically what they did to you. Over your objections they sent them. Over their objections you returned them.

claviska
They haven’t given me an address. The laptop is going to a third-party processor with a return auth. I’ve been told there’s nobody in the company’s office to accept shipments due to COVID so they’d likely be returned to me.
willcipriano
Look up your states abandoned property law, you'll have to inform them that you have it and don't want it and after a certain time it will typically become yours.
claviska
They’re in a different state than me, so I’m not sure which jurisdiction’s law(s) would apply.
willcipriano
Not a lawyer but this would be a small claims matter, if they wanted to sue they would have to do so in your state. Practically speaking you can do whatever you want because they aren't likely to travel to your state for that amount.
torstenvl
> if they wanted to sue they would have to do so in your state

Not always true. Careful. Some states don't allow you to sue out-of-state defendants in small claims (e.g., North Carolina, last I checked), but some states do (e.g., Virginia, again, last I checked), so long as they have constitutionally sufficient contacts with the state.

Spooky23
I’d be cautious. It’s fairly common for companies to establish venue by contract.
[deleted]
(comment deleted)
f2000
Put it in your garage/closet and forget about it. Life is too short! If they want their stuff back they'll figure it out.
askafriend
This reads like a parody. Just keep them - nothing is gonna happen. Do you realize how much of a rounding error your silly monitors and random peripherals are for the company?
brundolf
Depends how big it is. If it's a 12-person startup and OP has multiple 4k monitors, that's not nothing.
weird-eye-issue
They said two, that's not multiple
jobigoud
Multiple

adjective Having, relating to, or consisting of more than one individual, element, part, or other component; manifold.

weird-eye-issue
Interesting, I'm seeing "having or involving several parts, elements, or members." And "several" means more than two
askafriend
This is the one of the most Hacker Newsy comment chains I've read....
askafriend
Nah - he's talking about $1k worth of stuff, maybe $2k max. Clearly the startup doesn't give a shit enough to track it down. On top of that they're human - they'll forget and move on.

I mean come on, people in this thread are talking about lawyers....as if it's even worth the bathroom time of a single lawyer.

claviska
The company in question has 10,000+ employees.
rPlayer6554
What are you doing asking for this advice on HN. If you think it could actually be a legal issue contact a lawyer. They can tell you if you have liability and help you write the email.
trcarney
If you don't want to contact a lawyer directly, you can probably find some sort of a help line that deals with legal issues in regards to employee relations. They should at least be able to give you a good idea as to what your next steps should be.
claviska
Chances are, I’m not the first person this has happened to. I’m looking for prior experiences that may help before jumping into a potentially expensive attorney consultation.
smarri
Same happened to me. I just treat it as my own property now.
claviska
How long has it been? Did the company eventually reach out to claim it?
smarri
3 months, no they haven't and I've spoken to the owner of the company since then. They aren't worried about it at all as far as I can tell.
znpy
Just send them in anyway.
claviska
I have not been given an address. The laptop box has a preprinted sticker but it’s being sent to a third-party for processing, not the company. Without a return auth, they’d likely refuse the shipment.
dave_sid
Can you sell them on ebay?
claviska
I could, but I’d rather donate them to a local school or library. I just don’t want to be billed full price for it eventually.
8b16380d
Just sell or get rid of it. No company is going to legally go after you for some accessories.
claviska
I doubt they care about the keyboard and mouse and all that, but surely they’d want two fairly pricey monitors back.
runawaybottle
Lol just throw that shit away unless your worked for the government. All that stuff could have gotten lost in the mail, what are they really going to do about it?

They pretty much told you they don’t care what you do with it.

claviska
I’d like to donate it but I don’t want to pay for it should they choose to attempt recovery at some random date in the future.
jklein11
How about this.. you send me the equipment. Tell your company you are sending it to me for storage and they can reach out to me when they are ready to receive it. I’ll charge you $100 for this service.
nt2h9uh238h
Just send it to them, anyway :)
Broken_Hippo
I know this was a joke, but... Heck, no. Shipping is expensive.
notahacker
Unless they're incredibly bulky, I'd leave them where they were (maybe even keep using the monitors) until they took reasonable steps to reclaim them

Collection is their problem, as is them not being insured. If something insurable happens to your home, frankly someone else's monitors are the least of your concerns and you'll likely have the paperwork from insurance claims on your own stuff to prove it. If it doesn't and the items just don't work next time they plug them in, that's their problem and not one they're likely to waste time and money following up with you over.

Gibbon1
You are 100% correct. If they don't steps to collect, then they have abandoned their stuff. And people don't have a right to store stuff in your house.

My take is whoever is responsible for the companies assets doesn't want to deal with low value returned equipment.

claviska
Update: I pushed hard enough and FINALLY got confirmation that they are only collecting the laptop and I’m free to donate/discard the rest.

Thanks for your suggestions! Glad to have this behind me now.