A Mississippi-based furniture company, United Furniture Industries, has become a bad Samaritan for its employees just before Thanksgiving.
The company fired almost 2,700 employees in text messages and emails.
The company’s employees, spread across North Carolina, Mississippi, and California, were unemployed before Thanksgiving.
“At the instruction of the board of directors, we regret to inform you that due to unforeseen business circumstances, the company has been forced to make the difficult decision to terminate the employment of all its employees, effective immediately, on Nov. 21,” the message read, as quoted by the New York Post.
“With the exception of over-the-road drivers that are out on delivery. Your layoff from the company is expected to be permanent and all benefits will be terminated immediately without provision of COBRA,” the message added.
Earlier this year, the company fired its chief executive, chief financial officer, and executive vice president of sales.
“It’s not fair to the laborers who seriously worked so hard to be blindsided like this. It’s not fair to the mom who just had a baby to wonder if she even has health insurance to cover it. It’s not fair to the cancer patient amid chemo about how to pay for her treatments,” the Post quoted one of the laid-off employees as saying.
United Furniture Industries is now facing a class-action lawsuit for not giving workers proper notice of the firings, it remains unclear what led to the company’s sudden step of mass layoffs and the ceasing of operations.
Source: Yahoo Finance
The calculated coldness of the timing and wording of this notice is ugly. While this appears to violate Federal law requiring specific advance notice of mass layoff’s this large, it’s unclear if a meaningful remedy will be available. Unsecured assets may have been exhausted.