my job offer fell through after I’d already resigned (and when I was about to move)

A reader writes:

I was offered a job last week, which was going to require a 2.5-hour move. I accepted as it’s a field I love and a company ownership I had worked for previously, just not at this location.

Yesterday the job fell through because the expected job salary budget didn’t come through. At all. I had been waiting on paperwork to 100% make my hiring official. I even had a start date, which had been reiterated last week when they were waiting for the national leadership to send over the papers.

I am lucky that I was able to reverse my resignation at my current job. I’m also lucky that I figure I’m only out about $100. I had applied for and been accepted for an apartment but hadn’t signed a lease or even set up a moving truck.

Since I am not out much, I am naturally going to move on and merely grouse about the experience (they only let me know with a single text that the position was canceled!). But could I have had any recourse had I been out more money?

Oh no.

As a general rule, it’s best never to give notice at your existing job until the new job is 100% official, meaning that any paperwork has been signed and all contingencies are removed. Even then, something like this can still happen, but waiting lowers the risk of it.

As for legal recourse if you had been out more money or if you had actually moved: in most states you wouldn’t have legal recourse unless you could show the employer had operated with deliberately fraudulent intent.

There is a legal concept called “detrimental reliance,” where you would argue that you had relied on their offer to your detriment. Generally, though, courts mostly haven’t sided with those claims (largely because since employment is at-will, you also could have been fired on your first day without legal resource). That said, if you ever were in a situation where you were out a significant sum of money — or if you had already moved — it could be useful to talk with an employment lawyer to get their take.

An additional option you’d have in that situation would be to tell the employer that you’d relied on their offer and start date in good faith and lost $X as a result, and ask them to make it right. Their offer might have used language that would protect them from any legal obligation to make you whole (especially if it was clear things were not yet finalized), but it would be reasonable to try.

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