DEAR CARRIE: My son was hired at a private lab, and as part of his hiring bonus he received 5,000 shares of company stock. A year and a half later, he was fired and the shares were taken back. Is that legal?
DEAR ILLEGAL: That depends on the circumstances, an employment attorney said.
"If the shares were given as a hiring bonus, with no strings attached, then it would be against the law for the lab to take them back," said Richard Kass, a partner at Bond, Schoeneck & King in Manhattan. "But I suspect that this was part of a deferred compensation plan that included a vesting schedule. That would mean that the employee does not have a right to keep the shares unless he remains employed for a set amount of time, typically three years."
So your son should take another look at the agreement he signed to see what he is entitled to, if anything.
