Can I be sued for a Facebook review?
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Can I be sued for a Facebook review?
My postNot a good place to work. If the manager doesn’t like you, she fires you. There was no front desk person the day I started nobody knew how to do the job. I learned it on on my own in the 3 weeks I was there. Her reason for letting me go,
Asked on September 9, 2017 under Employment Labor Law, Texas
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 7 years ago | Contributor
Yes, you could be: what you describe is partly defamation. Defamation is making an untrue statement of fact which damages another's reputation (including the reputations of both people and businesses). You can safely say it was not a good place to work--that is an opinion, and an opinion is not defamation.
But saying the manager fires you if she doesn't like you is a factual assertion: it states the the manager fires (a provable act) *anyone* whom she does not like. Find any employees whom she does not personally like who have not been fired, and this is a false factual assertion--that is, it may be defamation. Never make any factual assertion which may be proven false on social media.
For reference: unless you had a written employment contract protecting or guarantying your job (e.g. a one-year contract), you were an "employee at will" and could be fired at any time, for any reason, including during your probationary period. There is no right to a job without a contract.
And saying someone is not the "right person" is a common and perfectly acceptable reason or ground to fire someone: an employer does not need to keep anyone they don't think is appropriate or right for a position, even if that is just based on their gut instinct or subjective impression. Remember: you don't have a right to a job; they do have the right to terminate you.
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