Court penalises recruiter for joining rival company
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A West Sussex recruiter says she faces bankruptcy after her former employer took out an injunction to enforce a restrictive agreement and a court awarded costs of £18,000 against her.
Salli Coburn left Crawley-based Search in May of this year. She took up a position with Hylton Bishop, a catering recruiter, which started trading in March of this year and is also based in Crawley. As the firm is a competitor to Search, taking the position breached a restrictive agreement Coburn had signed.
As is standard practice in the industry, the agreement stipulated that for a period of six months she was not allowed to approach Search clients. Coburn was also told she was not allowed to recruit any client or candidate within five miles of Search's office on High Street, Crawley.
Coburn told Recruiter: "I was aware that I was breaching the agreement, but I know of others who left Search and did exactly the same thing. Maybe the difference was that they went to longer-established companies. "She said the position was made even more difficult by the fact that she lives in Crawley.
Search also claimed £18,000 for the costs it had incurred in pursuing the matter and obtaining an injunction. An initial judgment in the High Court ruled that Coburn did not have to pay the costs. However, Search appealed against this and won.
Coburn said she is unlikely to be able to pay the costs, which could force her into bankruptcy. She told Recruiter she was worried about the "stigma"" of bankruptcy.
Search may look to recover the money from Hylton Bishop, which could force it into liquidation.
Coburn's solicitor, Catherine Turtle of Rawlison Butler, advised her: "While it may seem a bitter pill to swallow, I would recommend that you give some serious thought to trying to reach a deal with Search as regards the outstanding costs." Turtle said the restrictions imposed on her were "reasonable".
Chris Mason, company secretary of Search, said: ""I can't imagine any business not having these conditions. Coburn was in breach of them. We won't stand idly by and watch this happen."
In 2002, Coburn took up a position with Ashton Jones, which was taken over by Search in 2004.
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Readers' comments (1)
Louise Ogilvy | Wed, 29 Nov 2006 12:54 pm
I have read your article with interest and it raises one or two concerns for the recruitment industry. As a Managing Director of a recruitment to recruitment company, we are in the business of helping individuals to source new opportunities within the recruitment industry. We are often asked by individuals how they will be affected by any restrictive convenants and non competition clauses in their contracts. This is certainly a grey area. To provide a clear answer, surely there are certain factors that need to be taken in to consideration? Whilst I can see the importance of a company protecting it's business through protecting it's client and candidate base, surely the needs of the candidate should also be taken in to account? For example, a candidate who chooses to leave a recruitment position to develop their career and lives in area where there are limited recruitment agencies would be forced to change career for a period of 6 months if we took the example with Coburn as in this article? Or alternatively would need to increase their journey time if being forced to look outside of a 5 mile radius, which may not always be possible due to outside commitments. I believe that there should be clearer guidelines when looking at this subject, so as not to restict an individual from gaining new employment. Perhaps in this instance Coburn directly contacted clients from a database that had previously belonged to Search? If we look at this case without this information I believe that it is going to have a detrimental impact on the recruitment industry as will restrict the freedom of movement from company to another and may force individuals to look outside of the recruitment industry. In what is already a candidate short market this would not be a good move for the future of the industry.
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