valuing your EEOC case and a low settlement offer

note: most eeoc cases are dismissed, and result in $0 award

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VALUING YOUR CASE

While reading the “valuing your case” post, I noticed it was on the depressing side, in that the writer estimates you will not be getting what you deserve, rather you will be getting half of a much smaller percentage. The post writer also tries to explain the length of court cases and recommends against the long drawn out process that could take several years after the several years you waited for a decision in your EEOC case to end, or until they gave you a settlement offer. It seems like he is recommending you take a low settlement offer. Since I am not a lawyer and have no experience in settlement offers or waiting years to get to the award point of your case, I do take the advice with an open mind. (I am in the waiting process for a decision on my EEOC case at the appeal stage which translates to about 3 years since the start of my EEOC claim)

This could be good advice on what to realistically expect the value of your case to be worth?

The most important – and most difficult – aspect of mediation/ or law suit settlement negotiations is valuing your case.

If you have come this far, you undoubtedly believe that your case is strong.
But to know whether you should accept a settlement, you need to know how to value your case: you need to compare your employer’s mediation offer with the amount you could win in court, if you were to spend many years litigating your case and if you won.
It is difficult in a guide like this to give a precise formula for valuing your case.

However, there are general principles that you may find helpful.

Valuing “Wrongful Termination”

– If you have been terminated, calculate how much money you would have earned up to the date of the mediation had you not been terminated. That is called your “back pay.” For example, if you were fired in April 1, 2001, filed your charge of discrimination on June 1, 2001, and your mediation is set for September 1, 2001, figure out how much money you would have earned between April 1 and September 1. You should bear in mind, though, that back pay usually cannot reach further back in time than 300 days before you filed your charge. In other words, you usually cannot obtain back pay stretching more than 300 days before you filed your charge.

Valuing “Front Pay”


Next, if you were terminated, calculate how long you expect to remain unemployed while looking for another job. You may be entitled to “front pay” for this additional period of unemployment. Estimating the future period of unemployment is difficult and controversial. Most employees anticipate it may take up to six months to find suitable, new work. Some older employees may believe they will never be hired again. (Be sure to keep any records of your job search until your case has been resolved.) Employers contend that you should be able to find work immediately if you are qualified. Courts will only allow you “front pay” for a reasonable period of time – that is, the time it takes for you, acting with diligence, to find another suitable job. At the mediation, it will probably be difficult to obtain a front pay award because your employer may argue that if you land a new job, say, one week after the settlement, any additional front pay would be a windfall. As with all issues, you need to be willing to compromise if you want to resolve your case in mediation.

Valuing severance pay


— If you are still working at the job but you want to leave your job, you can negotiate a severance in the mediation. The back and front pay part of your severance might be based on your estimate of how long you would expect to be unemployed and what you would have earned during that time at your current job.

Valuing Emotional injuries

If you are a victim of sexual, racial or some other type of harassment and you sustained emotional injuries, calculate what your out-of-pocket medical expenses have been.

• your out-of-pocket medical expenses
• your recoverable emotional injuries and distress.

It is very difficult to predict what you might be able to recover in court for emotional distress. Generally, depending on the case, these damages can range from $5,000 to over $100,000 depending on the length of time you experienced harassment, its severity, the employer’s awareness of the problem, the employer’s refusal to correct it, and how much genuine distress you suffered.

“In many cases, emotional distress awards are in the $10,000 to $30,000 range.” 

Sometimes, courts will award a plaintiff an amount equal to one or two times a plaintiff’s back and front pay for these or similar damages.

Add all of these items of damages together (there may be others). You should then multiply this by how likely it is that you will win.

“No case is a 100% sure winner.”

Many cases have somewhere between a 20% and 80% chance of winning. Be realistic. If, for example, your itemized damages are $12,000 and you estimate you have a 50% chance of winning, your case can be valued at $6,000.

Valuing settlement offers


You should also consider the “present value” of money. To win the $6,000 in court, you would need to litigate your case for several years. Most people would gladly accept $4,500 today, rather than $6,000 in four years. Therefore, in this case, $4,500 might be a reasonable settlement value today.

To continue with the $4,500 example, if you decide that you would accept a settlement of $4,500, it would be reasonable to ask for $9,000 as an opening demand, in hopes of ending up at $4,500 or slightly higher.

To determine your chances of winning, you must take into account everything that has been presented at the mediation: how believable your story is compared to the employer’s, whether either side has independent support (in documents or witnesses) for their point of view. No case is a sure winner. You need a pretty strong case to give yourself a more than 70% chance of winning, considering how difficult things can be when you go to court.

Source: www.illinoislegalaid.com/index

The $300,000 cap on compensatory damages remains and is now more than 20 years old.   Each year the value of $300,000 has been gradually devalued by inflation.  It will take an act by Congress to correct the cap on damages.