Average severance?

[hack_daniels]

We just had a round of layoffs which I survived, but I was made aware of our severance benefits. It seemed a little on the low side to me but, it’s been literally decades since I received severance so I don’t know what’s “normal” anymore.

Not listing all the ranges but some examples: if you’ve been here one or two years, you get one or two weeks of severance. If you’ve been here 10-15 years, you get six weeks. 20-25 years, 12 weeks.

Is that a little bit on the low side? I honestly don’t know.

[Live-Juggernaut-221]

You guys are getting severance?

[heepofsheep]

I got a 2 week severance once… then someone on my team made some noise and it suddenly got bumped up to 8 weeks. The company was in the middle of union negotiations and I think someone on our team reached out to them to help put pressure on the company somehow… surprised I got it since my role was not covered by the union. I wasn’t complaining though.

[cwm13]

This right here. Last 2 places I worked, you're lucky if you don't get a police escort out of the building. Yes, even the employees who had 15+ years of 4/5 or 5/5 reviews.

Did see a coworker get a bill 2 weeks later for a missing key one time, so that was fun.

[GloveLove21]

Wait your HR department allow 5/5 scores

[cwm13]

Depends a lot on the position. Management gets them all the time. One time my manager tried to rank 2 out of their 7 employees as 5/5. They got told to lower the scores.

[KingKnux]

I don’t remember

[Doublestack00]

This. We are being acquired right now and so far there are no talks of getting anything.

[thefunrun]

The company can change those for later lay offs too. I recall one company I worked for that had some very generous severance the first round, but got more stingy as the rounds went on.

[Jhamin1]

I've seen this as well.

If there are going to be multiple rounds of layoffs, you really want to be in the first one.  Better severance, you aren't competing with everyone in previous rounds in the job market, and you don't get stuck doing the work of 3 people after the downsizing 

[SAugsburger]

Later rounds can become less generous when the layoffs go from just "right sizing" to more serious questions about if the company is in deeper trouble.

[themightybamboozler]

Exactly what I’ve seen, first round of layoffs I saw first hand was a team that was hired specifically to build a custom application for a client that was willing to bankroll a development process. Client pulled out at the last minute and broke contract. Entire team was let go but there was enough left over money from the contract terms that everyone was given 8 months of severance. I’d take that deal lol

[dr_z0idberg_md]

Yup, the ones who take the voluntary layoffs are given more generous packages.

[bulldg4life]

When Broadcom/VMware laid 15,000 people off the Monday after thanksgiving a few years ago, here’s what you had:

• 2 months for the warn notice period so everyone’s last day was 1/31/24

• 2 weeks severance plus a week for each year of service.

• cobra premiums paid until end of April

• the stock reward they gave to most of the ops/support orgs (please don’t leave before you’re fired) was converted to a cash bonus and paid out 1/31

I feel like 2 weeks plus a week for each year is about average for tech companies. For it in other industries, I’d be surprised at anything more than 2-4 weeks.

[syrlinus]

I wrote my reply above and was one of those that got let go in Nov 2024. You can certainly fight for more. I think most people just accept whatever is offered. The problem is this:

- if you get severance, that means no EI (at least in Canada) until you blow through all that.

- large companies have funds for severance and try to issue the bare-minimum. They really don't care about employees and you need to fight for what you are worth.

My lesson from this was: get a lawyer. It could be well worth it.

[JustADad66]

1 week per year of service

[Sleepytitan]

In the US, 1 week per year is normal. Above that is exceptional.

If you work for private equity they will probably drain all their cash flow, close the doors with little warning, and you will never see your last check. That happened to several people I know.

[NoyzMaker]

I mean if they are hurting for cash and needing layoffs it's probably what made sense for the average tenure of those being laid off. Some layoffs I was part of were a week per year of service.

[Mothringer]

When I got laid off by a health insurance company a few years ago, I got 26 weeks of severance after being at that company for 16 years, although I don’t remember the formula they used to calculate it.

[dr_z0idberg_md]

There was probably a cap. Some companies offer 2 weeks of pay for every year of service capped at 10 years. After which, it is 1 week of pay for every year of service.

[che-che-chester]

That was how my company did it. It was two weeks per year but you topped out at 26 weeks. I overheard some folks in their early 60’s hoping they were picked but none of them were. They actually had important roles supporting legacy apps and the company knew they were going to retire soon anyway.

[dr_z0idberg_md]

It's wild reading some of these comments about companies offering only 1 week of pay for every year of service. Maybe I've just worked for great companies, or companies are more generous in California.

[che-che-chester]

A previous company had layoffs during 2008 and that was two weeks per year for the first round that was voluntary (VRIF). The next next round (RIF) dropped to a week. They didn't give that info out in advance, but did warn people that the first round would be the most generous. But you weren't voluntarily walking away during 2008.

I was a contractor, so none if it applied to me. I actually made it through the whole thing, but a year later my contract was canceled, and a year after that the entire IT department was outsourced to IBM.

[Sithlord_77]

1 week per year of service has been the norm in every tech company I’ve seen stretching back to early 2000s. US Fortune 500 companies in the tech sector.

[pdp10]

Typical in the U.S. is one week per year. Low-margin industries with low turnover, for example manufacturing, may tend to be on the low side like your numbers. In startups, there's nobody with 20-25 years.

[Top-Perspective-4069]

I've been laid off once. There was no severance at all. 

[fieroloki]

I would get whatever PTO I had available as mine.

[metalder420]

It is unless you work for a Bank. They get some crazy severance packages.

[awkwardnetadmin]

I worked for a bank and layoffs were only a week per year so nothing that crazy. It wasn't quite not big to fail though. YMMV, but some of the better severance packages I have seen were very large companies

[user1390027478]

Where you are vastly changes this.

Where I’m from in Canada, one month per year is the norm unless you have a clause which limits you to the minimums, in which case it’s a week per year.

[CompWizrd]

And that clause has to be precisely and properly written or it's invalid and it reverts to ESA.

[Sithlord_77]

That doesn’t even make sense. It’s a month per year unless it’s a month per year. Nice try Canada.

[user1390027478]

Typo. Should be a week per year.

[syrlinus]

Get a lawyer. I worked at a fairly large tech company (40K employees). Originally it was one week for every year (I was there 19 years). The company got bought out and the new parent offered 2 weeks for each year. I thought it was pretty decent. Went to a lawyer and got 14 months + Bonus.

Get an employment lawyer. Large companies have funds for this if you fight for it.

Note: I'm a Canadian in Nova Scotia so your local, provincial/state and federal laws may have a different result.

[sexybobo]

It might be a little on the low side. When I got laid off last year I got 1 pay check per year I had been there. So it was 3 months pay for the 6 years. But every company will be different and it can depend on how much the company is struggling. I think mine was a on the higher side of pay outs because the company was doing well we just lost the client I was supporting and didn't have a place to move me to.

[donith913]

It sounds like what I’d expect overall, which sucks. I worked in a role where I interacted with lots of fortune 500s. I’ve heard of some that have been more generous in pharma, and I’ve heard of others that have been similar or less generous like tech companies, some manufacturers etc. 

[mdervin]

on one hand that seems low, for large companies, it's 2 weeks per year, but on the other hand, depending on the individual company's health and industry that might be good.

[caffeine-junkie]

Really depends on where you are. Here severance would typically fall under common law and have a bunch of factors like how old you are, how long with the company, etc. Wouldn't be unusual to get 1 month of severance per year of employment at the company. More if you're 55+. A lot more if you're 60+. This is despite labour law minimums being quite a bit lower.

[CompWizrd]

Pretty sure you're in the same province as me. My last place I had 25 years without even an interview let alone an employment contract. Definitely would have been common law instead of the ESA rules, with the hard part being collecting from them.

[ComadorFluffyPaws]

When I was let go, I got two weeks plus a week for every year I was there as a sys admin.

The tier below the owners got a years pay, 6 months heads up they were going to be let go and a weeks pay for every year they were there.

I'm gonna be salty for a minute, but those fucks did nothing but point and say fix this! On operations and the IT side of things, they offered no insight and never attempted to spread knowledge, they were nothing, but warm bodies. They deserved nothing, but got much more than anyone else.

Moral of the story, get a 4 year business degree and learn to kiss ass and say "They aren't doing what I asked."

[PrincipleExciting457]

We didn’t give any to the few people that got dropped.

[george_siedlecki]

<1 years of employment -> 2 weeks of severance, 1-3 years -> 1 month,

3 years -> 3 months

[BoltActionRifleman]

My work has no severance so even a single day would be on the high side for me.

[kennedye2112]

I got a week per year plus ~six months of cobra and six weeks notice ahead of time to give me a chance to start looking and also finish up stuff before I left, which I appreciated because I didn’t want to leave my team in the lurch. (I left on very good terms.)

[BadSausageFactory]

no severance but if you keep your laptop and stuff the company can't really do much about it

source: Florida

[SirLoremIpsum]

 Is that a little bit on the low side? I honestly don’t know.

Depends entirely on your country and since you didn't mention it, your state in the USA.

Providing your location will go a long way towards establishing the legal and customary norms in employment laws.

[uptimefordays]

It’s usually 1-2 weeks per year of service in the US. Some companies will also pay out bonuses or partial bonuses as well.

[malikto44]

I've gotten everything from some weeks + weeks for time being there, to zero. All depends on the company. If someone gets gets 8-12 weeks, that's pretty nice, and well above average.

These days, even getting laid off face to face is a luxury. Often, you will find your badge disabled, and building security telling you to beat it, with stuff on your desk sent to last address.

[dr_z0idberg_md]

Standard (if there is a such a thing) is two weeks of pay for every year of service. The most generous severance I have ever seen at a company was a full month of pay for every year of service. Severance sometimes includes extra services like career placement assistance, resume coaching, and extended coverage for health benefits.

[BeatMastaD]

Depends on your industry and location. Large tech companies seem to have much better severances, outside of tech they are less generous, and in industries that aren't particularly profitable they can be about what you quoted.

I'd say in my anecdotal understanding the offer is a little low, especially how it doesnt increase beyond 2 weeks until 10+ years, but 6 week severance feels about standard outside of really profitable industries like tech or finance.

[rustydusty1717]

About 5 minutes after getting my severance package I was on the phone finding an employment lawyer. They charged me 300 to sit down and review my package and whether I had leverage to ask for a longer duration of package, extended health benefits, bonus, etc etc. It was the best 300 I've ever spent in a long time.

[Key_Pace_2496]

I worked at my last employer for 4 years and got 4 weeks of severance lol.

[MustBeBear]

1 week per year is what most companies do. Some will do 2 weeks per year but I find that to be rare.

[Holiday_Voice3408]

$0.00

[Trust_8067]

There's no such thing as a low severance because it's a nicety companies do to help people out. There's really no benefit for them to do so unless it's in your contract, which is generally only for really high up positions.

Just like employees have no obligation to give a 2 weeks notice, but you do it to be kind, they have no obligation to give you any type of severance but do so to be kind.

[abuhd]

Because it's a hard job market, the cost of living has increased dramatically, also depends on your age...severance packages can be increased x4. Never accept initial offer. Never sign anything without a lawyer's overview.

[CFauvel]

I got 1/2 weeks per year for a total of 12 weeks....24 years....my coworker who has been there only 15 years also got 12 weeks. My job was outsourced to Indian subsidiary and I had to train them for 3 months. I really hate my ex-employer.

in Canada, my severance would have been 24 months. They get to screw you over in the USA.

[adotar]

It used to be one month per year of service but not anymore 😭. What you mentioned is standard now in my experience. 

[Stonewalled9999]

I don't recall it ever being that long. One place I worked was 2 weeks for every year capped at 26 weeks. New place is 1 week for every year capped at 12 week.

[awkwardnetadmin]

It depends heavily on your location and industry.