A lawsuit submitted by less than TruckLoad-Wanderer XPO who recently moved to a federal court in North Carolina offers a window in the fight for the ability of companies to demand employees to sign non-competition agreements and whether such provisions can be able to are maintained.
The lawsuit against two former employees was originally submitted by XPO (NYSE: XPO) in January in the Superior Court in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, before he was moved to the American district court for the western district of North Carolina at the beginning of February.
The employees, Tess Farnan and Mark Schatteman, left their sales jobs at XPO to become a member of LTL Carrier Central Transport.
The two employees did not work for XPO in North Carolina; Instead, they worked in the Kansas City area. But the XPO right case says that the lawsuit is being filed in the state of Tar Heel because the company has “extensive activities” there.
But XPO has extensive operations in all lower 48 states. Why it was chosen is unclear – the company’s head office is in Connecticut and the employees worked in the Kansas City area – but it may be that the non -competitions of the State were considered favorable.
The Legal Now -Blog said about the non -competitive laws of North Carolina that they are ‘unique and nuanced, ruled by both legal rights and case law. The State has no specific status that outlines the use of non-competition agreements; Instead, their enforceability is determined by the courts on the basis of general principles of contract law and specific criteria developed by case law. “
The accusations against Farnan and Schatteman can be found in last month’s state campaign. Although the fundamental thrust of the case is simple – employees stop, go to a competitor, do business there and the original employer says that they do not prohibit them – the lawsuit reveals some of the provisions of a non -competition that be discussed in the court case.
According to the court case, Farnan signed a “confidential information about the security of 11 pages” in September 2021. SCHATTEMAN had signed the same type of agreement in March 2020.
An important provision in the non -competitions is that the two would not “go after termination” in “any competing activities or XPO customers with whom they worked.” There was also a requirement that the employees would “maintain the confidentiality of the confidential information of XPO and return all confidential information and property of XPO to XPO about the termination of their employment.”
The period in which one-off XPO customers could not be requested is six months.
But the lawsuit said that the two sales representatives left XPO and became members of Central Transport, where they “asked XPO customers in violation of their agreements with XPO.” SCHATTEMAN resigned on 13 June 2024 and joined Central Transport in Chesterfield, Missouri. Farnan resigned on 20 September and continued central transport at a location that is only described as the Kansas City area.
