Reuters - Three of Wall Street's top investment banks agreed to pay millions of dollars in fines and buy back billions of dollars in frozen, illiquid securities after U.S. regulators reached settlements over the way the firms sold auction-rate securities. More

AFP - The European Commission proposed new measures Thursday for supervising credit rating agencies, which have been blamed for contributing to world financial turmoil.

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When you sit down to let the worker go, you must be sincere, but professional. The jobholder was insubordinate if the employer did not provoke the abusive language, the worker said it in the presence of other personnel or business customers and the language was not a common form of talk in that specific workplace. Training all managers and supervisors in the accurate and fair evaluation of staff will ensure that you will avoid the problems coming from illegal dismissals. The information shared in an exit interview can be as important as the comments you receive from your customers — even if these comments are from a fired employee. Many attorneys will take cases on contingency and try to prove you terminated the individual without cause.

Remember, the others are watching and if you drop the ball on this one then you'll inevitably have to deal with the problem again and possibly from someone else. Record anything significant the fired worker said which would affect a unlawful lay off case. Often, the sick and disabled employee can't return to work within 12 weeks because of her condition. This is a great way to get your point across, get your message heard, and avoid being accusatory or 'emotional' in the process. So, if the employee refuses a valid job offer, he's ineligible for future unemployment benefits. Now that you have prepared all the papers for the lay off meeting, it is time to call the jobholder in and notify him or her of the firing. o Consent to hire firm's workforce at new job (especially trusted lieutenants). The same applies if you have a jobholder who engages in what you consider to be unethical or improper conduct outside work, even if you hear about it — for example, drug-taking or sexual antics. o The separated employee wants to work "the system" and make money off his layoff. Sacking Executive Level Personnel. o Put all the worker's take home materials (separation memorandum, separation document, COBRA notice, final paycheck and severance check) into a folder for easy access.