Home -> Law Blog Directory -> International Law Blogs -> jurabilis - German bLAWg from Berlin.

International Law

: jurabilis - German bLAWg from Berlin.

Serie: Verrechtlichung aller Lebensbereiche

Heute: Der Liebesvertrag.

For lawyers defending corporate clients against sexual harassment complaints, it's a classic story. Two employees begin an office romance, and after the initial fireworks the romance sours. Recriminations ensue. The subordinate-who may or may not report directly to his or her lover-claims to have been pressured into a relationship that was never consensual. For companies, fending off a single contentious complaint can add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees, not to mention the damage to office morale. To nip such situations in the bud, employers are increasingly turning to consensual relationship agreements, a.k.a. love contracts.

Ok. Wir lernen von Newsweek:

How do they work? Consensual relationship agreements are customized for a specific situation, but they are typically drawn up when a supervisor is dating a subordinate or when one of two co-workers is promoted above the other. In some cases employees will disclose their relationship to their employers. However, more often than not it's management that will call in a suspected couple to discuss the situation. According to Mathiason, love contracts are always signed voluntarily, and they often state that either party will seek arbitration rather than file a harassment grievance if the relationship sours.

Because of the privacy issues involved and concerns that they may be perceived as intrusive, companies rarely admit to using love contracts and prohibit employees from discussing them.

Full post as published by jurabilis - German bLAWg from Berlin. on May 24, 2008 (boomark / email).