Enforced an employee contract requiring CPA to pay for the book of business and goodwill the CPA took with him when he resigned.

Issue: Non-solicitation | Employment Agreement | Trade Secrets

Court: Oakland County Circuit Court (Michigan)

Industry: Finance

Judge: Judge Potts

Case Description

My client was an accounting firm. One of its CPAs signed an employment agreement that allowed the CPA to leave the firm with clients so long as the CPA paid for those clients based on a pre-determined formula.

The CPA resigned and went to work for the competitor, but not before taking a flashdrive containing hundreds of confidential documents and diverting a substantial amount of the accounting firm’s clients to the competing firm.

Unfortunately, the CPA refused to pay not only refused’s former employee signed a contract that CPA employee from taking clients with him—unless the employee paid fees for the clients he took.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees were in dispute.

It was a cut-and-dry contract, but a surprising amount of people flagrantly violate contracts and believe it is worth the work. Along these lines, the particular former employee flatly refused to pay fees owed on his contract. I sued on behalf of my client to enforce the contract.

The parties satisfactorily resolved the dispute shortly thereafter.