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Comment by petesergeant | Hacker News Reader

> I tend to try something on with employment contracts too - I return an unsigned copy to the company.

So you email it back without comment, which shows you received it and understood what it was, and then started work… I suspect that’s binding in many jurisdictions, and the lack of an actual signature is simply an inconvenience

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Indeed - as soon as you start work, and get paid, then an employment agreement exists between you.

If they emailed you terms beforehand and you still started work, then most courts would take that to indicate your acceptance of the terms.

What if they crossed out a few clauses and signed, and the employer never noticed. Are you saying that because they begin working for the company, that represents the company's tacit acceptance of the modifications to the contract?

years ago I made a habit of making small changes to contracting agreements. The net results off the top of my head? most contracts sent were written for one side, not both sides, making some changes to defend my side simple self-defense (I didn't change the compensation terms); I only got the changes accepted two out of three times or so; when the tides of tech changed, I was the first to be left out.. it seems in hindsight that this was some kind of "larval state" for me.. I had to either get more authority in writing to become stable, or, be replaced by compliant, more desperate, more outsourced "talent" that could do specific tech work. As an intellectual, I went back to school, and lost the chance to embed and define authority in contractual relationships at the same time.

I think you have a significantly bigger burden of proof to prove the other party had accepted it if you signed it and returned it having amended it without mentioning those changes in the email, and it would be much less clear cut. If you mentioned “here it is with a few small changes”, and you got back an email that said “received”, even if they didn’t explicitly ok the changes or sign it, and you started working, I think you’d be on much firmer ground though.

There’ll be explicit case law but it’ll come down to “would a reasonable person think the changes to the contract had been accepted”

This is exactly what I do. I have an amendment on my contract about intellectual property being owned by the company changed from "while under employment" to "using company equipment in employed hours". They sent me two copies they had signed, I modified both with the change, signed it and scanned the contract.

The returned copy was accepted by HR via email (not sure if they ever read it or not)

What will be interesting is if this ever gets to be tested as not ever sheet in the contract was signed.

You changed the document after they signed it? If you didn't also remove their signature, that's forgery.

Doesn't sound like forgery. Whether it will hold up in court is iffy. If you are not a lawyer I would be more hesitant to state your legal opinions as fact.

* https://www.adamsdrafting.com/making-sneaky-changes-to-a-con...

In Australia it's common to initial pages to indicate they have been read, and next to altered terms specifically. Both parties write their initials in such cases, so you don't need a signature on each page.

I don't think it has a direct legal basis, but like most things to do with contracts it builds the picture of intent and acceptance and understanding of what they were getting into.

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