- Jurisdiction
- California
Hello all, I am hoping someone can point me to a more definitive answer to this question than I have been able to find in my own searching.
I am in California. In 2018 I began to work with a couple of people who were starting up a business that I had great interest in. As a self-funded startup they did not have the money to pay what my role would have cost, so they offered me exclusively an equity share in the company. My interest in what they were setting out to do was great enough that I agreed to work with no pay.
After about a year I decided that it was no longer a good fit for me and decided to cease working with them. I received no wages in that time. Now they are asking me to sign a whole bunch of what I would call "exit paperwork" that is deeper and more complicated than anything I ever signed when terminating gainful employment at large companies in the past. The main point that jumped out at me is that they are calling this a resignation, and stating that I was an employee. I didn't think this was the case, but I'm not really sure what the legal status of what I was would be.
I worked from home the vast majority of the time, mostly set my own hours (except for occasional meetings and a few other things that had to be at a specific time), and ultimately did things the way I saw fit. Was I an employee?
I am in California. In 2018 I began to work with a couple of people who were starting up a business that I had great interest in. As a self-funded startup they did not have the money to pay what my role would have cost, so they offered me exclusively an equity share in the company. My interest in what they were setting out to do was great enough that I agreed to work with no pay.
After about a year I decided that it was no longer a good fit for me and decided to cease working with them. I received no wages in that time. Now they are asking me to sign a whole bunch of what I would call "exit paperwork" that is deeper and more complicated than anything I ever signed when terminating gainful employment at large companies in the past. The main point that jumped out at me is that they are calling this a resignation, and stating that I was an employee. I didn't think this was the case, but I'm not really sure what the legal status of what I was would be.
I worked from home the vast majority of the time, mostly set my own hours (except for occasional meetings and a few other things that had to be at a specific time), and ultimately did things the way I saw fit. Was I an employee?