California employee fired by CEO in a rage is asked back 6 days later by the board, wants to decline without losing unemployment

The employee wants to know if she can decline returning to work and still keep her unemployment, and that presents a pretty complex situation. Others have advised her to get a lawyer to deal with that question, and that's probably sound advice.

But, for other cases like this, there are some good rules we can follow. If you've been fired and you're out of work and you have the chance at a job or returning, you pretty much want to take it. Even if it's a stop-gap measure, you just take the job, get the pay, and sort something else out with that extra time.

Now, this is not legal advice, but just plain old common sense. As I've written many times and as we have seen in countless stories: In situations like this, you should always keep a paper trail, especially when you know returning or staying at your job is risky.

For the employee, I would say that the next step should be establishing with the supervisor who reached out to her exactly what returning involves.

Namely, she needs to learn:

• Whether she would be reporting to the same boss (who appears to be the CEO in the original poster's comments)
• Who would supervise her instead
• What protections she would have for retaliation from the CEO.

However, it is also important that she:
 

• Not rely on the employer to protect her or be honest with her.
• Keep her own written terms and records of the reported incidents

Then she needs to keep that CV fresh and keep looking for a new job! There's no telling when this might happen again… or if the employer will just get rid of her later on when there isn't a risk of her claiming retaliation.

Below are some of the comments the original poster added to give more information to her original post along with more information she provided in response to reader's advice.