I know what companies do in practice and am in complete agreement with you there. Where our understandings differ is about the law. My understanding is they can make negative statements as long as they are true. Furthermore, that the burden of proof that the statements were untrue or malicious is on the ex-employee, not the company. Companies' reticence to say much is a product of caution, not law, at least as I understand it. And when HR and corporate lawyers are both involved, there is going to be a lot of caution ;-(

My own experience, from back when I was hiring a lot of people for a software company, was that if you could get a line person -- ideally the person's direct supervisor -- rather than HR, you had a chance of getting an honest appraisal. In general (not always) they were smart enough not to leave any smoking guns, but there is always a way to indicate whether you thought the person was a good employee or a bad employee. Which as a potential next employer is all you are really looking for.


>I'm going to disagree here. Employers are pretty much in a 'neutral reference' state where nothing is provided other than hours worked and job title. Anything negative stated can impact the former employers ability to gain future employment and that is indeed a possibility for a suit. I've seen very large corporations I worked for have reams of documents backing up a dismissal and still refuse to provide any additional information to a potential employer seeking a reference due to the history of successful suits targeted against former employers. The closest they will come is if the prospective employers asks 'would you hire them again?' they might answer 'no.'
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>>>>>>If some firm asked you your opinion about me and you'd give it (either negative or positive), without my approval or request for being a reference, I'd have bad feelings about it.
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>>>>>Negative comments are illegal in the USA and Canada as far as I know.
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>>>>They aren't illegal, it's just that most corporate human resources departments avoid them because of potential legal liability.
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>>>>>>departments avoid them because of potential legal liability.
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>>>Doesm't that make it a legal situation, can be taken to court?
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>>Anything can be taken to court. That doesn't mean the plaintiff will prevail. If a person was fired for poor performance, for example, you can tell a prospective employer they were fired for poor performance. In practice most employers, at least the big ones, generally keep it to the minimum (verification of employment, dates, and title) to avoid any exposure at all to what a court might decide. But it isn't illegal to say more, as long as it's factual.