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I have a job offer from company A and I mentioned that during hr rounds to another company B. Now company B has selected me but before sending the offer letter to me they want the offer letter of company A. I don't know what to do now. Will I send the offer letter from A to B or not? If I send it will the company B tell A that I have been looking for job in company B? If I don't send them the offer letter can B deny me the job ? I don't want chance from B to let go but at the same time don't want to end up losing both the chances. Can anybody give me any suggestion? Thank you in advance.

Shankar
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    You already have an offer from company A. So if you do nothing, it seems you won't lose that chance. If company B is serious about making you an offer, they should just make the offer. If you don't want to show them the letter, be clear but polite about this point. The letter is a matter just between you and company A. If company B wants you, please write your own letter. – Brandin Apr 09 '16 at 05:24
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    You said "company B has selected me". What did they actually say, and what reason do they give for wanting to see an offer letter from another company? It seems a little weird. – Brandin Apr 09 '16 at 06:12
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    It looks like Company B is using you as a free "market research". That strikes me as very unprofessional, and I would recommend staying away from this company. – Masked Man Apr 09 '16 at 06:12
  • Welcome to the site by the way @saikat. As a general rule you should use comments to ask for clarification from the poster or otherwise add information. General "thank you" comments are discouraged and you can show appreciation by upvoting an answer or a comment (now that you have the required reputation to do so). – Lilienthal Apr 09 '16 at 14:35
  • @Brandin . Company B has told me that they will be sending me the offer letter once I send them the soft copy of school and college pass certificates , valid address proof and this offer letter proof. – Shankar Apr 09 '16 at 16:02
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    @saikat The copies of passing certificates and address/identity proofs sound reasonable, but have you asked them why they need some other company's offer letter to release their own offer letter? That sounds extremely suspicious and stupid to me. – Masked Man Apr 09 '16 at 17:16
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    Also, why do they even know that company A has made an offer? Did you perchance mention this offer as a negotiating tactic to company B? – Brandin Apr 09 '16 at 18:31
  • They can ask. Your answer should probably be "no". – keshlam Apr 10 '16 at 03:16
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    Never exclude that this might just be a test of your ethics. Just do what feels right. If both options evaporate, there will be more. – Justin Ohms Jan 16 '18 at 19:53
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    @JustinOhms You don't test people's ethics by lying to them, especially when they are also equally concerned about your ethics. – David Schwartz Nov 22 '19 at 02:32
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    @DavidSchwartz It sounds counterintuitive but in reality, deception is often involved when testing ethics. A common ethics test is the forgotten wallet test which is a deception. It is probably the most often used ethics test in restaurants and retail. Besides in the example given I don't see that anyone is lying. Company B is simply asking for something. They can ask for anything they want. But the correct answer may be to challenge them asking. – Justin Ohms Dec 16 '19 at 03:58
  • @JustinOhms Those are all cases where one party is evaluating the other party. In the job negotiating process, the two parties are evaluating each other. The situations are not at all comparable. A prospective employee is, among other things, evaluating a prospective employer's honesty in dealing with their employees. Using deception like this would be utterly outrageous. – David Schwartz Dec 16 '19 at 05:49
  • @DavidSchwartz Two parties evaluating each other is exactly the same as one parting evaluating the other, just x2. The act of asking for something is not a lie. If you ask me to break into a computer and I do it. That tells you about my character. (Yes, the flip side is that you asking tells me about your ethics.) Your assertion that this kind of thing is "outrageous" doesn't mean it doesn't happen. (BTW it does) Interviews are an evaluation process and not all are conventional. The way you respond to an impossible or unethical request tells me more about you than any answer you can think of. – Justin Ohms Dec 16 '19 at 18:15
  • @JustinOhms Sorry, no. Just no. This is utterly absurd. In a situation where two people are evaluating each other, you never ask the other person to violate a third party's confidence in such a way that they might actually do it. You could, perhaps, ask them if they would be willing to do it as some kind of test. But to see if they actually do it is outrageous and reckless. I'm not saying it might not happen, but don't normalize outrageous conduct. – David Schwartz Dec 17 '19 at 00:55
  • I am not endorsing or normalizing the behavior. I just live in the real world where it can and does happen (more often than you probably realize) and people should know what it looks like when it does. You and I might not do such a thing but other people will, and they do. To assume that everyone you encounter will share and abide by your ethical framework is simply naive. A person with no ethics, doesn't care a bit about your ethics. You can be the most ethical person in the world, a bear will still eat you because a bear has no ethics. That's why you need to watch out for the bear. – Justin Ohms Dec 17 '19 at 23:26

3 Answers3

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Worst case scenario, this is what happens when you forward the letter. Best case scenario, you still weaken your negotiating position if you forward it (as Kilisi mentioned).

Basically, there is little that's good that can come out of forwarding such a letter. Personally, this is what I would write to company B instead:

"I'm sorry, but I can not in good conscience forward a private communication sent to me from another potential employer."

Please note the purposefully vague language I'm using here. It's important to not even disclose the name of company A (unless you already did). If they ask, just tell them what the company does in the most general terms, so that they know the kind of company that they're up against, but you certainly don't need to be specific.

Or if you already told them that you'd forward the offer letter to them, you could simply say:

"I'm sorry, but I changed my mind. I know what I said earlier, but I can not in good conscience forward you a private communication sent to me from another potential employer."

And yes, it's company B's prerogative to decide whether you should become their employee or not, so they could very well deny you the job on the grounds that you didn't forward that offer letter to them (which is well within their rights). But at some point, you have to respect yourself enough and be willing to walk away.

After all, if a competing candidate requested a copy (or a partial screenshot) of the resume of the leading candidate for that same position, or if a candidate requested that the employer forward him a copy of the counteroffer made by another candidate. That would equally be a non-starter.

And what happens if company B doesn't believe that you have an actual offer on the table from another company since you're unwilling to show an offer letter? That's fine. If they don't believe you, that's on them. And it's not your obligation to justify or explain yourself further, and it's your prerogative to be able to walk away from any potential employer, especially any potential employer that makes unreasonable requests.

Stephan Branczyk
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    I agree, I wouldn't forward the letter either, it weakens your negotiating position as well as the rest outlined above. – Kilisi Apr 09 '16 at 06:34
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    +1. This is pretty much exactly how I would handle this and the suggested wording is perfect for this situation. – Lilienthal Apr 09 '16 at 09:00
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    Before judging company B, it might be that some manager told some HR drone "send an offer to saikat" and the HR drone decided that they also wanted to see A's offer without knowledge of the company. – gnasher729 Apr 10 '16 at 07:59
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    Think about the ethical standards of that company when they are asking you to divulge private communication. It may be perhaps only the standards of that particular person you have to deal with but nevertheless you shouldn't do it.You can play a lot of tricks and tell little lies when you are looking for a job, it's part of the game, but not this. I doubt it is but it could be a test of what kind of person you are. – Mircea Ion Sep 29 '16 at 12:42
  • Thank you Stephan, that's the perfect answer I have been searching for, thank you very much! – Prateek Jan 17 '17 at 14:23
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I can think of two reasons why they'd ask:

(a) They think you're lying about having another offer, or about the amount or some other details of the offer.

(b) They want to know what kind of salaries other companies are offering, or gain some other information about the competition.

Either way, asking for a copy of the other company's offer letter seems a little ... tacky, inappropriate, bad form ... to me. I'd reply something to the effect of, "I don't think it's appropriate for me to forward private correspondence from another company." That's the sort of thing I'd rather say in an email than in person, but if I had to do it in person, I'd try to look and sound confused, like, "why in the world are you asking me this?"

If they push on this, I would consider that a reason not to want to work for B.

If you already have an offer from A, presumably you are not desperate to get an offer from B, so you don't have to give in to unreasonable demands. Well, I don't know how good the offer from A is or what you expect from B. As always in real life, sometimes you have to weigh the pros and cons.

Jay
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  • At that point, both A and B are "potential future employers" and one of them, for example A, might become your "employer". You wouldn't want to end up in a position where you had sent an offer from your employer to a competitor. – gnasher729 Apr 10 '16 at 12:33
  • The offer should be based on what they think your value is to the company. It has nothing to do with Company A. They're trying to go "Price Is Right" by just topping the competition by as little as possible. The person asking should not try to pit the offers against each other, though, either. If that's what he/she wants, then they should just share the letter. I'd say "Please extend your best and final offer if you feel you want to. I have no intention of trying to pit you against another interested employer, so I promise to give you a yes or no answer in a timely fashion." No counters. – PoloHoleSet Sep 29 '16 at 15:11
  • It is way more than tacky. We are employees, not slaves, I would not want to work with people that think they own me and my life. For me, they already failed in "my" side of the interview. Life is too short to work with people like that. – Rui F Ribeiro Sep 30 '16 at 13:18
  • @AndrewMattson Hmm, but surely you are trying to pit offers against each other. If you get two job offers, I presume you are going to compare them and take whichever is best. Not necessarily the one that offers the most money, there are other factors, like benefits working conditions, and so on. But if, say, company A offered $50,000 and company B offered $55,000, and you thought you'd like working at A more but the extra money was very tempting, would you really rule out going to A and saying, "hey, if you can beat B's $55k, I'd rather work for you"? – Jay Oct 01 '16 at 18:39
  • @Jay - More than money factors in and it is different than actively soliciting a bidding war. Someone who is that mercenary and only cares about the money is considered a bad potential employee. Someone who doesn't care about the opportunity, the work, the work environment, working with co-workers, and building a career is going to get rejected by most companies as a poor choice for someone to add as an employee. Now, maybe money your primary motivation, and you think that's fine, but that's not how employers look at candidates they consider, and that's not something they think is positive. – PoloHoleSet Oct 03 '16 at 13:31
  • @PoloHoleSet Seriously? If you applied for a job, and they offered you great working conditions, totally lovable and inspiring co-workers, fascinating tasks to work on, etc ... but they offered to pay you $2 an hour, would you say "oh of course the money doesn't matter" and take the job? I doubt it. I certainly wouldn't. Money certainly isn't the ONLY thing I care about. But it's certainly on my list of things I care about. – Jay Jan 17 '20 at 15:00
  • @Jay - It took you 3+ years to fabricate a completely cartoonish strawman representation of my argument to knock down? Bravo. Compensation is part of what encompasses "the opportunity," but it is a part it, not the whole. If company "A" is considered the leading edge company, a company that, with their name on my resume, is going to open a lot more doors and, over my career, more compensation, then I'd be an idiot for choosing to collect $5K more, now. In fact, companies that are swirling around the toilet often offer absurd amounts more money because their opportunity, overall is so poor. – PoloHoleSet Jan 17 '20 at 15:28
  • @Jay - nuance from my earlier comments that you conveniently ignore - "more than money factors in" not "money does not matter", "only cares about money" not "considers money at all". Well done. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum – PoloHoleSet Jan 17 '20 at 15:32
  • @PoloHoleSet BTW I came back here because there was some activity on the question and it popped up. But anyway, you made a cartoonish mischaracterization of my post, interpreting my statement that I would compare the salaries being offered by two companies as meaning that all I care about is money, but then you are shocked and offended when I interpret your statements as meaning that a job seeker shouldn't care about money at all? So hmm, you think that a job seeker should consider many factors, one of which is money. That is exactly what I said. So what is it that you are ridiculing me for? – Jay Jan 17 '20 at 19:31
  • No, actually, I was not characterizing your answer that way, at all. My original comment was actually agreeing with your answer, and elaborating on why I agreed with it. I noted that it looked like OP might be taking that approach, and you came back and responded to my comment and said, yes, and that's what should be going on. It's all there in the comments. Re-read them from the start without the defensively-colored glasses on. And then, three years later, you decided it was a burning enough issue to double-down on it. If you think we agree, then why disagree in comments? – PoloHoleSet Jan 20 '20 at 15:37
  • Okay, fine. If I misinterpreted you, sorry. – Jay Jan 21 '20 at 13:33
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Your mistake was mentioning the other offer. They expect that every candidate is interviewing at multiple companies. But you mentioned the other offer so now the face a dilemma.

They were prepared to offer you X but you have an offer in your hand. They know that the most they can offer is X+delta. They want to know if they will win with X so they don't have to offer x+delta. They don't want to waste any more time if x+delta will be too low. Showing them the offer letter will cut right to the end. They will either just beat A's offer or they will walk away.

of course if you told them how much A is offering while you were talking to HR, they want to see the letter before they push for a funding decision from the company. They don't want to maximize their offer when there was no offer.

You have to decide which you want to go with. Take the written offer from A, or pursue a potentially better offer from B. Keep in mind your opinion of B's HR is not very good right now.

mhoran_psprep
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    A mistake?! As far as I can tell, he made no mistake. Mentioning a competing offer is not necessarily a mistake. Sometimes, it's the only option a job-hunter has because most offers come with short deadlines before they expire. And it's in the job-hunter's best interest to hurry along other potential offers before making a final decision. – Stephan Branczyk Apr 09 '16 at 21:54