Law provides guidelines on what former employers may disclose

What kind of information is a former employer allowed to reveal to a prospective employer? After an interview process with a potential employer, the company practically guaranteed me getting hired. But later, the HR person called and told me that they were not going to hire me and indicated the decision was made after contacting my previous employer — with whom I had personal differences that led to my departure. I have not committed any illegal act and my performance reviews have been positive. Can my former bosses ruin my chances of getting hired by personally criticizing me to other companies?

Arizona’s blacklisting statute regulates what information employers may disclose about employees and former employees.

Under the statute, certain employers are immune from liability for communicating to prospective employers, in good faith, truthful information about a former employee’s education, training, experience, qualifications and job performance. They also are immune from liability for disclosing, in good faith, the reason for terminating a former employee, as well as his or her professional conduct or evaluations. These disclosures are presumed to be in good faith if the disclosing employer has less than 100 workers or, if larger, has a regular practice of making such disclosures.

The presumption of good faith in the statute is rebuttable by showing that the employer disclosed the information with actual malice or with the intent to mislead. For the purposes of the statute, actual malice means knowledge that the information was false or was provided with reckless disregard of its truth or falsity.

If you can rebut the presumption that your former employer disclosed information about you in good faith, you then may have a claim against the former employer for defamation or interfering with your prospective employment relationship.

Notwithstanding the protection that the blacklisting statute affords to employers, many businesses will direct all requests from prospective employers to be handled by human-resources personnel, who will provide only a neutral reference, such as the dates of employment. Employers that follow neutral reference policies consistently naturally reduce their risk of liability to former workers.