Arbitration: Enforceability – Consideration – Employment Case

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Where an employer sought to compel a former employee to arbitrate her age discrimination claim against them, denial of the motion to compel is affirmed because an agreement signed by the employee during the first week of her almost-29 year employment did not include a mutual promise from the employer that would act as consideration for the employee’s promise to arbitrate, and the employer did not show that the employee’s promise to arbitrate was made in exchange for its initial offer of at-will employment because there was no showing that the employer conditioned its offer upon signing of the agreement and the promise to arbitrate was a term of employment that ended with employment.

Judgment is affirmed.

Sniezek v. Kansas City Chiefs Football Club, Inc. (MLW No. 64714/Case No. WD75206 – 9 pages) (Missouri Court of Appeals, Western District, Hardwick, J.) Appealed from circuit court, Jackson County, Wimes, J. (William T. Kilroy and William E. Quirk, Kansas City, Missouri, and Jon R. Dedon, Overland Park, Kansas, for appellant) (Dennis W. Egan, Kansas City, Missouri, for respondent).

Read the full text of this opinion. (PDF)