What to do if a Former Employee Solicits Customers?

Your star sales­per­son has decided to jump ship to a com­peti­tor.  She has taken your cus­tomer list and has started solic­it­ing for busi­ness. What can you do to stop her?

Under New York Con­tract Law, you may be able to obtain a per­ma­nent  injunc­tion against her where she would be pro­hib­ited from solic­it­ing your clients. 

A pre­lim­i­nary injunc­tion can be granted in the early stages of a law­suit. For exam­ple, a pre­lim­i­nary injunc­tion may be appro­pri­ate to stop a for­mer employee from doing busi­ness or solic­it­ing any cus­tomers of the cor­po­ra­tion who where cus­tomers of the com­pany when she was employed by the company.

Gen­er­ally the com­pany needs to show that there was a writ­ten con­tract between the employer and employee and that the non-solicit clause was rea­son­able in terms of time and scope.