You are allowed to negotiate. Say it again until you believe it.

Leanne Hahn from Advanced Practice Provider Solutions walks through what's inside a PA contract and which parts deserve a second look. Termination clauses. Notice periods. Restrictive covenants and non-competes, which can genuinely limit where you're able to work if you leave.

Her rule that stuck with me: if it isn't in writing, it doesn't exist. Verbal promises about schedule, CME money, or a raise at six months are worth nothing when the person who made them leaves.

New grads worry that asking questions makes them look ungrateful. It doesn't. It makes you look like someone who reads.

What we talk about:

• What's actually in a PA employment contract
• Termination clauses and notice periods
• Non-competes and restrictive covenants
• Why everything needs to be in writing
• How to negotiate without burning the relationship
• What new grads most often overlook

Resources:

Free resume download: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/free-resume-download

Pre-PA counseling: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/pre-pa-counseling

PA Program Map: https://www.thepaplatform.com/pa-platform-map

Free application timeline: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/free-application-timeline

Mentioned in this episode:

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You're listening to episode 83 of the Pre PA Club podcast.

Today we're diving into PA contracts and negotiations with Leanne Hahn from Advanced Practice Provider Solutions.

Welcome to the Pre PA Club Podcast.

If you want to learn how to become a physician assistant, you're in the right place.

I'm your host, Savannah Perry.

Let's get to it.

Hey, y', all, thanks so much for joining in and Happy CASPA opening.

It is official.

I am Savannah, by the way.

I am a dermatology PA and I also run the paplatform.com where you can find tons of resources to help you on your journey to becoming a pa.

Whether you're Pre pa, a PA student, we are there for you.

So I'm really excited about today's episode.

And before we jump into it, I do want to mention our sponsor, which is MyPA resource.

And so MyPA resource is, you know, I would assume you've already kind of started working on your essay if you're applying this cycle, but if you haven't, you need my PA Resource because they're an essay editing service specifically for PA school.

So if you need someone to look over your essay, edit, check your grammar, check your flow, make sure you're touching on all of the main topics, answering all the essential questions, MyPA resource can offer you that they only use PAs to edit.

I'm an editor for them.

And yeah, so go check out the website myparesource.com youm can use the Code Prepa Club for a discount if you decide to use that service.

And there is a free workshop to check out if you're just like, I have no idea where to start.

I don't know what to put in my essay.

I know I want to become a pa.

I can't say why.

So that's something to work on.

And the free workshop can help you out with that.

All right, so before we get into today's episode, if you're a Pre PA student, you may be kind of going, why does this matter to me?

Contracts, negotiations.

I just want to get into PA school.

But I think as a Pre PA student, it's so important to be looking towards the future and learning as much as you can along the way, because they really don't teach you this in PA school, unfortunately.

And this is a talk that Leanne goes and gives to PA students.

And so in part one, a couple weeks ago, we talked about resumes, which is definitely relevant because some schools do want you to upload a resume to caspa.

And then last week we talked about interviewing for PA jobs and things to look for.

So today we're going to dive into contracts, negotiations, things to look out for, things to ask for.

You never know until you ask.

And so these are things that you know.

PA school flies by.

So when you're going into your clinical year starting to look for jobs, come back and revisit this and make sure that you're kind of applying these tips and techniques to make sure you're getting what you're worth.

But let's dive in.

And if you want to watch this with the presentation, go to YouTube.com thepaplatform.

The next section I talk about is contracts and I've kind of mixed that in a little bit with what I was just talking about.

But now we'll just focus on that.

So you've got the job.

Now what do I have to sign as offered?

No, you don't.

Can I negotiate the terms?

Yes, you can.

Depends on your employer.

Like I said, the very first job offer I get, that guy didn't want to talk to me about negotiating on any, anything at all.

So you have to determine whether or not that relationship is going to be a good fit if that's the response that you get.

Other important considerations, termination provisions, applicable law, restrictive covenants.

I'm getting into big words here.

Termination provisions is basically talking about if the employer doesn't like you and they want to get rid of you, how many days notice do they have to give you or can you leave effective immediately?

And same thing you, you want it the other way around if you want to leave, it's not a good fit.

How much notice do you have to give them?

And usually that's spelled out in the contract.

Applicable law.

This is state dependent restrictive covenants.

We kind of touched on that a little bit.

This is also known as like a non compete.

You want to really look for this in your contract.

If it doesn't have one, fantastic.

But if they do, this is something that can literally make or break your career.

So you really want to be knowledgeable about what your non compete says and what it's going to be restricting you from doing and can you negotiate the terms of it or have it removed from.

Everything's legally binding.

You need to read and understand everything that you're signing.

It's so important.

Most of this part of my presentation generally my husband will do since he's the attorney and I'm not.

So I'll go over this to the best of my knowledge, we talk about employment law basics.

Employee, you're under the control and supervision of the employer.

You work for the employer for a wage, salary, payment or fee.

The terms of your employment under an express or implied agreement, your employer is likely to provide benefits or medical malpractice and taxes will be withheld by the employer.

And then I talk about independent contractor.

And this is basically just the definitions and how they're different.

The general rule is that an individual is an independent contractor if the payer has the right to control or direct only the result of the work and not what will be done or how it will be done.

And so this gets kind of sticky because there's actually people who are hiring PAs as independent contractors.

But if the IRS were to actually look at it, they would not classify that you, your schedule and where to be and when to do it and how to do it.

You're technically not an independent contractor.

As an independent contractor, you have to be able to make your own decisions and schedules.

And so this gets sticky.

I like a good example of independent contractor situation versus employee situation.

Might be like a hospitalist position.

There's some hospitalist positions where they'll say you're going to work seven on, seven off.

That gets a little sticky.

Whereas you could have a hospitalist position where you show up whenever you want to show up.

You know that you need to get the job done.

You show up at a reasonable time.

Maybe you show up at 7 in the morning, you show up at 9 in the morning, you could show up at noon.

But you know that you have a job that needs to get done and you get your list of patients and you see your patients on your time during the time frame it needs to be done.

And when you're done seeing your patients, you leave.

This would be a closer example to somebody that would be better classified as an independent contractor compared to the other example that I gave.

So it can get sticky.

And there's definitely some things where you can get reclassified as one or the other based on what the IRS thinks.

Something to consider.

So I talked about some other things with Florida, how we don't have malpractice requirements.

Another thing about Florida is that we're also considered an at will state and I wish I could talk to you about every single state in the country, but I can't.

This is just because this is where I am.

So the employer can determine the terms and conditions of employment.

And I'm sure Florida is not the only at will state.

They can change the terms and conditions at any time for any reason, with or without advance notice.

And they can also let you go without warning.

And so basically that's the basis of being an at will state.

If you live in an at will state, the employer can let you go for no reason.

They don't have to have a reason, but it cannot be for any illegal reasons.

So examples of this might be if you are working at an employer and maybe you notice that they're doing something against the law and you bring it to their attention, maybe thinking that they didn't know, and you just say, hey, this front desk girl is not a certified X ray technician.

She shouldn't be using the X ray machine.

We have to have somebody with a basic machine operator license or whatever it may be to operate this machine.

And maybe the employer didn't know that.

And so you just bring it to their attention.

But then you show up to work the next day and they've terminated you.

That might be grounds for saying, you know what, this is not a situation where I'm being terminated at will.

This is more of a whistleblower situation.

And that's again where you're going to want to get an attorney who's ultimately going to decide those things.

But there's certain situations where you actually would not be considered being terminated at will.

And it would be more of a whistleblower issue for you, bringing up certain things to their attention or there being illegal activity.

But there's a lot of different situations where that might look completely different.

How do you protect yourself, your contract?

That's the number one thing, making sure that everything's in writing.

Understanding for cause.

And without cause, which normally is spelled out in a contract, you know, what reasons can they terminate you?

What reasons can they let you go for?

No reason or not or whatever.

So normally they spell this out.

If it's with cause, it'll usually be things like, oh, well, you lose your license or you get sued or in a malpractice lawsuit, or you lose your privileges at a hospital.

Those are usually reasons why an employer is going to let you go.

And then there's the without cause where maybe the personality is just not working out and they're just going to let you go.

And that's okay.

In Some states.

So you definitely want to make sure that your contract talks about terms of notice for termination like we talked about.

How much notice do you have to give?

How much notice do they have to give?

And it can be really complex.

So other considerations.

Talk again about non competes.

This is usually a huge issue for everyone.

This is an example of a non compete clause.

In this particular situation.

For 18 months this person's unable to perform certain services.

And this is within a five mile radius of the practice or any other location which this physician is rendering services for the owner on behalf of herself or of any competitive business for which the primary services, blah, blah, blah.

So this is just an example.

And this is not something that's like standard across the board.

This really varies.

Like I've seen some where it goes for two years, five years.

I've seen them go five mile radiuses to 50 mile radiuses.

I've seen different clauses in contracts that say if you break your contract and you don't stay with us or you violate any of the terms here, you owe us $500,000.

I mean, you never know.

Non solicitation, this is typically something that's also in contracts.

Basically it just prevents you from soliciting former patients.

So say, for example, you work for one primary care doctor and now you're going to work for another one.

They don't want you on social media, basically recruiting your former patients to follow you to the new place.

This could get you in trouble.

And then there's arbitration clauses.

Some contracts have these, some contracts don't.

This is generally something that if you see an arbitration clause, it's in the favor of the employer.

And basically in a nutshell, an arbitration allows the employer to mediate or negotiate any disputes outside of court prior to you filing a lawsuit.

The issue is that if you file a lawsuit, that, that's public information.

And so they try to avoid becoming public by having an arbitration clause where you don't file anything yet.

Nothing's public yet.

And we try to mediate something with a neutral party outside of court.

She went out of the duration of your employment.

Does the contract say it expires after a year?

Is it indefinite?

Can you renew it?

What does it say?

Basic takeaways.

Understand the terms of your contract.

There are no two contracts that are exactly alike.

They're often drafted in employer favor.

And ideally we want to see a contract that's favored for the employer and the employee.

And I do see these often.

So if it's super employer favored, it may not be good for you.

Avoid any ambiguities.

You really want clarification on vague terms like things we talked about such as two weeks.

What is two weeks?

Retain a dually executed copy.

Again, like big legal jargon.

What does that mean?

Basically this is like, oh, okay, you send me the contract, I'm going to sign it and scan it back to you, but now I need a copy of the contract signed by you.

So you want to make sure that when you do sign your contract, you get back a copy that has their signature and your signature because this makes it more enforceable and easier for an attorney to defend you should that ever become a problem for you in the future.

And I think oftentimes people send their signed contract and they never get back the one that has both signatures.

And that's something people need to think about.

If you have any questions about any of this stuff, get a professional, hire a company like mine or find an attorney, somebody that's really well versed in this type of thing to help you negotiations.

Do you have any comments before I move forward with this?

Well, so is there a way to break a contract or should it kind of specify, specify in there like what that would have to look like.

So when you break a contract often, or if they break contact is called.

Yeah.

Or if they break one, that may even be the better point.

Yeah.

So there's something called breach.

And a lot of these contracts that people will hand me like 10, 17, 20 page contracts, typically those will have some language in it about breach of contract and when a contract can be broken.

So if an employer violates certain terms or their contract, whatever that may be, and you give them notice and then they fail to do anything about it, they may be in breach of contract.

So if their contract says that they are going to give you a paycheck every two weeks and then they start paying you like once every other month whenever they feel like it, they may be in breach of contract and you can say to them, hey guys, your contract says this, we need to remedy this by seven days or whatever you guys decide on.

Sorry.

Sometimes in your contract it'll actually specify how many days it needs to be remedied by.

And if they do not comply with that, then they are in breach of contract and then you can leave your contract typically and then everything's void.

Everything's void at that point.

So yeah, you just want to know if you're in a breach of contract type of situation or not, then you can leave and they could do the same.

Okay.

And then do non competes tend to hold up.

I mean I feel like that's something I see a lot like can they even be enforced?

And from what I've heard and read, it tends to be more state dependent.

And how it's okay, it depends on how crazy it is.

Like if they have something in there that says you're going to owe them $500,000 that might not be enforceable.

And again, I'm not an attorney, but that's such an astronomical number that you may be able to find representation that can argue that this number is unreasonable.

This doesn't make sense.

Or if somebody says you can never work for primary care ever again for the next 15 years, somebody will probably be able to represent you and say this is too strict, this is not fair or valid.

And then they would likely just reduce the terms or who knows, me throw it out.

Hard to predict.

But something that you sign that says one year, five miles, if you sign that and you agree to it, that's very valid and can be enforced.

And basically anything that you're signing and agreeing to can be enforced.

So that's why it's really important to keep in mind what are you non competes?

They'll just go off and do stuff against their non compete anyways.

And for most employers, what I've heard when I talk to them about non competes, they say that that's really there for their protection in case there's somebody that they kind of get into a tiff with, somebody that upsets them or is just a pain and then they want to be able to enforce that.

But a lot of people don't actually end up enforcing it.

But then you're just gambling basically at that point it's just all a gamble because if they wanted to, they could.

Okay, all right, negotiations.

So I wish I had more slides on negotiations, but this is an example offer letter or contract and I kind of point out different sections and how I might have negotiated differently or better here.

Let's see.

So this is just an offer letter.

It's not a contract that says dear so and so, this company is extending an offer of employment to you as a full time physicians.

Gotta love that assistance pac.

This employment agreement is made on such and such a day of this month by this company and your name and it's going to begin immediately.

And the following represents an outline of our terms of employment, devotion of duties.

So they're saying you're going to provide non surgical orthopedic services on behalf of the corporation as a physician's assistant at such and such location.

And the employee is going to provide the services on a full time basis.

And the party agrees that full time means a minimum of 40 hours a week, as well as the employee's proportionate share of call coverage.

Okay, well, what I like about that is that they didn't just say full time, which a lot of contracts do, is they actually spelled out for us what full time means to them.

So that's nice.

But we do want to know specifics if they're willing to put it in there.

As far as what does your schedule look like, how many days are you working, and what is your proportionate call coverage share mean then goes on to term.

And in this particular section, they talk about for no reason or any reason they can, upon 60 days prior, written notice to their party.

You guys can part ways.

60 Days isn't bad.

That's actually pretty normal for most PA contracts is 60 to 90 days.

For a hospital, it's usually about 90 because it takes that long to get somebody credentialed.

But for the benefit of you, the lower this number, the better.

Because if you find a really good job position, maybe they can't wait 60 days.

You may want this to be lower and this may be a point of consideration to negotiate down so when it's time for you to exit, you don't have to wait two months.

Something to think about.

So the next page,.

This.

I'm just going to kind of point out what I said here.

So additional compensation, once you're credentialed and we're able to commence billing for your services, you also receive 10% of collected revenue for professional services performed by you beyond 140,000 on a quarterly calendar basis.

So I say that's nice, but can you even hit 140,000 on a quarterly basis?

And if you can, how do you know that you are.

Are they being transparent?

Are they showing you the books?

Like, how is this being tracked?

And the other thing that we don't know here is, okay, so you're performing professional services.

Are they considering this collected revenue?

Like that's what it says here, 10% of collected revenue, that's something to keep in mind.

And not just what you're billing, but what they're actually collecting.

Because if they never paid by somebody, it's not collected revenue.

And how do you know that you're even going to get paid like that quickly on a quarterly basis by insurance companies, by patients, by whomever.

So this can become sticky.

So it's not just what you're billing, it's actually what they're collecting.

So we need more specifics on these numbers down here.

Professional liability insurance.

The employer is going to cover the cost of your malpractice insurance.

That's very vague.

We don't know if that's claims made.

We don't know if that's occurrence.

They're covering the cost of my malpractice.

Does that mean that they're paying for it or I'm getting my own?

What does that mean?

So this is not clear.

And if it is claims made, who's paying for my tail over here?

Health insurance.

The employer is going to provide the group with health and dental insurance coverage for you commencing after three months of employment.

And again, I say just because they provide the insurance doesn't mean that they're paying for it.

So we have no idea here if the employer is paying part of this, some of this, none of this.

They just offer it and you're paying $500 a month.

We don't know that.

So.

So we want to get more details there.

Is there a match or are you only contributing to 401?

I talked about this earlier.

So here you can see that in writing.

401K plan.

Our benefit program includes participation in our 401k which will begin after you've completed one year of employment, plan summaries and eligibility requirements to be provided.

So we want to take a look at that.

We want to know are they going to match or is this just something I'm able to contribute to here?

They're paying this person $90,000.

Always try to negotiate your salary.

It can't hurt, right?

So even if you think that whatever number they've put on the piece of paper is completely fair for you, I say try.

It definitely can't hurt if they have a little bit of wiggle board.

So here they do the vacation time thing where they say, oh, you will be eligible for three weeks of vacation, including illness, after three months of employment.

Unused time is not payable upon termination.

So in this situation, because they've explicitly stated that your unused time is not payable upon termination, they don't have to pay it out.

But if that line wasn't there, you could be entitled to that PTO because they're giving it to you up front, you're not accruing it.

So what we want to know here is three weeks vacation.

Does three weeks mean seven days times three?

Does it mean five days times three?

So how many days are we really looking at here?

We need to define what they think a week is and Then just like typical things that we talked about, non disclosures, confidentiality, these are really common to having contracts.

And actually, I would argue, since we're at the end of this contract, that this contract is not very thorough at all.

So there's probably.

This is not employer favored by any means, because if this went to court, they're missing a lot of stuff, but that's their problem.

So.

And it could be your problem if there's certain things you guys talked about that's not in here and for your protection too.

So definitely something to keep in mind.

But this is a poorly written contract.

So at the end, everybody signs.

And remember, when you sign, you send this back.

You want to get it sent back to you with these signatures as well.

So this is a disclaimer.

I had initially made this for school, so if I were to make my disclaimer here on your podcast, I would say that the views and opinions expressed in this presentation are those of the author, which would be myself, and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the PA platform, irs, FAPA, or the AAPA or any other state association.

We're not a law firm, we're not an accounting firm, but we're a really good resource if you need help.

So definitely check out the website and the services that we offer.

And I agree with the advice you.

Have given, if it matters.

Cool.

Yeah.

So I think it's pretty thorough.

I try to think about other questions people have asked.

So one question about negotiations.

I mean, do you feel like with like a big hospital incorporation and maybe with your healthcare administration stuff now, do you feel like there's room to negotiate?

Or in those cases, is it more of like, this is what we're going.

To offer and this is how it.

Is, Take it or leave it?

Yeah.

Unfortunately, the things that I've seen from actual hospitals that are like, giving you the contract, and it's not like a hospitalist group, it's actually, you're being employed by the hospital.

They're not so willing to negotiate on much.

They're kind of like, this is what you get, this is what everybody gets.

This is how it is.

And in that situation, I wouldn't necessarily turn it down or think of it as something that's bad.

It just depends on the terms of the contract, what they're offering you.

And if it's really a package that's worth taking.

I mean, I had a situation like that recently where I was interviewing for no reason, and I came upon a job that would have been monetarily very Beneficial to me.

But at the end of the day, what ended up happening was they had a four month policy where I had to give them four months notice if I wanted to leave.

And I said, this is ridiculous.

I said, I'm not going to give you four months notice if I want to leave this job.

And they were not willing to negotiate on that.

And for me, that was something I wasn't willing to sign because I didn't want to commit to something that I didn't know how it was going to work out and then have to be stuck there giving four months notice.

Then I can't even tell another employer, oh, well, I have to be at my current job for four months.

That's probably not going to apply.

There's no other job that's going to wait for me for four months until I leave my job.

So it became a little sticky and I decided that for me, I wasn't really willing to sign that.

Yeah, no, that's completely reasonable.

Okay.

Yeah, I think we covered a lot of the essentials.

I definitely welcome any additional questions.

If there's something I haven't touched on or brought up, they can feel free to message you or me on social media or on my website and then I can address those with anybody that sends us questions.

Yeah, and I'll definitely make sure I put all the links and stuff in the description and make sure everybody can, can find you.

And it does involve a lot of paperwork and tracking things.

And if you don't understand it, it can be really intimidating.

But if you do understand it and you have a good accountant, it can actually be very beneficial.

So just.

Okay, cool.

Let me try to stop this and see what happens.

Alright, y', all, I hope you feel more prepared and more informed about what it takes to negotiate a great contract and get a job as a pa.

So that'll be really helpful to anyone on the job search or kind of looking for maybe not necessarily a non traditional job, but maybe a non traditional route compared to what most PAs end up doing.

I do want to mention also PA school prep.

So if you're getting ready to start start PA school, you definitely want to go to paschoolprep.com and check that out.

It is a program that is designed to help prepare you for that first didactic year of PA school.

It's a review of anatomy and physiology as well as medical terminology by pas and they know what PA school entails and what you need to know to do well and not be as stressed out.

So go check that out.

It is available, it's an online course and you can use the code Pre PA Club there as well for a discount.

And you can also use that on the PA platform.com for any services as far as prepay assessments or mock interviews.

Which interview season is coming up and it is my favorite.

So all right, we'll see you guys next week.

Thank you so so much for listening.

And if you love this episode, if you loved any episode and you feel so inclined to leave us a review on itunes, subscribe to the podcast.

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Subscribe there.

Just make sure you're following along so you don't miss out on anything.

Awesome, because there's a lot of cool stuff coming up.