Got A Signing Bonus From Lehman Brothers? Yeah We're Gonna Need That Back

Were you a member of an elite group of individuals taken before their time known as the Lehman Brothers associate class of 2008? Were you robbed of the chance to toil under the Gorilla for more than a few weeks because oops the firm went out of business? (And speaking of that: do you blame yourself? Dick Fuld certainly does.) Those $40k signing bonuses you got and probably already spent are going to need to be paid back, ASAP.

The requests are allegedly coming from PricewaterhouseCoopers, which is administering Lehman's estate in the UK. "More than 60% of my class received this letter around two weeks ago," says one former Lehman associate. "We're seeking legal opinions on whether we have to pay it back."

Elaine Aarons, a partners who acts for senior executives at law firm Withers, says PWC might be able to extract the money from the unfortunate associates if the contracts were worded so that the loans were repayable if they simply weren't in employment with Lehman 12 months on.
"Whilst it may seem unreasonable on a common sense basis to have to repay something that you've probably already spent when you have done nothing wrong, it's not impossible that on a strict reading of the contract events have triggered the conditions in which a repayment would occur."

Former Lehman associates allegedly being asked to repay $40k [eFC via BI]