‘Take care of this cat situation, right meow.’
An associate at a Biglaw firm in London has reportedly lost his job over something absolutely, pawsitively ridiculous.
As first reported by RollOnFriday, an associate at Travers Smith — a firm that brought in $244,327,250 gross revenue in 2022, putting it at No. 26 on most recent UK 100 ranking — was on a secondment at Inflexion, one of the firm’s private equity clients. While there, an employee posted on the company’s internal messaging app, attempting to sell some kittens. The associate jumped at the chance, offering to take two, but little did they know that this attempt to buy some pets would end in catastrophe.
One week later, the associate attempted to return the kittens because they had fleas. That’s when all of the trouble started. From RollOnFriday:
[The seller] refused, but over the next couple of weeks the Travers associate repeatedly messaged her to say that she needed to take the kittens back and refund him because their fleas meant they were not sold as described, sources told ROF.
His requests culminated in an eight page letter which set out “all his legal and statutory rights” and demanded that the seller take the cats back and refund him or he would initiate court proceedings against her, said sources.
What a sourpuss. From there, a chain of events began that would land the associate’s career in the litter box.
Inflexion reported the associate to HR, HR went to legal, legal went to Travers, and the associate’s secondment was lost. Travers Smith reportedly asked the associate to apologize to the seller at Inflexion and donate the cats to shelter. According to ROF, the associate allegedly refused to give the cats away for free, and said they would do so if, and only if, the firm refunded the purchase price.
Unlike the unwanted cats, this associate did not have nine lives, and their job with the firm was hisssstory. ROF notes that the associate in question still has the “flea-ridden kittens.” Purrrfect!
EXCLUSIVE Travers Smith associate dismissed after complaining that a client ‘sold him flea-ridden kittens’ [RollOnFriday]
Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter and Threads or connect with her on LinkedIn.
