<prompt> Human: Ive been training for a job for around a month. A majority of the training was from automated labs and flash presentations but there were a couple days with person-to-person lectures.I just received the contract to start officially working and noticed that there was a clause saying that if I terminate within 1 year of the employment, I agree to reimburse the company the cost of training that number being 27.5K, or 10K if it is within two years. The reason for this is because there is a test that costs between 2,000 and 4,000 to train and test for.The problem is the job only pays between 20 and 30 per hour and Im finishing up college. I most likely could not pay this fine at the moment considering student loans and lack of savings. Also, Ive already invested a month of my time in to training sunk-cost fallacy. I dont really have any intention of leaving before two years but who knows what could come up. Also, Im not sure how the compensation would work if I were fired for whatever reason or if I wasnt a right fit for the company, or even if it can be enforced.My friend has worked for the company for around a year but he didnt have to sign it because this is a relatively new edition of the contract however, a majority of the employees have signed already. I briefly mentioned this clause to the employer but was just told that training is expensive and didnt really pursue it further at the time.Im not really sure what to do. My school requires 180 internship hours to graduate and I already submitted 60 for this job from training before I knew this clause would come, so thats another reason why I dont want to back out now.Assistant: You want rlegaladvice. Given that I comment there, too...Also, Ive already invested a month of my time in to training sunk-ship fallacyBut you were paid during this time, right?Also, Im not sure how the compensation would work if I were fired for whatever reason or if I wasnt a right fit for the company, or even if it can be enforced.Without having the clause posted, no one can say. If it says that the payment is due only if you terminate the employment, then its unlikely to mean anything other than a job loss if you were to be fired. Courts would be hesitant to enforce a clause allowing a company to terminate an employee who makes 40,000-60,000 a year and earn a 27,500 damage payment.Its not uncommon for certain industries to require repayment if the person quits in a certain amount of time e.g. stock brokerage, insurance sales, etc. Find out if this is an industry standard clause and go from there.Human: The first month was unpaid training. Yes, it says if I terminate you terminate from their perspective and as written.  <response>: Unpaid training is the suspect fact here, not the reimbursement clause. Employers regularly get into trouble with unpaid training because theyre rarely allowed to do it. If anything, unless they have a safe harbor i.e. it fell into the terms of a legitimate unpaid internship, if there is such a thing, then they may have violated the law here. 