She says she hit 177% of target and built the training deck — then came the layoff call
A former eBay worker is suing, saying an eight-month delay in her FMLA paperwork and disclosure of her medical information led to her firing.
Paige Williams spent more than nine years at eBay's Utah operations, working in the company's Premium Services Front Office. According to a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Utah (Williams v. eBay Inc., Case No. 4:26-cv-00059), her career ended on January 24, 2024 — 29 days after she returned from short-term disability leave, and on the very morning she was scheduled to train a group of new hires using a training deck she says she had built herself.
The lawsuit, filed on May 22, 2026, lays out a story that will sound uncomfortably familiar to HR leaders who have wrestled with third-party leave administrators, manager confidentiality lapses, and the optics of a post-leave reduction in force.
At the heart of the case is the FMLA. Williams says she sent a written request for FMLA paperwork to eBay's third-party leave administrator, Sedgwick, on December 23, 2022, copying eBay HR directly. She says she heard nothing for more than eight months — far beyond the five-business-day window employers are expected to hit. When eBay finally got back to her, the filing states, the company told her she was not eligible. Williams argues that the delay itself shifted the 12-month window used to calculate her eligibility, and that the company, in effect, created the very ineligibility it later relied on. She also says she asked eBay directly whether the delay caused the problem, and never got an answer.
She also alleges that a manager repeatedly shared her disability status and accommodation details with coworkers and other managers. The disclosures were so widespread, the filing states, that supervisors across eBay began sending other employees to Williams for advice on FMLA, ADA, and short-term disability questions. Williams says her prescription medication was later stolen as a downstream consequence.
Then there is the timing of the firing itself. Williams says her manager had documented her at 177% of target. She says she had spent her time after returning from leave voluntarily consolidating the department's training materials into a single deck, met with newly onboarded employees the night before her termination, and was scheduled to continue training them the next morning. Instead, she was told she was being let go in a "reduction in force." At least two members of that new-hire group, she says, were still working in her former department months later.
The filing also raises a whistleblower claim tied to eBay's Promoted Listings program, with Williams saying she had flagged concerns to leadership before her firing.
The allegations have not been tested in court. eBay has not yet filed a response, and no court has ruled.
