Last week we discussed the situation of Moshe, who was hired to help bake matzos but due to his tardy arrival, the group was only able to use one of the two reserved hours. Baking Matzos Part I

Q: If due to Moshe’s tardiness the group lost money, is he liable?

A: The issue at hand is whether damage that results from an employee arriving late is categorized as grama (indirect damages), in which case he is not liable. A similar situation arises when someone blocks a tenant from accessing his rented house; some authorities contend that the damage is only grama and the “damager” is not obligated to pay (see Nesivos 312:5, cf. Rabbeinu Yitzchak Elchanan 165). 

However, we find that when an employee causes his employer a loss, it is categorized as garmi (a category of indirect damages for which the “damager” is liable) and thus the employee is liable (Rema 333:6; Shach 333:39). Others reject this notion and exempt the employee even in this case (Nesivos 333:14 and Chazon Ish, B.K. 23:25, who rejects the Rema’s position altogether).

A possible precedent is the halachah of a sharecropper who is hired to plow and plant the owner’s field. If he allows the field to lay fallow, he must pay the owner the amount he would have earned had the sharecropper done his job. Seemingly, this obligates employees who cause their employer a loss by not performing their responsibilities. This parallel, however, is not very precise because in that case the sharecropper explicitly agreed to provide a certain income to the owner. Even if such a clause was not explicitly discussed, since it is a standard clause in sharecropping agreements it is as if it was written (C.M. 328). Accordingly, in your case, since it is not common to make such an agreement, he should not be liable.

Another possible precedent is that when one hires an employee to perform a task which, if not performed, will cause the employer a loss, the employee is liable, since the employer relied on the employee to prevent the potential loss (midin arev). An example of this is a merchant who hired someone to purchase wine while it was cheap so that he could resell it at a profit, and the employee did not purchase the wine (Nesivos 176:31, 185, 306:6 and 333:3; and Chasam Sofer, C.M. 178).

Others claim that the source for this halachah represents a minority opinion and is not strong enough to force an employee to reimburse his employer for the loss he caused him (Nachalas Tzvi 292; and see Imrei Binah Halvaah 39 and Maharsham 1:77).

Even in circumstances in which the employee cannot be compelled to reimburse his employer for the loss he caused, if the loss was caused by his negligence he has a moral obligation (chayav latzeis yedei Shamayim) to reimburse his employer. Accordingly, the question of whether forgetting to perform a task is categorized as negligence would have to be explored (see Divrei Geonim 99:10 for a discussion of the issue) and in each circumstance one would have to consider whether forgetting would be categorized as negligence.