Redundancy/consultation advice please

Soldato
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I'll try to keep this brief/vague due for obvious reasons..

My girlfriend's company has been bought out 'proper' by their sister/parent company in the US. Obviously this means a mass cull of staff here in the UK.

My girlfriend's team has been restructured to remove most of the junior staff, keep the managers (her) and their department head. Usual yank way of keeping the upper management and getting rid of everyone that actually, you know, does the work :rolleyes:

Turns out the redundancy package is actually very good (probably another reason to keep the 'expensive/experienced' people) and considering my girlfriend has been there for more than 5 years (I'm being vague on purpose here), together with the lump sum, two months notice she could have been in line for something nearly equivalent to a years salary in cash. Problem is, they have mapped her role to an 'equivalent' role in the US structure.

And there endeth her chances, apparently. She absolutely wants to leave and has made it clear that she will in the new year (to her line manager). The equivalent team in the US are useless, not qualified and generally have a terrible standard of work. The role she has been mapped to is not-even equivalent to the role she had when she joined, it is essentially a two-grade demotion if you read the role profile. So she is absolutely gutted. Having a great redundancy package waved in front of you, being absolutely clear that you want to leave the job. Then not getting it. How gutting :(

So, she's started arguing against the mapping of her role. How they have taken away her line management etc, how more than 30% of her role has changed. Problem is, they don't agree 30% or more has changed - they just refute that fact. They've now come back and said to her that if she wishes to argue it further, she has to raise a grievance with HR and that will be treated separately from the main consultation that everyone else is going through. The kicker of that means that if she wins, she may not be eligible for the great redundancy package that everyone else is getting.

My question is, can that be correct? :confused: Their argument is that she has been mapped to a role, therefore her job is safe. If she raises a grievance with HR they are saying it is a separate issue. How can that possibly be the case? She is arguing against the mapping of her role which is part of the ongoing consultation :confused:

Does anyone have any experience with this? She now has a dilemma of taking this on with a grievance where they may turn round and say "ok you're right, your role is redundant and here is your statutory minimum package" and getting royally screwed over before Christmas :confused: She is tempted to forget it and stay until the new year, as she gets a Christmas bonus which is likely to be bigger than statutory min redundancy package.

Redundancy has to be the most unfair thing ever :(
 
I don't know the answer I'm afraid. But I thought a company can change a persons role anyway?

Back in 2006 or 2007 I applied for redundancy and was declined. Then accepted.. Then it was revoked again two weeks later (lol).
 
Why did she tell her line manager she was going to leave? Of course the company is going to make out they want to keep her if she is going to leave - one less redundancy payment they have to make.
 
Why did she tell her line manager she was going to leave? Of course the company is going to make out they want to keep her if she is going to leave - one less redundancy payment they have to make.

Yeah duh,

She should just leave it and get on with what ever she's supposed to be doing, she's one of the extremely lucky ones .

Has she actually got another job to go to?
 
I'm going on the first assumption that her salary will not change with the new role?

Also what does her contract specifically state regarding her job role? Most seem to have some vague line about the company being able to move you into other roles that they believe matches your skillset.

I think with both of the above, there's not much she'd be able to do. Sounds like she's unhappy there and the redundancy is a nice get-out card, which isn't really what the redundancy schemes are about.

As Slam puts it, she should probably be grateful for the job security approaching this time of the year, her colleagues might now be facing one of their worst Christmases ever.
 
unless they are offering a voluntary option then there is no way to force them to consider your other half for redundancy. even voluntary applications can be turned down.

as shes now said she will leave either way I suspect they'll just hang on for that anyway and avoid a payout. but they are not obligated to consider her for redundancy even from a grievance.
 
Turns out the redundancy package is actually very good

snip

considering my girlfriend has been there for more than 5 years, together with the lump sum, two months notice she could have been in line for something nearly equivalent to a years salary in cash.

snip

as she gets a Christmas bonus which is likely to be bigger than statutory min redundancy package.

so if the bonus is more than redundancy, take the bonus then quit
 
Not a lot you can do with this - all she can do is register her interest in taking redundancy and hopefully if there is any trouble with anyone else they might take the easy route and pick her as an easy option to meet the numbers

The time to tell your boss you might leave is when you want to ask for a payrise or when you actually hand your notice in. Certainly not before a round of redundancy!
 
so if the bonus is more than redundancy, take the bonus then quit

I think the issue is its more than statutory but way less than the generous package on offer to her work colleagues.

I think the OP is trying to say if they hadn't matched her job to the equivalent one they have then she would have been made redundant and got a year's wage.

I don't think she will get anywhere, as people have said you cant force a company to make you redundant and she has already told them she is leaving in the new year which automatically removes here from redundancy anyway.

I doubt she would be kicking up such a stink though if it had just been statutory redundancy of about £1,500.

Sometimes some people win with the big time redundancy and other people who stay get jealous.

Place I used to work a guy got a full years salary, and given his company car as a redundancy package even though pretty much everybody knew the only reason he had stayed on for so long was to hold out for redundancy.
 
Interesting responses. Telling her boss she is likely to leave in the next year was not a big deal or likely to put her out of the running for redundancy at all. They get on very well and her boss is not high-up enough in the food chain to be making any of those decisions. It's a big corporate and the re-organisation is coming from the US. Either way, sounds like they have done similar things across the board in other departments.

see the TUPE regs, basically shes stuffed, new company has a job for her.
Her argument is really about what the new job is. If a company is undergoing consultation and offer (for example) a store manager at Tescos a job stacking the shelves, if they keep his salary and grade correct what can he do? Is that legal?

She has it on good authority that a lot of people are raising grievances because they've been put in the same boat.

The real kick in the teeth is that for those that have been offered new 'alternative' positions (i.e. not their current role) they can actually choose to take that role, or take the full redundancy package! :(

EDIT:
I think the issue is its more than statutory but way less than the generous package on offer to her work colleagues.
Correct. And if they turn round and make her redundant on statutory she wouldn't get her bonus and she'd be out of a job in two months.
 
Interesting responses. Telling her boss she is likely to leave in the next year was not a big deal or likely to put her out of the running for redundancy at all. They get on very well and her boss is not high-up enough in the food chain to be making any of those decisions. It's a big corporate and the re-organisation is coming from the US. Either way, sounds like they have done similar things across the board in other departments.

Her argument is really about what the new job is. If a company is undergoing consultation and offer (for example) a store manager at Tescos a job stacking the shelves, if they keep his salary and grade correct what can he do? Is that legal?

She has it on good authority that a lot of people are raising grievances because they've been put in the same boat.

The real kick in the teeth is that for those that have been offered new 'alternative' positions (i.e. not their current role) they can actually choose to take that role, or take the full redundancy package! :(

EDIT:Correct. And if they turn round and make her redundant on statutory she wouldn't get her bonus and she'd be out of a job in two months.

Basically so long as they pay the same and its the same hours/benefits then it doesnt matter that the job is a lessor one.

Of course the employer would be stupid doing that as they could pay basic redundancy eg £1500 and keep a lessor person on substantially less pay doing the new role and they would soon get the £1,500 back from the wage difference so there ahs to be something more going on here.

Your analogy is correct ref Tesco's store manager but in this case they are doing what you said but at the same time make a shelf stacker redundant and giving them a years redundancy.

For some unknown reason they really want to keep her. Perhaps she is too good?
 
It's the role that has been made redundant not the person, I believe she can refuse to take a new role and therefore mean she stays in that role that is being made redundant (the kicker here is that they may decide to not give her the enhanced terms) and then be made redundant.

Best thing to do is get a union rep onside as they will make sure everything is done fairly although it looks like they are offering enhanced term for people who 'go quietly' and people like in your gfs case may just get statutory.

As people have said, have they made it clear why they want to keep her?
 
It's the role that has been made redundant not the person, I believe she can refuse to take a new role and therefore mean she stays in that role that is being made redundant (the kicker here is that they may decide to not give her the enhanced terms) and then be made redundant.

Best thing to do is get a union rep onside as they will make sure everything is done fairly although it looks like they are offering enhanced term for people who 'go quietly' and people like in your gfs case may just get statutory.

As people have said, have they made it clear why they want to keep her?

TUPE is there to protect employment and benefits.

I believe if she is offered a role with equal employment terms + benefits her refusal would be classed as resignation not redundancy. At least thats my recollection from when I went through similar.
 
Not really. She is generally respected as the best in her team (and more useful than her boss) but you know, I've only got one point of view on that.

Hmm ok, not sure what she can do, as people have said to tell her boss she was willing to leave is not the greatest thing but I'm not sure her boss would've rung the States and told them to save their cash as she was ready to leave with nothing.

When I was made redundant last year I requested to stay in the role to TUPE across knowing it would more than likely lead to redundancy and when they said there was 2 jobs (for 30 engineers!!) I didn't apply as my RMG T&Cs meant I would get a decent wedge, I then took voluntary and got 'let go' 2 months early paid.

I did get a call about a week before leaving by the Unite rep saying that he thought he could force them to keep me as they didn't think it was fair the way I was included in the transfer, soon put paid to that and told them I didn't want them 'cocking' up my payday!!
 
I believe if she is offered a role with equal employment terms + benefits her refusal would be classed as resignation not redundancy. At least thats my recollection from when I went through similar.

Not sure if that's true as our Union Reps were saying if you refuse more than 2 roles offered then you effectively make yourself redundant because your previous role has gone, never mentioned anything about it being classed as a resignation and missing out on the money.

Anyway I'm not an employment guru and was trying to share my experience with OP as I went through group consultation and redundancy after we were transferred under TUPE hoping it gave him an insight into what can and usually does happen, some guys clung on until the bitter end (assume it was to get their morgage payment protection activated as I don't think you're covered if you take VR).
 
Seriously it's not a good idea to try to get legal advice on a forum by people who clearly are half guessing/having a stab at trying to provide advice.

It gets quite complex depending on the stance/circumstances i.e does her role still exist and if you can argue it doesn't then the next step is to prove the role offered is not a suitable alternative; and a whole raft of factors go into this and not just pay/hours as someone said above.

First port of call is to contact ACAS or check your house insurance to see if you've got access to any legal advice
 
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