What are my rights when my company relocates ?

No3ntry · 5 Jun 2008 at 21:09

The company that i work for is having to move my office (not by choice i might ad) to a new location.
The new office is a further 6 miles for me.
my current journey is 16 miles and takes about 30 minutes, witha daily round trip of 32 miles and 1 hour travelling.

The new location is going to mean a 44 miles round trip and 1 hour 20 mins travelling.

My car does approx 26MPG which means very roughly about £60 extra per month for me and that is at current prices I am led to believe fuel is very likely to be £1.50 by the end of the year.

It has been suggested by my superviosr that i should look at buying a new car, so i took this up with my manager and got accross to him without being obnoxious or rude that i wasnt happy with this suggestion and he in return without being impolite suggested that my supervisor was perhaps right.
I have asked for some sort of contribution towards extra fuel when we move at the end of the month, and was told he would take it up with his manager (who also works in our office 2 or 3 times a week) so at the minute I am awaiting an answer.

I have been in this company about a month and they did not mention (and apparently did not find out themselves until shortly after i started) anything about moving offices at the interview.

What are my official rights ?

P.S. any suggestion about driving more economically, I already am I have taken the cars economy from ~18MPG to 26MPG by taking it easy on the right pedal my car is an Audi S3 and there are lots of hills on the way to my place of work.

No3ntry · 5 Jun 2008 at 21:45

Oh I wouldn't leave if they refused to pay anything or if i wasn't entitled to anything, it would just hurt a little until i get a payrise as currently my "spare" cash every month is about £200 so that would be reduced to £140 which isnt a lot of money to play with every month.

No3ntry · 6 Jun 2008 at 01:47

in my contract.

under the heading "variation of terms"
The company reserves the right reasonably to reallocate responsibilities to you which may involve a change in the scope of the natue of your job and / or place of work.

that is all I am not sure wether asking me to spend another £60ish a month on fuel is reasonable or not.

To the people who think i should get another car, I ask you this why should I have to sell my car and get another due to my company moving premises. I already pay through the nose for insurance, tax and fuel through my own desire to own a nice (and powerful) car. If i drove a standard run of the mill car which i cared nothing for fair enough it probably would have been sold long ago in exchange for a diesel anyhow, but my car isn't just a commuting vehicle.

I considered buying something like a 2nd hand 1.5D 106 just to travel to work in but i think any savings made would be spent on extra insurance tax MOT and repairs anyway making it pointless.

Do not think for one second that I am being unreasonable if push comes to shove I will just bite the bullet and soak up the cost as from what i understand in the next 12 months my wages will go up by about £1500 and this is such a big company I have good future prospects/oppertunities with them.

No3ntry · 6 Jun 2008 at 19:29

A lot of assumptions and opinions in this thread.

Can everyone please get off there high horse for a second.
There is no need for everyone to be nasty to each other like they are doing I am sure speaking IRL you wouldn't be as aggressive as you are on here, now that being said.

I didnt kick up a fuss I asked reasonably what could be done.
I bought my S3 when i lived 1.5 miles from where i worked and earned £2k a year more my situation has changed now (redundancy) I may need to evaluate the car situation in the near future but for now I am going to suffer for a while in order to keep it.

What i asked for at the start of this thread is my legal stance not your opinion on wether I am right or wrong, it si quite obvious from this thread that half the camp feel I am in the wrong and half the camp feel I am right to ask for compensation for more outgoings.

I am fully aware of both sides of the arguement even before i approached my manager and am also aware of the consequences of kicking up a stink about what is probably a trivial matter would do after such a short term in employment. I am also aware that choosing to drive a performance vehicle means I pay more and I would also be happy with being offered SOME of the extra cost, hell I have already said i would still stay there if they gave me nothing.

Some of you have suggested that i ask the question and see what the result is, well if you had read my first post you would see that is what I have already done.

Now please could someone help me out here on my legal posistion

[EDIT] for those of you in the camp of OP should buy a new car why ? lets say i drove a car which returned a normal 35MPG (especially on the road I drive loads of hills) its still gonna be ~£45 extra per month should I still foot that extra money even though I drive a "normal" car ?