When is an interview not an interview?

[confusedSA]

Good morning UK legal experts.

I've tried everywhere to find a UK legal definition of what constitutes an interview. Because my employer has thrown a total curve ball.

Our company set up a new team and a few of us applied for the positions within in. We negotiated a start date, salary and package. Two of us were told we had got the job verbally, and we both started the work on the start date - but our pay hasn't changed and neither of us have received a offer letter or a written statement. I have just come out of Personnel with a sore head. Our PM claims our interviews were not interviews as such, more "informal discussions" so nothing agreed in them are binding. Is that legal??

Does anyone have a legal definition of an interview, or an ET Ruling / precedent that we can fire back at our Personnel Department?

[efpom]

I think it might be better if you approached this from a contract standpoint.

Was there an offer?
Was there acceptance of the offer?
If the answer is "yes" to both above, a contract exists.

Was there performance under the contract so formed?
Answer - would seem to be yes - at least by you.

Has the other party performed to the contract? - answer would seem to be "no"

Remedy, possible unlawful deduction of wages - Employment Tribunal.

Hope this analysis helps.

[confusedSA]

Yes all of those points have been considered and in our view, yes a contract exists. When you sit in front of an interviewer and they offer you a salary for a position on a specific start date for a specific position, that should be binding (see McCann v. Snozone Ltd ET/3402068/2015 which nails down that verbal offers in an interview is binding).

The problem we are having is, our employer has referred us back to the original invitation to interviews. And the company headed all the internal applicants' emails "Meeting to discuss the position of...". So their defence is, these were not interviews. My colleague who did get the other job went to our local Citizens Advice yesterday; he says they have had a run of identical complaints against the same employer for at least a year. but nothing seems to stick.

Our understanding is this: the company changed its wording to deliberately give themselves a cast-iron get-out if they don't like the terms agreed in an interview. It works like this: Advertise a position, collect all the applications, invite candidates to a "meeting" (not an interview), offer the job VERBALLY to the successful applicant(s) - but after that, they can do what they want. And especially if the applicant is an existing employee, make sure they do not get an offer letter or Written Terms (because ERA 1996 and the 2018 Amendment only mention Written Statements for new starters), and pay them their old salary for their previous job. If/when the employee complains, refer the employee (or the Tribunal) that the only correspondence refers to a "meeting" not an interview. Case gets dismissed.

I have just come home from a consultation with a local solicitor. He knows the company and the issue - he's had other requests from other (ex) employees. But he cannot take on my (or anyone else's) case because the letters state the employee or applicant is invited to a "meeting" not an interview. He admits there has to be an obscure precedent somewhere that counters this, but it could take weeks to find such a precedent and at £250 an hour and all of us being low paid, it's just not viable for anyone to engage him.

Someone somewhere must know where to look for a case similar to this, or something in law that prevents companies from using alternative descriptions to dodge their legal responsibilities, otherwise companies up and down the country would be abusing this loophole on a industrial scale. So if anyone has any pointers, I will happily represent myself. Even if I don't win, hopefully the judge would then give the company an enormous kick up the backside so they abandon this disgusting practise.

[efpom]

Their so called defence is complete twaddle - meeting vs interview is semantics. It is the substance of what went on in the room that counts, not whether the room is labelled "meeting room" or "interview room" or any other label.

[Amethyst]

After agreeing terms / salary etc you were verbally offered the position and verbally accepted the offer. You then left your original job and started the new job as agreed.

Are they arguing that it was simply an internal shuffle and no new terms were agreed ( because it was just a 'meeting' ) for the change of role ?

[confusedSA]

After agreeing terms / salary etc you were verbally offered the position and verbally accepted the offer. You then left your original job and started the new job as agreed.

Totally. My previous role no longer exists. I am not the only person affected by the restructure. A few redundancies and consolidating roles is normal business practise, but they way it's been handled is at best, unethical. The new roles were advertised, those of us left applied for them, some of us have got them, and the roles have been set up. We're doing the work. But none of us have got what we negotiated in our interviews. Because the Company says they were not interviews. I have challenged this and was referred back to the contract I signed when I first joined over ten years ago. Specifically, the clause "Adjustments" - ie "we reserve the right to make reasonable adjustments to your terms and conditions, which will be either communicated to you direct within a month of implementing the change, or will be posted on the Company Notice Board".

Are they arguing that it was simply an internal shuffle and no new terms were agreed ( because it was just a 'meeting' ) for the change of role ?

That's about it. In their view, every new role was simply a reasonable adjustment to restructure the company. It appears the company's been using this get-out for years. I fail to see how this is legal let alone fair, but they've been getting away with it for so long, maybe it is legal. And the absence of any viable legal challenge to it (we've collectively spent over £3,000 on solicitors and not one solicitor has been able to find a precedent that defends us) - we have no option but to either accept this disgusting manipulation, or resign.

[efpom]

"we reserve the right to make reasonable adjustments to your terms and conditions, which will be either communicated to you direct within a month of implementing the change, or will be posted on the Company Notice Board"

Has the employer, in fact, done this "communication", which seems to be after the fact of the "change",

[jaguarsuk]

"we reserve the right to make reasonable adjustments to your terms and conditions, which will be either communicated to you direct within a month of implementing the change, or will be posted on the Company Notice Board"

Has the employer, in fact, done this "communication", which seems to be after the fact of the "change",

Yeah, they can't have a meeting about a job they advertised and then retrospectively say that meeting was to talk about restructuring you.

If they wanted to restructure you they have to invite you to attend a meeting about restructuring you.

[efpom]

This is now becoming a sterile discussion. Either, you issue tribunal proceedings or put up with the situation. It seems to me, shortly put, that your case is simply that you are not being paid what you are entitled to be paid.

[ULA]

Sorry come into this thread a bit way down track. Couple of things I have picked up particularly on your post #6

1. You said your position no longer exists, does that mean you went through a redundancy consultation?
2. Was the new role considered a suitable alternative position?
3. What has happened to those people who did not get the job? Were they made redundant?

My questions above aside because they are about the process that led to the "new job" becoming available, your remedy would be a claim for an unlawful deduction of wages based on the difference between the salary you were on and the salary of the new job from the time that you started doing the new job.

How long ago did you start the new job.

[confusedSA]

We can't afford a solicitor but we are doing a joint claim for breach of contract & unlawful deduction of wages. Overall, the impression we get from all your responses is the company's claim our interviews were not interviews is utter nonsense, but three cases this year (that we know of) have been struck out already because there is no legal challenge to it. The "was there an offer" argument is not working. And even our solicitors have told us, if we cannot find a single case in the history of employment tribunals where the court has ruled that that kind of claim is nonsense, we are almost certainly doomed to go the same way, and lose the case.

I appreciate lawyers and solicitors really work hard, racking up hours upon hours trying to find a needle in a haystack in all those big law report books. I have to say it's not very efficient though, surely all cases are available electronically (and I assume they would have to be public domain) and there is some form of "Loogle" (legal google"), where people simply type in keywords for a specific point of argument and a list appears of relevant judgements? If there is such a thing, where is it? And if it is restricted to the legal profession, surely the search would have taken a few minutes at most - and only cost an hour's charge? Maybe I'm overthinking it, we are just so stressed we are clutching at straws.

If there is no such thing, crumbs if there was ever a business that needed setting up, it's that!!!

[ULA]

Most law firms pay for comprehensive legal library services for their lawyer and solicitors which they can access to find relevant case law etc.

There is a public access site where you can find British and Irish case law and legislation which has a search function but I am not sure how effective the search is. The link is here:

http://www.bailii.org/