Redundancy with no suitable alternatives

[Jamie_93]

Hello,

I've recently been told that my employer is making my role redundant, and that there are no suitable alternative roles to offer me. I have a few questions I'm hoping someone can help me with, to make sure I'm interpreting the process correctly.

I lead a small team. My team members have been put into a different selection pool than myself, and have been found suitable alternative employment. This employment is essentially the same job as we're currently doing, but reporting into someone else.

My questions are:
1) Is it right to put my direct reports into a different selection pool to myself even though our jobs are very similar? The reason I was given was that the salary is very different, but I've also read that lower salary roles should be offered to me, and so I'm wondering whether I should be offered the same roles that my subordinates have?
2) Is it illegal to assume the outcome of a consultation process, so much so that the "at risk" employee's responsibilities are shared amongst colleagues before the consultation process has even started?
3) I haven't been offered any form of redundancy package other than PILON alongside statutory redundancy pay. Am I able to request a settlement agreement from my employer if they haven't already offered one? And if so, how do I raise this?
4) How is it determined whether roles are similar enough to be included in the consultation? There are other roles at the same level as mine in the business, who I believe should be added to my pool, but how do I prove that they should be if my employer disagrees?
5) What are the requirements for my employer to prove that they've tried to redeploy me elsewhere in the business? Are they obliged to consider "bouncing", and how much training is reasonable to get me into a different vacancy/role?

Many thanks in advance,
Jamie

[ULA]

Sorry to hear about our situation. In answer to your questions:

1. I cannot say about the selection pool as you have not indicated the level of other people in the pool you have been allocated to for this process. The company should include in each pool all roles that are the same or similar, which may be based on skills, management level if a number of senior roles are being made redundant etc. There are no set rules about how a redundancy pool should be defined. The company just needs to show that its choice of pool was reasonable in the circumstances,
In terms of suitable alternative positions, regardless of the pool you are placed in, even if the roles on offer are at a lower salary or grade they should be made available to you for consideration as a possible suitable alternative. It would then be up to you to decide whether you are happy to accept a role on a lower salary or grade.

2. It seems to me you are inferring that without the consultation process having commenced and/or completed, responsibilities you/your team carry out are being allocated elsewhere. A redundancy consultation process is started because for specific reasons the company needs to reduce the number of positions in the company. How that is exactly achieved may alter due to the consultation process, depending on the reason for the redundancies and any suggestions that may come about from individual's affected which may lead to changes in the final outcome. I think you firstly need to find out the reason why the company is already moving responsibilities before the conclusion of the consultation process.

3. If your position is made redundant, unless there is a company agreement in place to enhance the package, there is no requirement for a company to pay more than than the statutory redundancy payment, plus any notice and accrued but untaken holiday pay. If the employer believes it is following a fair process that would stand scrutiny at an Employment Tribunal if you did decide to make a claim for unfair dismissal, there is no obvious advantage to them offering a settlement agreement.

4. When considering the selection pool an employer needs to consider i) which particular kind of work is disappearing and ii) which employees do the particular kind of work that is disappearing? If there is a clear link between the work that is no longer required and the people doing the work then the pool is straight forward to identify. Other relevant factors that come into the decision on the pool are a) the extent to which employees are doing similar work b) the extent to which employees’ jobs are interchangeable c) whether the section pool has been agreed with the union or staff representatives. Any challenge to the pool would have to be based on asking whether the company has considered x,y,z positions as being similar in nature and if not, would they give it consideration and if they have, what was the reason/s for the company not putting them in the pool.

5. The employer needs to set out the efforts that it has gone to consider where elsewhere in the business that you could potentially be redeployed. That may even be giving consideration to suggestions that you have for redeployment elsewhere.

In respect of bumping it can appear to be very unjust particularly as it results in the dismissal of someone in a job that is not redundant. The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has set out the principle that there is no strict requirement on an employer to consider bumping its employees in order to dismiss fairly in every redundancy case, nor is the employer under a positive obligation to dismiss another employee to preserve the employment of another member of staff. However the EAT has suggested that as a matter of best practice, employers should consider bumping as a possible option in all cases.

There is no definitive answer to your training question. Factors that would need to be taken into consideration are what training is available/needed, what is the cost of this, how long would it take for you to be skilled and productive in that area? Based on those answers the company would have to consider the reasonableness of this as an option and if they did not believe it to be a viable option then consider documenting why they have come to that conclusion.

I hope this helps but please come back to this thread if you have any further questions.