Jump to content
NEurope
MoogleViper

Legal advice: leaving job during redundancy period

Recommended Posts

I know we have a few legal gurus (and generally old fogeys with mucho experience) so I thought you guys might be able to help. My girlfriend has been made redundant (thanks a lot, Brexit) so is looking for a new job. The company have said that the handover period until they're made redundant is 3 months, which is the notice period that my gf would have to give if she wanted to leave.

 

However as she's being made redundant, she can't afford to be turning down offers of employment if they want her to start earlier. So if she were to find a job, can she leave the company before 3 months? Her contract says she has to give 3 months notice to leave, but in the circumstances is anything different?

 

P.S. she's not entitled to any redundancy pay so that's not a factor.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

From a non-legal standpoint: she could ask her boss about it.

 

A lot of companies would be willing to allow people to finish early when stuff like this happens.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I think I qualify to say I know a little bit about the law :)

 

She is contractually obliged to provide 3 months notice. Should she leave early without her employer's consent then she will be in breach of contract. That is the legal position. Employer would also have to evidence loss due to the breach of conteaxt. Lets be realistic here, if her employer is making her redundant, what loss would there be if she was to leave early? Probably minimal.

 

However, practically speaking enployers tend to be more accommodating in a redundancy situation and should your girlfriend secure alternative employement then she can just ask her current employer to waive their notice requirement

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
I think I qualify to say I know a little bit about the law :)

 

She is contractually obliged to provide 3 months notice. Should she leave early without her employer's consent then she will be in breach of contract. That is the legal position. Employer would also have to evidence loss due to the breach of conteaxt. Lets be realistic here, if her employer is making her redundant, what loss would there be if she was to leave early? Probably minimal.

 

However, practically speaking enployers tend to be more accommodating in a redundancy situation and should your girlfriend secure alternative employement then she can just ask her current employer to waive their notice requirement

 

So legally/contractually she is still obliged to provide 3 months notice, even though she's being made redundant?

 

Thanks for clarifying. Hopefully it's not an issue (her company did say they expect them to work the full 3 months but we'll see).

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'd imagine they would wave the notice period if something comes up. Three months is an insane amount of time for a notice period, unless she's super senior in the company. I guess they could want people there for all three months to cover the transition though. With no money at stake I'd say just tell her to have a chat with the manager and see what they can work out.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

When i was made redundant years ago, we were told if we sourced a new job in the notice period of redundancy that they would waive the notice period and allow us to start as soon as possible. It happened to a few people, with no issues.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

A friend of mine just quit and didn't work his notice period (or at least not all of it). There was some legal posturing over it (company owners sister is a lawyer), but ultimately nothing happened.

 

Let's face it, most companies aren't going to bother getting legal over an employee that's leaving anyway. The only reason I can see the lawyers getting involved is if her leaving really fucks the company up.

 

From my limited research into the matter when my friend left, it's also quite hard for companies to prove loss of earnings due to employee absense.

 

I'd give your girlfriend the same advice I gave my friend: being sued for loss of earnings will inconvenience her in the short term, missing out on a great job will have a much longer term effect. I say go for it and just deal with whatever consequences the company throws your way.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

However, practically speaking enployers tend to be more accommodating in a redundancy situation and should your girlfriend secure alternative employement then she can just ask her current employer to waive their notice requirement

 

My thoughts are similar. If she's being made redundant then the company will be keen to get her off the books as soon as possible to save money.

 

Further to this, her employer legally has to be accommodating for her to take time off to go to interviews etc.

 

However, you mentioned a 'handover' period. To be made redundant it means the position is no longer required. If she's handing her work over to someone else it seems as if her position, or at least parts of it, are still required, they just don't want her to do it anymore. This is different scenario altogether and if this is the case I'd recommend reaching out to Citizens Advice Bureau. CAB are very good at wha they do and well worth talking to even just about your original post. See this page for a bit more information on it.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
My thoughts are similar. If she's being made redundant then the company will be keen to get her off the books as soon as possible to save money.

 

Further to this, her employer legally has to be accommodating for her to take time off to go to interviews etc.

 

However, you mentioned a 'handover' period. To be made redundant it means the position is no longer required. If she's handing her work over to someone else it seems as if her position, or at least parts of it, are still required, they just don't want her to do it anymore. This is different scenario altogether and if this is the case I'd recommend reaching out to Citizens Advice Bureau. CAB are very good at wha they do and well worth talking to even just about your original post. See this page for a bit more information on it.

 

They're moving the office to Dublin to be inside the EU (although I think they're dissolving her team and getting the work done by an agency, so they'll be handing over to them; though nobody in the office is particularly willing to cooperate).

 

I'd imagine they would wave the notice period if something comes up. Three months is an insane amount of time for a notice period' date=' unless she's super senior in the company. I guess they could want people there for all three months to cover the transition though. With no money at stake I'd say just tell her to have a chat with the manager and see what they can work out.[/quote']

 

She's not senior. Three months is ridiculous, although in this case it's worked out to be a blessing in disguise as it means she has more time to find a job.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm one of the old fogeys you so kindly referred to.

 

I've run numerous businesses and been involved in a few liquidations, administrations and BIMBO's. Your girlfriend has absolutely nothing to worry about. Worst case scenario she might get a posturing letter (highly unlikely) and in future she may not get the best reference. I can assure you there would be no legal ramifications to leaving early, unless she was stealing clients or data and even then in the real world there isn't much they could do.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Three months is an insane amount of time for a notice period' date=' unless she's super senior in the company.[/quote']

 

I'm on a three month notice period. It's a mid-level manager thing where I work. However, in practice I've not seen anyone work it; all you have to do is move to a competitor, or not tell the MD where you're going and you'll be on gardening leave instead. And also, she'll probably never give you a decent reference.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
I'm on a three month notice period. It's a mid-level manager thing where I work. However, in practice I've not seen anyone work it; all you have to do is move to a competitor, or not tell the MD where you're going and you'll be on gardening leave instead. And also, she'll probably never give you a decent reference.

 

Do employers still give character references? I thought the done thing was to confirm that they did work there for the period of time stated.

 

Apparently (according to Reddit, so take it with a pinch of salt) you can sue for defamation if your character reference isn't 100% accurate and it results in you not getting the job.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Do employers still give character references? I thought the done thing was to confirm that they did work there for the period of time stated.

 

Apparently (according to Reddit, so take it with a pinch of salt) you can sue for defamation if your character reference isn't 100% accurate and it results in you not getting the job.

 

I don't even know. We never follow up with references here, so I can imagine other companies also don't bother.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Do employers still give character references? I thought the done thing was to confirm that they did work there for the period of time stated.

 

I heard something along the lines that a company can't give a bad reference now, they can either say they worked there for the time they said, or choose not to provide a reference. Something along those lines.

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

 

I heard something along the lines that a company can't give a bad reference now, they can either say they worked there for the time they said, or choose not to provide a reference. Something along those lines.

 

 

I believe the least they have to do is confirm the employment (position and period) so if you just give that you're essentially giving a bad reference.

 

I've been a referee a number of times and it has had to include a character reference, although they're mostly probably not read. As with the above, you're either going to give a positive reference or a "yes, they worked here" one and employers would probably just check its not the former unless things were very tight between two candidates.

 

And in terms of notice periods, I had a 3 month one at my last place which was annoying. I understood if they used that time to recruit, but it always ended up with interviews taking place in the last few weeks so its not like there was a handover period. Although I actually ended up giving a 14 week notice but there we go.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Companies can't give a bad reference but they can refuse to give a reference or request the company call and speak in confidence about an ex employee, i know his because a guy who worked for us suddenly left about 3 years ago, just upped and walked out one day saying he was off on holiday and then never came back

Two weeks later we all had to sign releases and have a meeting

after he left we got notified by the courts that he actually went to court on charges of child grooming

Long story short we've over the past three years had requests for references and we've effectively refused and when they've called told them exactly why

Bare in mind our jobs can take us near schools, so regardless of if were on merky ground we don't want this man working for another local authority (as he keeps trying)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Companies can give give a bad reference - it's just that they have to be 100% true. As it can often be hard to prove all this stuff, people tend to just prefer to not give a reference than risk someone getting angry and attempting to sue them.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

NHS can refer reference requests to HR who will just confirm dates of employment.

 

I would say unless said employee was like one in (special) Agent Gibbs' case there would be little they would actually do against said employee.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Companies can't give a bad reference but they can refuse to give a reference or request the company call and speak in confidence about an ex employee, i know his because a guy who worked for us suddenly left about 3 years ago, just upped and walked out one day saying he was off on holiday and then never came back

Two weeks later we all had to sign releases and have a meeting

after he left we got notified by the courts that he actually went to court on charges of child grooming

Long story short we've over the past three years had requests for references and we've effectively refused and when they've called told them exactly why

Bare in mind our jobs can take us near schools, so regardless of if were on merky ground we don't want this man working for another local authority (as he keeps trying)

 

surely then a CRB check should pick this up??? is that not the entire point of the things?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
surely then a CRB check should pick this up??? is that not the entire point of the things?

 

Very true and would have been picked up on a CRB check, but this man is applying for Civil Engineer jobs, and rather shockingly even though you can have contact with children and do jobs for/near schools that could interact with children and/or rquire you to be surveying/taking photographs near schools........you don't need a CRB check! mainly because its not essential, its work dependent

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

×