Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 12:45 pm  

Hull White Star wrote:

Last 10 in, first 10 out may have been a fairer system?

Maybe I am wrong, but I've been made redundant a few times and have always been told its not me or my work but the company has to save money and its that particular job that has to go. I thought they couldn't get someone else in to do that job either for so many months after the person is made redundant?

I believe 'last in, first out' isn't legally seen as a fair system as it may lead to age discrimination - in many cases those in last are possibly likely to be younger.

I'm no expert but I took plenty of advice last year (including from Shmoo, who works in this field) when my Mrs was made redundant.

I believe the only 'fair' system is by scoring according to criteria such as disciplinary record, time-keeping, productivity, overall performance, etc. And if more than one person has the same job role as that being made redundant, they should all be entered into the pool of candidates for redundancy.

Oh, and if anyone's interested, we wiped the floor with the fookers last year and came away with a hefty payment. It won't last forever but will help for a few years, and was roughly double the amount our solicitor estimated as fair settlement.

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 12:46 pm  

Big Graeme wrote:

It isn't going to Leith any more.

[DaveO]

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 2:03 pm  

rover49 wrote:

I think you might be wrong on the job being made redundant, my company went through this a while back and selection was made on a scoring system, not jobs. They wanted 3 to go and it was clear that the individual was assessed not the post.

That is not legal. A while back I was going to made redundant and it was the position noe me I wasn't because I was given another post in the company with a different title (and more money!) but to this day I am not allowed to work on the stuff I used to because if I did it would prove the position was not actually redundant so they should not have said it was.

Prior to that the company clearly wanted to reduce the head count so what they did was categorise us as either product development, professional services and something else (can't remember). I was in "product development" and when the process began it was stated that no positions in that group were being made redundant but one of the support positions was. That narrowed it down to three people and the one with the least experience went. As soon as we found out what was going on everyone (including the person who go the chop) knew instantly who was going to be leaving.

That is still not what you said though because the three people involved all had to go through the consultancy process and all three of their jobs were at risk.

A builder I am dealing with has also done this, they made several managers and supervisors redundant while sites were live and just moved others into their place, it was done on 'competency' and the lower your score the more at risk.

That is not redundancy. You can't make people redundant and employ people to do the same job the day after. You can sack people for being incompetent provided you can prove it but that is not redundancy.

Three people from my team of ten were made redundant last year and as we are all doing the same job on the same salary scales, I would have not objected to been put in a hat and taking that risk, it just seems a fairer way of doing it. Selection itself becomes a problem as there are certain people at my company that would not have been in the mix if they had took a year off, come back and shot the CEO and it has nothing to do with ability and more to do with percentages.

Companies or organisations drawing lots are insane. There is supposed to be a due process and consultation. Anyone made redundant that way has a very strong case for unfair dismissal.

Dave

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 2:21 pm  

When I was a Union Secretary, I made it plain to the employers that they should not confuse competency matters with redundancy. If an employee was "incompetent", they should choose that path and if ... etc. Some of the posting here seem to cofuse the two.

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 2:53 pm  

Hillbilly_Red wrote:

When I was a Union Secretary, I made it plain to the employers that they should not confuse competency matters with redundancy. If an employee was "incompetent", they should choose that path and if ... etc. Some of the posting here seem to cofuse the two.

No, but if there are 10 identical positions to be made redundant and you have 30 people doing that same, identical job, competency could taken into account alongside other scoring criteria - but a lack of competency must be proved. The employer must use a fair selection process and demonstrate why those 10 people in particular have been selected over the remaining 20. The whole selection process and criteria must be shown in detail.

It's not illegal to use 'last in, first out', but I believe it's frowned upon by tribunals. The fairest process is by scoring on criteria such as timekeeping, disciplinary record, productivity, etc, perhaps also scoring based on certain job skills. Someone who is incompetent would most likely be shown up by this process.

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 4:39 pm  

My other half is going through this at the moment, and from reading some of the comments about the process I'm not sure it's being done properly, would someone be kind enough to clarify?

> You make position redundant, not the person? So that would mean that role is no longer required? So you couldn't make someone redundant and then share their role out?
> Is it fair and legal that the person who has the final decision of who is being made redundant is very close to the group one of which is going to be made redundant from? (To make it simpler it's a team of 5 and 1 has to go and it's the direct manager making the decision) further to this, one of of those five is the managers son; is it correct that the manager should make this decision under these circumstances?

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 4:58 pm  

Enicomb wrote:

My other half is going through this at the moment, and from reading some of the comments about the process I'm not sure it's being done properly, would someone be kind enough to clarify?

> You make position redundant, not the person? So that would mean that role is no longer required? So you couldn't make someone redundant and then share their role out?

From what I understood from my own circumstances its the position not the person. I was a full time credit controller during a busy time for a company. Business for whatever reason, slacked off(I know this to be genuine, I worked in the accounts department!) and I was told the role of credit controller was being made redundant and if and when customers needed to be called then the other two accounts assistants would be able to fit it in with their roles. I was on the understanding they couldn't employ another full time credit controller for at least 6 months. Has it happened the company went under not long after I was made redundant so they never did hire another one.

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 5:19 pm  

Enicomb wrote:

> You make position redundant, not the person? So that would mean that role is no longer required? So you couldn't make someone redundant and then share their role out?

Mostly correct, the position (job) is made redundant but usually this means that the workload is shared out elsewhere, as an example a friend of mine was at a senior grade in a civil service department until last April when a decision was made to make that grade redundant across the whole country and off he went with a settlement. His job function is still being performed by others (out-sourced and in-house) but that grade of management does not now exist.

> Is it fair and legal that the person who has the final decision of who is being made redundant is very close to the group one of which is going to be made redundant from? (To make it simpler it's a team of 5 and 1 has to go and it's the direct manager making the decision) further to this, one of of those five is the managers son; is it correct that the manager should make this decision under these circumstances?

I don't think that sounds fair at all, either on the employees or the manager and if I were the manager I'd be asking to be relinquished from this duty to protect the company against a possible claim, whether its legal or not I don't know.

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 7:34 pm  

My wife has worked in the NHS for 40 years and is retiring this year. Last year the trust North East Lincs asked everyone if they wanted redundancy, early retirement, or a job with less hours, to save the trust millions in the future. Guess what one person got the redudancy. HR woman who sent out the letters. I was mad but the wife is just glad to get out of the madhouse which the Nhs is becoming.

[Sadfish]

Re: Choosing people for redundancy : Fri Jan 27, 2012 9:01 pm  

When I worked for 1 of the banks, they once asked about 500 to a hotel up the road, everyone wandered down there clueless, as you walked in, there where tables with your name on, room A or room B.

When in the room the HR manager came in and said either "You will be pleased to know you have kept your job" or "You will be sad to know you are being made redundant."

When I took VR the manager was almost in tears having to even talk about it, I put my hand on his shoulder and said "You will be making my year if your make me redundant from this God damn awful industry, think of it as a good thing."