How would you term this?

[andy-xr]

Cant work out the term for whats going on here, maybe someone could help? No suggestion of anything untoward as yet, just not sure how to position it

Short version: Remote worker contract employee, external sales, home based. Company wants to make the role office based, revise the salary and comms £20k lower, nearest local office 150 miles away.

Employee welcome to apply for role, but no travel payments on offer. Possible parting package as option 2, TBC on figures

[rog007]

Difficult! Employer has to do what is best for company, but with minimising impact upon present workforce. I'm afraid it will all be down to what is, or is not, in the contract. If you have a good relationship with boss, go and have a chat over coffee. If not, get hold of your contract and seek advice from employment expert. Good luck!

[andy-xr]

Thanks

It's an interesting one and taking emotion away from the situation I can understand the reasoning for doing what they're doing. It seems that a 3-months-pay parting offer is Option 2. Trying to work out whether thats reasonable, it's above and beyond statutory I realise

[zaphod42]

Assuming 1 months notice, 3 months pay sounds fair - as part of a compromise agreement.

Not bad as an opening offer; I'd be looking for them to pay the legal fees for the setting up of a compromise agreement as well.

Is it part of a broader restructuring, or just this one role?

[andy-xr]

Thanks, I'm torn between reckoning it's an opener and whether there's some room to move, or whether thats as good as it gets. Decisions decision....

It's a small local team of a worldwide organisation, just the 1 role needs tweaking in the UK

[zaphod42]

andy-xr said:

Thanks, I'm torn between reckoning it's an opener and whether there's some room to move, or whether thats as good as it gets. Decisions decision....

It's a small local team of a worldwide organisation, just the 1 role needs tweaking in the UK

To be honest it doesn't sound like a bad offer; but I'm not an employment lawyer.

I'd suggest:

1) Call ACAS on their help line number - they can be very helpful (and can be useless, but they are free...)
2) Do you have a workers council or similar - might be worth getting in touch
3) Work out what you need - they may have some flexibility to top up the amounts if you have a fixed number in mind
4) What are the "soft benefits" that you might need? e.g. Light duties until end of the role to help job hunt? Reference from the regional director / VP / etc? Stuff that is easy for them to do but might help in your transition and exit?

A good head hunter is what you need on your side, so a professional CV polish might help - or a careers advisor for interview prep etc, might be useful if they are willing to pay. All these kind of things are constructive in the negotiations

Hope this helps...

[GeraldSmith]

What do you mean by 'contract employee'? If a regular employee then they should be going down a redundancy route, advising role is at risk, going through a selection process etc.etc.

[zaphod42]

GeraldSmith said:

What do you mean by 'contract employee'? If a regular employee then they should be going down a redundancy route, advising role is at risk, going through a selection process etc.etc.

Not required if the employee is approached with a compromise agreement and both parties are happy, and if the settlement terms exceed any statutory terms. Happens all the time in multinationals as the preferred mechanism for exiting/rebalancing single roles.

[GeraldSmith]

zaphod42 said:

GeraldSmith said:

What do you mean by 'contract employee'? If a regular employee then they should be going down a redundancy route, advising role is at risk, going through a selection process etc.etc.

Not required if the employee is approached with a compromise agreement and both parties are happy, and if the settlement terms exceed any statutory terms. Happens all the time in multinationals as the preferred mechanism for exiting/rebalancing single roles.

Hmm, well.... it's dangerous in that it presupposes that both parties will be happy. From an employer perspective it's much better to follow proper procedure otherwise you could have issues of unfair dismissal. It's hard to claim that you followed proper procedure and selected fairly when the employee is sitting there saying that you tried to persuade them to leave voluntarily.

[andy-xr]

I'm not entirely sure this is redundancy - it feels like there's been some avoidance of the word in the conversations I've been having. I think Restructure is probably more like whats happening, and thats OK too. In my mind I'm the one who they dont want to work there anymore, it's not through my choice and I'd carry on working there if I could. As long as I'm not penalised or unfairly treated then they can call it what they want

Edited by andy-xr on Tuesday 31st May 17:30

[zaphod42]

andy-xr said:

I'm not entirely sure this is redundancy - it feels like there's been some avoidance of the word in the conversations I've been having. I think Restructure is probably more like whats happening, and thats OK too. In my mind I'm the one who they dont want to work there anymore. As long as I'm not penalised or unfairly treated then they can call it what they want

If I could pra-phrase... is this the scenario?

They want to harmonise all roles against a standard.You are in a unique role (home based) and on a different package from the "standard role".
They have approached you with a compromise agreement to offer you the chance to terminate your employment on a highly compensated basis.
They want to be able to recruit to your role in the office environment on the harmonised terms without anyone crying foul that the role had been made redundant.
They have made an opening offer and are being constructive, but avoiding the phrase "redundant" at all costs.

[andy-xr]

zaphod42 said:

If I could pra-phrase... is this the scenario?

They want to harmonise all roles against a standard.You are in a unique role (home based) and on a different package from the "standard role".
They have approached you with a compromise agreement to offer you the chance to terminate your employment on a highly compensated basis.
They want to be able to recruit to your role in the office environment on the harmonised terms without anyone crying foul that the role had been made redundant.
They have made an opening offer and are being constructive, but avoiding the phrase "redundant" at all costs.

90% true. Others who work there are remote workers too, but they have different roles to me. It's the specific job I'm doing thats being changed as part of a restructure. I've been offered the option of applying to this new role, no guarantee I'd get it as I'd have to interview same as anyone else, but due to distance and reduction of money it's not a viable option for me. So it's likely going to be filled by AN Other who'll be recruited from outside the company.

They've made an opening offer which has some consideration to the length of service and appear to be being constructive. No-one's brought up the word redundancy yet, but I'd stick a fiver on everyone thinking it

[zaphod42]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compromise_agreement (forgive that it's a wikipedia entry)

If I were you, I would ask the HR restructuring rep to arrange at their cost, with no obligation in your behalf, 30 mins of advice from an independent solicitor. In parallel, I'd call the ACAS helpline and ask to talk to a specialist in compromise agreements, and then it's all a matter of negotiation....

[GeraldSmith]

andy-xr said:

90% true. Others who work there are remote workers too, but they have different roles to me. It's the specific job I'm doing thats being changed as part of a restructure. I've been offered the option of applying to this new role, no guarantee I'd get it as I'd have to interview same as anyone else, but due to distance and reduction of money it's not a viable option for me. So it's likely going to be filled by AN Other who'll be recruited from outside the company.

They've made an opening offer which has some consideration to the length of service and appear to be being constructive. No-one's brought up the word redundancy yet, but I'd stick a fiver on everyone thinking it

It is redundancy and it's stupid not to call it that and go through the proper procedure. The employer is legally entitled to make the role redundant and, so long as they follow correct procedure, terminate your employment through that route. They have no entitlement to make you sign a compromise agreement or leave employment through any other route. So failing to enact a redundancy procedure and do the process correctly acts in your favour, once they have started to negotiate with you it is harder for them to backtrack and start a redundancy process.

From your perspective the best course of action is probably to negotiate and see what you can get from them in termination. But bear in mind that they can't just restructure and change your role in this way without your agreement or without going through the redundancy process.

[andy-xr]

GeraldSmith said:

From your perspective the best course of action is probably to negotiate and see what you can get from them in termination. But bear in mind that they can't just restructure and change your role in this way without your agreement or without going through the redundancy process.

Bit of movement recently on this one, offered voluntary redundancy in a not so voluntary way, but thats what they want to call it. Welcome to apply for it subject to contract, with an unattractive separation offer as well as PILON and holidays

Because I'm just one guy, I'm not sure whether the rules that would apply to a collective redundancy situation would be applicable to me, but I'm still not convinced they've gone about it in the right order.

Is there anything pre-defined that they should have done re consultation do you know?

IE consult, say that there's the possibility the role might be made redundant, then look at what else I could do, rather than say I wont be doing what I'm doing anymore, offer me a job thats no-where near what I was doing and send in a magic circle firm as option 2?

[GeraldSmith]

andy-xr said:

GeraldSmith said:

From your perspective the best course of action is probably to negotiate and see what you can get from them in termination. But bear in mind that they can't just restructure and change your role in this way without your agreement or without going through the redundancy process.

Bit of movement recently on this one, offered voluntary redundancy in a not so voluntary way, but thats what they want to call it. Welcome to apply for it subject to contract, with an unattractive separation offer as well as PILON and holidays

Because I'm just one guy, I'm not sure whether the rules that would apply to a collective redundancy situation would be applicable to me, but I'm still not convinced they've gone about it in the right order.

Is there anything pre-defined that they should have done re consultation do you know?

IE consult, say that there's the possibility the role might be made redundant, then look at what else I could do, rather than say I wont be doing what I'm doing anymore, offer me a job thats no-where near what I was doing and send in a magic circle firm as option 2?

They should start by issuing a notice that a post or posts are at risk of redundancy. Then they should consult, they should look for other roles in the company and so on. www.direct.gov.uk is a good source of information. To be honest if they do it properly they can make you redundant but it sounds like they have been stupid and not done that. Another good resource is ACAS, people think they are only for big disputes but they aren't, they would be happy to give you advice.