Am I being unfairly dismissed?

[Deva Link]

TurricanII said:

If I went for a job which turned out ti be a fixed term then the end date would be a massively obvious and important bit of info that would make me consider the implications come the end date. I would have started looking for my next job three or four months before my end date depending on notice period terms.

If you and the employer have agreed from the outset to finish work on a certain date then I really hope any tribunal would hold it to be fair that you finish work on that certain date.

Read the second paragraph of the original post.

[TurricanII]

Deva Link said:

Read the second paragraph of the original post.

Yes it says he has been given almost two and a half months of notice to get himself sorted which sounds perfectly reasonable. I imagine the employer made it a fixed term contract to specifically manage their spend on staff.

If he wanted further benefits and lengthier employment then perhaps best looking for a job that is not for a fixed length of time. It's not as if the employer has hidden this from him.

Obviously I am looking at this from an employer's view but we all enter into time limited contracts and I would be a bit annoyed if someone tried to penalise me for not renewing a contract.

[Deva Link]

TurricanII said:

I imagine the employer made it a fixed term contract to specifically manage their spend on staff.

He said it's been extended 8 times and as the work continues he was probaly hopeful it would be extended again.

TurricanII said:

If he wanted further benefits and lengthier employment then perhaps best looking for a job that is not for a fixed length of time.

He'll have to answer for himself, but perhaps this was the only job he could get and he took in the hope that it would be become permanent. There is a time in public sector jobs (maybe all jobs) where it's deemed to defauly to permanent - think it's 4 years.

[Babu 01]

Deva Link said:

When they did the last recruitment in my wife's ex-Department they rejected all the surplus from other departments applicants as unsuitable (this was for a run-of-the-mill clerical role that any established civil servant could do standing on their head) and interviewed and employed the office managers daughter.

Once I would have been indignant and recommending emails to Gus O'Donnell but having just been through the amazingly headfking rigmarole of the redeployment pool myself I'm afraid that doesn't surprise me.

The manager will know full well that with all the rush & panic to reduce headcounts that even if someone did complain that it would never be investigated.

[Deva Link]

Babu 01 said:

Once I would have been indignant and recommending emails to Gus O'Donnell but having just been through the amazingly headfking rigmarole of the redeployment pool myself I'm afraid that doesn't surprise me.

The manager will know full well that with all the rush & panic to reduce headcounts that even if someone did complain that it would never be investigated.

I think more than ever your face has to fit or you have to know someone to get a job.

It's just bonkers that one department was making people redundant and another taking people on. Probably wouldn't happen now the hatches have been properly battened down, which is why the OP is finding himself in the position he's in.

[Firefoot]

Once you have been employed for 12 months, your fixed term status no longer applies, you have the same employment rights as everyone else.
The fact that you have an end date on your contract means nothing and you are being unfairly dismissed. You will win at tribunal, should you wish to go that route.

Your contract can only be ended by dismissal via the disciplinary process or redundancy via the standrad redundancy route.

[Landlord]

Firefoot said:

Once you have been employed for 12 months, your fixed term status no longer applies, you have the same employment rights as everyone else.

Looks like this is correct;

Lookee here

[IainT]

Landlord said:

ooks like this is correct;

Lookee here

* not to be unfairly dismissed (after one year’s service)
* to a written statement of reasons for the dismissal (after one year’s service)
* to statutory redundancy payments (after two years' service)
* to a minimum notice period of your contract ending before the agreed end date, task or event

So, the real question is, is the dismissal unfair or not? If it is then arbitration might be a good step.

[Du1point8]

IainT said:

Landlord said:

ooks like this is correct;

Lookee here

* not to be unfairly dismissed (after one year’s service)
* to a written statement of reasons for the dismissal (after one year’s service)
* to statutory redundancy payments (after two years' service)
* to a minimum notice period of your contract ending before the agreed end date, task or event

So, the real question is, is the dismissal unfair or not? If it is then arbitration might be a good step.

Did you not forget one?

Go down this route and win and your CV will be forever filed in the bin as noone will take the chance with you again in that industry?

[IainT]

Du1point8 said:

IainT said:

Landlord said:

ooks like this is correct;

Lookee here

* not to be unfairly dismissed (after one year’s service)
* to a written statement of reasons for the dismissal (after one year’s service)
* to statutory redundancy payments (after two years' service)
* to a minimum notice period of your contract ending before the agreed end date, task or event

So, the real question is, is the dismissal unfair or not? If it is then arbitration might be a good step.

Did you not forget one?

Go down this route and win and your CV will be forever filed in the bin as noone will take the chance with you again in that industry?

The bullet points weren't mine - they're from the Govt site linked. You're right of course unless the outcome is a permy job that they'll never dare get rid of you from...

[OneDs]

You are an FTA which makes you an employee (or Civil Servant I guess) on the exact same T&C's as permies just with an end date, so yes you can apply for internal vacancies, if they don't let you then yes it is unfair dismissal, if you do and don't get the job, the successful candidate would have to be demonstrably better than you at it. PCS should know this.

Edited by OneDs on Thursday 25th August 16:41

[TurricanII]

Landlord said:

ooks like this is correct;

Lookee here

I am not an expert, but the gov website link suggests that the contract can be extended repeatedly up to a max of 4 years:

---
How long can an employer keep on renewing a fixed-term contract?
An employee can be kept on successive fixed-term contracts for a limit of four years. If your contract is renewed after that you become a permanent employee. This is unless the employer can show a good reason why you should stay on a fixed-term contract. Only service from 10 July 2002 is counted towards the four-year limit.

The four-year limit was introduced to prevent employers abusing the use of successive fixed-term contracts to limit employees' employment rights.
---

Which means that after 12 months, whilst you have some additional rights to notice/written reason for dismissal, does not make the end date useless. And grounds for unfair dismissal per the gov link does not seem to include being dimissed because the agreed contact duration ended

[IainT]

I'm guessing the employer's goal is to avoid Redundancy Payment liability after the initial 2 years.

[zaphod42]

Du1point8 said:

Did you not forget one?

Go down this route and win and your CV will be forever filed in the bin as noone will take the chance with you again in that industry?

Except this is the civil service, where 2 groups in one department struggle to talk to each other (in my experience), let alone across govt departments, and there is no "blacklist" in the civil service for hiring - it's both illegal and they really aren't that joined up.
And it's a huge industry.
In small niche industries, I'd agree, but not in the civil service!

[Firefoot]

TurricanII said:

I am not an expert, but the gov website link suggests that the contract can be extended repeatedly up to a max of 4 years:

Which means that after 12 months, whilst you have some additional rights to notice/written reason for dismissal, does not make the end date useless. And grounds for unfair dismissal per the gov link does not seem to include being dimissed because the agreed contact duration ended

I can assure you that unless the employer goes through the disciplinary process or redundancy process then the dismissal based on a contract end date will be found to be unfair.

[edc]

IainT said:

I'm guessing the employer's goal is to avoid Redundancy Payment liability after the initial 2 years.

Which would be minuscule compared to other on costs.

[Deva Link]

edc said:

IainT said:

I'm guessing the employer's goal is to avoid Redundancy Payment liability after the initial 2 years.

Which would be minuscule compared to other on costs.

It seems bonkers accounting but in my wife's old department they had a fixed amount of money to get rid of people. When they went through the exercise and asked for volunteers, they found the average cost was lower than expected so they let more people leave. (Nearly half the workforce applied).

However they want to let more go again now but can't as all the budget has gone.

[Babu 01]

Also bear in mind that the Civil Service Agencies have to get permission from the Cabinet Office in order to make redundancy payouts.

More brownie points for the CEOs if they can get rid of people via other means.

It wouldn't surprise me if they had decided to run the risk of having to settle a few tribunal claims, before they got heard, rather than present the true cost of headcount reductions to Whitehall.