Contract of Employment & TUPE question

Contract of Employment & TUPE question

Author
Discussion

LaserTam

Original Poster:

2,108 posts

219 months

Monday 30th March 2015
quotequote all
Assume this is the best place for this...

I was employed by Company A for 20+ years until about 5 years ago. My department was outsourced to Company B and under TUPE rules, I was transferred to Company B. TUPE rules obviously meant all my T&Cs were moved across so I have been effectively on Company A T&Cs for that time. Now to the present, Company B has lost the contract and I will again be moving under TUPE rules to Company C in a couple of months. During a recent meeting with Company B's HR rep, seems that since moving to B, they did not get a copy of my contract of employment from A; therefore will not be able to pass this onto Company C.

How much of problem is this? On the basis all the basics will be passed across (Salary, holiday entitlement, years service, pension allowance etc etc), is this really a big issue? I need to make sure the redundancy terms are included because my current T&Cs are favourable, but beyond that, should I be worried?

I am going to contact the union to get some guidance from them.

edc

9,235 posts

251 months

Tuesday 31st March 2015
quotequote all
Redundancy terms are rarely contractual. If you have a copy of your previous contract or such amended by later letters etc then provide a copy to your current company. If you cannot and your current company cannot how can you expect your future company to be able to know of any specific T&Cs.

LaserTam

Original Poster:

2,108 posts

219 months

Tuesday 31st March 2015
quotequote all
Yes would agree, but I don't have a copy of my contract. Don't actually recall seeing one since I joined Company A 25+ years ago.

I have had a reply from the Union. We will get a Statement of Measures from Company C prior to the TUPE move and the Union say that as long as this has the details that it should regarding T&Cs then all is well. When I TUPE'd to Company B the Statement of Measures included that kind of stuff.

jonby

5,357 posts

157 months

Saturday 4th April 2015
quotequote all
I'm assuming you don't have a copy of your original employment contract ? Easy for me to say after the event, but as with any contract in any aspect of life, you should always keep a copy yourself if you might ever need to rely on it;s contents

The biggest issue is normally simply being sure they agree the start date of initial employment, which is pretty much a prerequisite of any TUPE transfer of employees. Even if not, you should be able to prove when you first started. That means that in the event you are made redundant, you get the full entitlement to redundancy monies based on your original start date, uncapped if they pay out as opposed to an insolvency where the government cap it

The only flaw in that is if you were entitled to more notice/redundancy monies than the legal minimum

The rest of the terms are less important, because if you get say 5 more days holiday than the stat minimum, presumably the new employers will 'recognise' that as soon as you start working for them and once you have those days acknowledged, would be very difficult for them to claw them back

LaserTam

Original Poster:

2,108 posts

219 months

Saturday 4th April 2015
quotequote all
Thanks Jonby. Hear what you are saying, and now I am a sensible adult, nothing like that is chucked. But I don't think I have had an updated contract since the time I started with Company A, I was 16 and it was a long long time ago and not a sensible adult, so no I don't have a copy.

Agree with your other points though, start date is important, so I will be ensuring that and few other key things are included in the 'statement of measures'.
Cheers.

jonby

5,357 posts

157 months

Saturday 4th April 2015
quotequote all
LaserTam said:
Thanks Jonby. Hear what you are saying, and now I am a sensible adult, nothing like that is chucked. But I don't think I have had an updated contract since the time I started with Company A, I was 16 and it was a long long time ago and not a sensible adult, so no I don't have a copy.

Agree with your other points though, start date is important, so I will be ensuring that and few other key things are included in the 'statement of measures'.
Cheers.
Sounds smart - if not, a letter from you just asking them to acknowledge you are carrying forward x days holiday, y% pension contribution etc, plus your original start date, would in the real world cover pretty much all of the downsides of not having a copy of the latest/last contract with your previous employers

best of luck with it all