Facing potential redundancy - What to do?

[PartsMonkey]

I am a parts manager at an independent used and nearly new car dealer. The company mainly sells prestige nearly new and used ex lease cars. They have decided to restructure the business, resulting in my job being made redundant along with the service advisor and service manager and others.

I have two choices on how to proceed through this situation:

Option one: There will be a new job after the restructure. It will be a hybrid role of my parts job and a percentage of service advising/management/workshop control. They haven't devised an actual job description yet nor have they worked out a salary but they have said it will be at least what I'm on already. Everyone who is being made redundant will be able to apply, however I think it will be only me and one other person going for it and I believe that due to my experience I've got a good chance of getting it.

Option two: Take the redundancy. They are going beyond their statutory obligations so once redundant, I will have enough money to see me through 2 months of being out of work, possibly more if I am frugal.

To complicate things a little more, I would like to move out of the motor trade. My wife would also like me to do this (She initially banned me from applying for motor trade jobs when I told her about the redundancy) as she is frustrated by the hours I work and how little I get paid (She works 40 hours less a month and gets paid double what I'm on).

Younger me would have panicked and tried to go for option one at all costs, however at 34 I feel a bit more confident in my abilities and I am tempted to opt for option two. Having two months off would allow me a fantastic level of flexibility to be able to attend interviews and speak to recruiters etc. and would also allow me to really consider what I want to do in a new career. The downside is that at the end of the two months I might not have a job to go to or the only job I can get is stepping down to parts advisor role somewhere. Having been in my current job for nine months I don't want it to look like I couldn't handle a managerial role (I know I can tell them I was made redundant but I'm not sure how I'd prove it).

Has anyone else on here been in the same situation? What did you decide and did it work out for better or worse? Any advice on how to adapt my skills to appeal to a different industry? All advice and comments will be greatly appreciated.


TL;DR Getting made redundant. Do I apply for new internal vacancy or take a chance with redundancy?

[SydneyBridge]

Redundancy
But dont think of it as 2 months off though as the money will go pretty quickly and then you'll be desperate for any job.

Look for another job asap doing whatever you want to do and look for any relevant collage courses.

[Tomo1971]

Start looking for work now, if nothing else, it will give you a feel on how the market is and how well your CV stacks up.

[SydneyBridge]

Your current employer have to give you time off for interviews if you're working your notice before redundancy

[The Beaver King]

Apply for the new role, but start looking for alternatives now.

There are no guarantees you'll get the new role or be successful in the open market. Hedge your bets by applying for the new role and also applying for new jobs externally. If you haven't managed to get an interview by the time it comes to signing the new contract, then you at least have a job. If you do manage to snag one, then don't sign the contract and revert back to redundancy.

Two months is not a lot of time to get a new job lined up from scratch. You'll hate yourself if you take redundancy and then end up out of work for 3-6 months....