Case Study - Redundancy

Brian runs a small fabrication business in Central Scotland. Most of the employees have been with the Company since it started, over 12 years ago.

A few years back one of his employees left the business in difficult circumstances. They raised an Employment Tribunal claim which (although it was ultimately unsuccessful) was distracting for the business and unsettling for Brian.

The Issue

A few months ago one of Brian’s main clients went bust, leaving a gap in the Company order book.

Brian has been working hard since then to bring in new business, but this is taking time.

In the meantime Gordon (who is employed as a semi-skilled machine operator) has had very little work for the last 8 weeks. Brian has tried to keep him busy doing deliveries and sweeping the yard, but this only covers about 20% of Gordon’s normal working hours.

Brian knows that it will be at least another 6 months before he has any meaningful work for Gordon to do. In the meantime he is paying him a full-time wage to do 8 hours of productive work a week.

There are other skilled roles within the business but Gordon doesn’t have the qualifications or experience to do these. It would take at least 3 years of training before Gordon would be qualified to do this work. He was offered the training in the past but turned it down.

Brian knows that he has to address the lack of work, but is extremely nervous about approaching Gordon on this. Brian is very nervous that this could lead to another employment tribunal situation, particularly as Gordon has a difficult nature and has been confrontational in the past.

The Solution

I assured Brian that the chance of a successful tribunal claim would be reduced if he followed a fair and thorough consultation process. We looked at the costs of keeping Gordon employed until work picked up, but this was not financially viable for the business.

He decided to enter into formal redundancy consultation with Gordon.

I prepared the letters and templates for each stage of the process, from the original letter explaining that Gordon was ‘at risk of redundancy’ through to the final outcome letter.

I also attended the consultation meetings to take notes and help guide Brian and Gordon through the process, making sure that the key stages needed for a fair consultation were all in place.

During the meetings Gordon accepted that there was a reduction in work and very little to do. He did however challenge the decision to make him redundant and suggested that he should be trained to take one of the other roles instead. This option was explored but ultimately rejected on grounds of cost.

We explored a variety of alternatives to redundancy (including the possibility of hiring Gordon out to clients until more work was found) but were unable to find anything suitable.

The Outcome

Gordon left the business at the end of a 3 week redundancy consultation process. He raised an appeal, which was heard by Brian’s business partner. The appeal was unsuccessful.

No tribunal application was received.

Brian was relieved and delighted with the support he received. He had been openly avoiding this issue for weeks, even although it was costing the business money. The coaching and support he received during the process has given him more confidence in tackling difficult employees in future.