Redundancy

ujxm

I am not sure if this the right place for asking this question but here goes:

I could not find relevant answers to my query.

My employers are making redundancies and I don't have much time to decide. The issues I'm faced with are as follows:

* Employers made announcement for redundancies last week due to loss of
business.
* I had 2 choices. a) "Be considered" for Voluntary Redundancy OR b) Get
Compulsory Redundancy.
* I chose option a) as I have been interviewed for a couple of internal
positions that have come up but decision will not be made till early next
week.
* I will find out tomorrow if I have been made redundant or not. I would
rather take the redundancy package and seek employment elsewhere.
* After announcing my decision to take Voluntary Redundancy I was
advised that I can only be considered for it but there is no guarantee
that I will be allowed to. Is this right?
* Possibilities are they might decide to keep me for one of the positions,
neither of which has any prospects of career development (but the
employers say otherwise).

My concern is that now that I have weighed my options and decided to be cosidered for Voluntary Redundancy, I still might not get it and get stuck in a dead end job. If I don't take the job almost forced upon me, I don't get the redundancy package.

I have never been in a situation that calls for Redundancy and don't know anyone who has been through one.

Can you please advise / help / correct me if I am wrong?

Thanks.

nickyc_2

Not sure I can help too much as it depends on individuals terms, company etc so can only relay my own experience...

Company had to let some people go, initially they company offered vol redundancies, take up wasn't bad but not quite enough so they offered people an incentive to apply (more money), this was negotiated by the unions so that more people would go voluntarily rather than compulsory. In the end enough people applied and we only had a handful of compulsories (if you were made comp you didn't get the incentive payment)

For people who applied for vol redundancy it wasn't guaranteed - you could get turned down on the basis of cost or that your skills were too valuable to lose. As it was vol there was no right to appeal (however they turned me down, but I negotiated my way to an extended leave date and got to go anyway with the incentive). Not sure what happens if you stay but get put in a job you don't want - hopefully someone else can help here.

If you get offered one of the jobs you applied for & decided to take it, it shouldn' be a problem to withdraw your vol application..it is after all purely voluntary.

This next bit will depend on how many people the company need to let go & how much money you need but - some people didn't like the offer they were given as they felt it was too low - they discussed with their managers and upped the payment can be risky however if you are just pushing you luck - as you have to decline the offer and then ask to negotiate and they may not! Others were turned down on cost grounds (mainly due to pension enhancements) and compromised on the payment in order to go.

Whatever happens, hope it works out ok for you.

mrs_deadline

My OH has been through this several times now, and each time escaped redundancy (or 'missed out' on the package depending which way you look at it), i.e. he was one of the ones they didn't want to lose.

Having lived through the aftermath a few times, the only advice is not to let the terrible atmosphere drag you down - try to remain positive whatever happens. Basically if you don't get the voluntary redundancy it's best not to think too much about the package you missed out on, try to focus on the upside. It's a massive compliment to you and your work if they need your skills so much that they refuse to let you go...

Same with the dead-end job - who's to say there won't be more openings in the new slimline set-up? Good luck with everything. Would be an idea to line up some fun with non-work friends for the next couple of evenings as the days could be quite miserable and you might just want to forget about it all...

bristol_pilot

Big shake-ups in organisations always seem to me to bring forth more opportunities than had been expected before the change. For example, 'team leaders' blocking the career path of those beneath them can suddenly disappear. That dead-end job may not turn out to be so dead-end after all.

A_Nice_Englishman

I've been through the redundancy process and thought it was jobs that were redundant rather than individuals. People in jobs that were redundant were given the opportunity to try other jobs within the organisation and still take the redundancy package if they didn't want the new job.

Don't know whether this is true everywhere and whether it's any help in your situation.