Being re-employed in a different role after taking redundancy???

naid78

Hi all. Please bear with me as I try to explain. I worked for a large jewellery chain as a retail assistant manager. I went on maternity in feb last year, then in april they announced that they were closing the store and voluntary redundancies were offered and I accepted, they closed the store in august and everyone else took their payment. I was contacted by my area manager who said that as I was on maternity they did not know how to continue to pay my SMP and would I mind waiting until my SMP ran out and continue on their books before receiving my redundancy payment. This was a bit annoying but i agreed to this and received my redundancy payout in november.
I was contacted by a manager at another store within the same company last week asking would I be interested in going back part-time in a completly different role. I said that i would and we started to get the ball rolling in returning.
Now, head office are saying that I can't be re-employed within the 6 months period in which I took redunancy or I would have to pay the redundancy back. Not a lot I can do but was just wondering if they were legal in what they are saying? The store and the area manager desperatly would like me to go back as I would not need training and I am good at the job. If I had taken the redundancy as everyone else got too when the shop shut in august I would have been over this 6 month deadline. I was doing them a favour by not taking it until november, now it seems doing them a favour has shot me in the foot!!! :mad:
Bit of a rant - i know, but this is just so annoying. Just wondering if anyone had any advice? Many thanks

getmore4less

Nothing legaly to stop you keeping the payment. as it was a genuine redundancy at the time.

They would probably have to let you keep the equivilent of the statutory payout if they did not reinstate service back to the previous start date.

Must be company policy not to re employ within the 6 month period.

peb

Not my field, however I am aware from my (limited) knowledge of employment law that there is difficulty if an employee is reemplyed within 6 months as there is an argument that the employee was not actually redundant in the first place therefore a lot of companys do have this policy. Your only point of appeal is that this is a completely different job role with different hours but if it is a national company they will probably try and stick to their rules. Can you do this role as self employed for a few months?