Urgent Help Needed

lloydssuck

My wife works for IBM who currently own the contract for the London congestion charge and or one reason or another they are making staff redundant. She has been working for them on a part time basis for 10 years and was offered £4500 to take voluntary redundancy about a month ago. She declined this as she believed the amount was sub standard based on her years of servitude.

She was invited to a meeting which took place this morning and they have now offered her 2 packages.

1. To take voluntary redundancy which will payout £3000
2. To be made redundant and receive £2600

There are a few things I am wondering:

1. Why are they now offering substantially less money.

2. Is this negotiable.

3. Would she be able to get some sort of 'gardeners leave' and then redundancy after this? (my company offer this but not sure if its a standard practice).

4. We have 2 children (one of 6 and one of 3) - will taking voluntary redundancy affect any of our benefits negatively in comparison with forced redundancy/or the ability to claim.

5. (Benefit specific question so not sure if you can help here)
I have contacted the Child Tax credit line who have effectively confirmed we would actually better off based on her being made redundant (see below). How can this be right?

Comparison of both scenario's

Current

Wifes monthly wage = £600
My monthly Wage = £1275
CTC = £110
CHB = £132

Total = 2117

New possibility

Wife monthly wage: £0
My monthly Wage: £1275
CTC: £776
CHB £132

Total = £2183???

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

McKneff

If your wife had worked there 10 years, she would be entitled to 10 weeks redundancy pay, so 10 weeks at £150 a week = 1,500. That is statutory minimum, anything more than this is a bonus.
(assuming she is under 41 years of age)

She would also be entitled to 10 weeks notice. The company decide whether she has to work this notice or not.

And any accrued holiday pay.

That's it.

Ewarwoowar2

lloydssuck wrote: »

There are a few things I am wondering:

1. Why are they now offering substantially less money.

Only the company knows. Perhaps the previous offer was to get people out of the door quickly.

Like flight prices, sometimes they go up the longer you wait and sometime they go down, depending on the demand and needs of the business.

lloydssuck wrote: »

2. Is this negotiable.

Maybe - why not ask?

lloydssuck wrote: »

3. Would she be able to get some sort of 'gardeners leave' and then redundancy after this? (my company offer this but not sure if its a standard practice).

You can only ask.

I'm not sure about the benefits questions.

lloydssuck

Thank you for your replies so far. In relation to the following:

She would also be entitled to 10 weeks notice. The company decide whether she has to work this notice or not.

They are stating her final date will be the 12th of November. Does this have any significance with the above statement?

Ewarwoowar2

lloydssuck wrote: »

Thank you for your replies so far. In relation to the following:

She would also be entitled to 10 weeks notice. The company decide whether she has to work this notice or not.

They are stating her final date will be the 12th of November. Does this have any significance with the above statement?

It generally means that they are going to pay her notice as a lump sum rather than making her work it.

lloydssuck

OK, so as she will be working 3 weeks of this up to and including the 14th of Nov, does this then mean they are also obliged to give her another 7 weeks worth of pay as a lump sum on top of the redundancy money?

kazmeister

It is the job role that is made redundant rather than the person. The company may decide to offer a voluntary redundancy package hoping that some people will take it rather than making it compulsory. I would also check out their redundancy policy as some employers pay above the statutory, we negotiated a 3 times statutory rate for our staff with no cap on weekly earnings when we had to renew our policy last year. If they have for example 20 people in a position and all 20 are being made redundant then she needs to look at what would be the best deal, going early or staying on until the end of the compulsory notice period. If they are reducing to say 10 post holders, it may be worth hanging on in the hope that her level of skills, experience etc or whatever selection criteria they are using, means that she could be kept on. With regard to the specific questions, they need to be asked of her HR department as different orgs have different policies stating different things.