Redeployment during consultation period

Gentoo365

My job role will be effectively redundant in a few months due to the closing down of an area of the business I work in.

We have been informed that the consultancy period will not start for a few months, as the future business plans and timeframe for the 'winding up' has not been decided.

This puts me in an odd position where my job role is not needed, but I am not being made redundant yet. Even if they start the consultancy period asap it will last 90 days (due to numbers of staff).

As there have been resignations since the news (people who prefer to move before they are pushed) there are areas of the business which need extra staff.

There is an expectation that during the consultancy period, anyone who's role is not needed is redeployed to fill in other areas. Their job roles will not change and this will be covered by the part of our contracts that state that we may be required to do other work as per business needs.

I am o.k. with this in one sense, I would rather do something useful than just do what little is left of my main role. However I am concerned that my redundancy will cease to depend on my actual role, but on my new deployment.

i.e. If this drags on for too long before the consultation completes I may be now considered to be in thus new role, where they do need staff.

In once sense I should be happy for the work, I know that this may seem selfish. However I don't really want to change my career path at this stage and if my role is redundant I would rather leave and continue that job elsewhere.

The new 'redeployment' role is not really a downgrade as such, it's just that I will go from having 4-5 years experience in my current role to being new. Which puts me at a disadvantage when it comes to future career growth.

Summary - I am concerned that a temporary redeployment during redundancy consultation will result in a permanent move to a new role against my wishes. I am happy to do the role on a temporary basis, but do not want it to affect my rights.

getmore4less

If the positions can be considered suitable alternatives there will be little you can do if the comapny want to offer them.

Gentoo365

Just to clarify,

These are not positions that have been offered as part of a redundancy process.

These are areas of work which we are expected to perform whilst waiting for the consultancy period to commence. Just things that need doing because other people are leaving.

I don't really want to discuss my particular job and the company, but as an analogy, it would be like an accountant being asked to work in legal admin for a bit because there is no longer any need for accountants but legal admin are busy.

Pay and terms are not changing, nor is 'official' job role, but actual work being performed is.

My concern is that some rule may decide that having performed a new job for a while then regardless of what is in writing the new role has been 'accepted'.