New employment: Probationary period

LittleVoice

jobbingmusician wrote: »

'Probationary periods are a red herring. The important date is 2 years after you start, when you gain more employment rights' (or words to that effect).

Of course we all have employment rights from Day 1 with an employer.


Two years gets you longer statutory notice (very likely to be less than your contractual rights) and the ability to claim unfair dismissal for a wider range of issues.

jobbingmusician

Fair comment, and corrected.

Snakey

Nope, that's totally cool. I know they can kick me out for any reason or none, all the way up until March 2017.

However, the difference between getting a week's money and getting two months' money is significant enough that I would like to nail down the whole "when does the probation period end?" question - without drawing HR's attention to it (another e-mail went round today about rationalisation, not in my department, but even so, I'd hate to give them ideas).

Am I safe on 1 October, or is there a "reasonable" period during which they could still tell me that I failed the first six months and kick me out on the lower notice period, or does it never end until they specifically tell me I've passed?

Thanks for all the thoughts so far.