question about 2 year rule...

BoJangles_2

On the other hand, there are many unscrupulous people out there who lie on their cv's claiming they can do abc when infact all they are good at is hanging on to a job. For some, one year just isn't long enough.

Gavin83

discat11 wrote: »

I think the only real difference is they have to give you a reason and a notice period after 2 years isn't it?

No. A company can't just get rid of you after 2 years. If they no longer want you working there they either have to:

A) Sack you. However to do this they need a good reason, especially for gross misconduct. You can't just sack someone because you feel like it. This isn't a straight forward solution as you need to be careful the employee wouldn't have a case for constructive dismissal.

Make you redundant. However to do this they'll have to pay redundancy pay and there are separate rules surrounding this. They can't make you redundant and then put someone else in your position for example.

C) Pay you to leave. Most employees will go if they're aware their employer no longer wants them there but naturally for a price. It also relies on the acceptance of the employee.

Getting rid of an employee is actually really difficult unless they've really screwed up. Even harder if they've got a protected charactistic.

mustang121

Its supposed to work both ways isn't it? If employee starts at a company and realises it's a shoddy run company then they can leave without giving notice.

tomtontom

mustang121 wrote: »

Its supposed to work both ways isn't it? If employee starts at a company and realises it's a shoddy run company then they can leave without giving notice.

Irrespective of the length of service both parties have to give (statutory or contractual) notice to terminate the relationship.

Undervalued

Gavin83 wrote: »

No. A company can't just get rid of you after 2 years. If they no longer want you working there they either have to:

A) Sack you. However to do this they need a good reason, especially for gross misconduct. You can't just sack someone because you feel like it. This isn't a straight forward solution as you need to be careful the employee wouldn't have a case for constructive dismissal.

Make you redundant. However to do this they'll have to pay redundancy pay and there are separate rules surrounding this. They can't make you redundant and then put someone else in your position for example.

C) Pay you to leave. Most employees will go if they're aware their employer no longer wants them there but naturally for a price. It also relies on the acceptance of the employee.

Getting rid of an employee is actually really difficult unless they've really screwed up. Even harder if they've got a protected charactistic.

Sorry but this is rather overstating it in the real world!

A) True, in theory. However it is really quite easy to lawfully "manage" an employee out over a period of time. Constructive dismissal is incredibly hard to prove. Less than 3% of CD cases that get as far as a tribunal succeed.

Again true up to a point. An employer really doesn't need to wait very long before replacing a "redundant" employee. Business needs change, often quite rapidly, and it is not in a tribunal's remit to question business decisions.

C) That is the safe option but was far more common before an employee had to pay fees to make an unfair dismissal claim.

discat11

That's my understanding too UV.
I think it's 6 months for the period to replace those redundant.

However there are ways & means an unscrupulous employer can replace immediately -change the job title, tweak the job responsibilities an duties and hey presto! a new vacancy.

LegalSec

Undervalued wrote: »

Unless the shoes happen to have a religious significance neither of the examples given would amount to unlawful discrimination!!

Fabricating evidence for a legal case can amount to attempting to pervert the course of justice. A very serious criminal offence.

But then, as a Legal Sec I would have thought you would know that!

Whether the shoes have any religious significance is unimportant. The point is that if, for example, a woman aged 31 who has worked for a company for less than 2 years is sacked on the spot for wearing shoes which upsets her boss then whilst she is unable to bring an action for unfair dismissal over the shoes, she would be able to bring a discrimination claim if she were to find out that perhaps a 52 year man working for the same company had infringed the company’s rules in some way (not necessary over shoes) and had not been sacked on the spot but instead had a proper disciplinary hearing, warnings, etc (even if he went on to be sacked eventually). The woman could claim that the company had discriminated against her on both counts of her gender and her age. So the person who posted this question, if he has been sacked on the spot for wearing the wrong shoes, should check out whether any one working for the company who is a different gender, race, age or has a different significant state of health has been treated differently. I am not saying that such a case would be successful but it might allow proceedings to be commenced, which possibly the company may wish to settle.
[FONT=&quot]NB: No one is suggesting that evidence is fabricated. Also, I am no longer a legal secretary and obtained most of my knowledge about employment law after I was unfairly dismissed myself[/FONT]

LegalSec

tomtontom wrote: »

So you're saying to fabricate a discrimination case in the hope they'll settle out of court?

Pretty shameful.

What is ‘shameful’ if the fact the government has eroded employment law so much that a person who has worked for 1 year 11 months can be fired without the ability to claim any compensation Fired perhaps because s/he does not get on with a new boss, or fired to make way for a friend of the boss’s wife who needs a job, fired just as a message to other workers to keep their head’s down, the list can go on forever but the point is that the employee is fired not for any fault of his or her own but rather by purely poor management.



It is also ‘shameful’ that employers feel they need 2 whole years to decide whether an employee is suitable. With advances in HR, Psychometric Testing, etc etc – it shows that British management is pretty stupid if it takes them up to 2 years to recognise an unproductive worker.

LittleVoice

discat11 wrote: »

That's my understanding too UV.
I think it's 6 months for the period to replace those redundant.

However there are ways & means an unscrupulous employer can replace immediately -change the job title, tweak the job responsibilities an duties and hey presto! a new vacancy.

No such rule as far as the law is concerned.


Individual organisations may feel it sensible to operate in that way but 6 months is quite a long time.

Takeaway_Addict

LegalSec wrote: »

Don’t give up. If you have worked somewhere for one year and have been sacked because your idiot bosses don’t like your shoes then an application to the Employment Tribunal for unfair dismissal would fail – it just would not be accepted.

So what you need to do is to bring a case for discrimination, which can be brought even if you have only worked there 5 minutes (or less).

Find out if (i) any one has worn similar shoes and not got sacked; or (ii) if someone has been sacked having spent less than two years in the workplace for another set of offences and had proper warnings and disciplinary meetings rather than just being ‘let go’. If the matter goes to Tribunal the company has to disclose this information to the Court.

In those cases, and if the other person involved was either a different gender, age, or race or perhaps had better health than you (or perhaps much worse health than you) then pursue with full force a case for discrimination. If you start looking, the evidence can often be found.

The payouts are quite large if you win and the publicity so negative that many firms will do anything to avoid the case ending up at a tribunal.

Two other points you raise.
1. Never ever trust HR. They so often get things wrong because they only say what management want them to say.

2. Why did the Tories get the 1 year rule extended to 2 years? Just read some of the responses on this forum and you will feel that a sizable number of the contributors automatically take the side of bosses, big business and most of all ‘authority’ rather than the average Joe or Joanna in the street who isn’t perfect but still in the 21st Century losses everything for being a few minutes late to work, not saying the right things, or having an off day and screwing up a bit (or wearing the wrong shoes!!). Good luck!!

HR work for the employer...not employee.

Did you take your own advice?

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5151711