No redundancy rights

paladin123

Hi everyone

I am a regular contributor to these forums but given the nature of what I'm going to say it would be too easy to piece together who I am based on previous posts and anonymity is important to me, so I've created a new account for this post. I hope that's ok.

I found out about 3 weeks ago that my company is going into administration in January. All the higher ups have been manically trying to find other companies to take us over, but since we're so large no one was big enough and willing to take us all on. Companies that would take on smaller chunks were found, and until about 5 days ago we believed we would be TUPE'd across. All of a sudden, they ditched a large part of the team they were going to take over, which I think they were able to do because so many people resigned that they could say what they are taking is no longer a business.

Leaving aside the question of what do I do next, I have two questions about the lack of TUPE rights:
1. Can I sue the administrators for my untaken holiday? I had rolled 5 days over into 2017, with my company's permission (I have that in writing). That would be worth approximately £700 after tax.
2. Can I sue for my bonus? This is much more tenuous I think. We have a bonus scheme based on how much you have billed over the year. I was almost at that level (with a few months of the year left to go), and had so much WIP already that I would have overshot the target by about £25k assuming I did no more work until the end of the tax year. Based on my current billings + WIP, my bonus would be worth approximately £10,000 before tax.

As for what to do next, I'll save that for another day. My head is spinning here. But to address the title of this thread - I joined the company about a year and a half ago, so I do not appear to have any rights. Please do correct me if that's wrong.

Many thanks for any responses.

Edit: Forgot to mention an important point: This is a solvent administration. The company has basically imploded because of the actions of a selfish few, but there is money there.

getmore4less

Why do you need to sue have they said they won't pay?

Still time to take the holiday?

paladin123

getmore4less wrote: »

Why do you need to sue have they said they won't pay?

Still time to take the holiday?

Good point, I didn't explain that. There is time to take the holiday but for various reasons I don't want to, e.g. I'm already taking holiday over Christmas; there are so many moving parts I'd rather be in the office to get all the updates than needlessly at home; there is still work to be done for people who might come with us etc.

I had assumed they wouldn't pay rolled over holiday as the company has a "use it in the first quarter or lose it" policy, i.e. they don't pay it if you don't use it. Is that not how it works in administration?

McKneff

No point in seeing a company that has no money !!!!
As above take your holiday now .

getmore4less

paladin123 wrote: »

I had assumed they wouldn't pay rolled over holiday as the company has a "use it in the first quarter or lose it" policy, i.e. they don't pay it if you don't use it. Is that not how it works in administration?

if you are owed the holiday and it is within the legal guidelines then the legal leaving rules allow payment

if however the company policy is you have to use holiday when leaving that can override the law.

paladin123

McKneff wrote: »

No point in seeing a company that has no money !!!!
As above take your holiday now .

Please see the bottom of my post - the company does have money as it's a solvent administration.

getmore4less wrote: »

if you are owed the holiday and it is within the legal guidelines then the legal leaving rules allow payment

if however the company policy is you have to use holiday when leaving that can override the law.

Thank you, that's helpful. I'll try to find out how to find out what the rules are rather than making assumptions!

getmore4less

often it is a good idea to make the new people in charge aware of what they are dealing with, sometimes they just don't know because they don't get told by those that do know.

have you been given notice yet?

paladin123

getmore4less wrote: »

often it is a good idea to make the new people in charge aware of what they are dealing with, sometimes they just don't know because they don't get told by those that do know.

By new people do you mean the people taking us over? As yet, no one is officially, but we do have an offer on the table. Those people do know about the administration etc and are aware that their "takeover" of our little part of the business will need to tie in.

getmore4less wrote: »

have you been given notice yet?

I didn't know anyone was supposed to give us notice, but no. We've heard on the grapevine that we'll be in administration at the earliest in mid-January and at the very latest at the end of January. What notice are they supposed to give?

Sorry, I really don't know anything about this situation and it's hard to motivate myself to read around it on the internet when we're more focused on finding someone to take us over

getmore4less

You need to look into this in a lot more detail.

it is not just a case of finding a buyer you need to understand how that should be done.

if the people wanting parts of the business want/need the people then you need to be looking at TUPE or negotiating a better deal to go.

paladin123

getmore4less wrote: »

You need to look into this in a lot more detail.

it is not just a case of finding a buyer you need to understand how that should be done.

if the people wanting parts of the business want/need the people then you need to be looking at TUPE or negotiating a better deal to go.

As it happens we now have someone taking us over, which is good, and even better they are complying with TUPE. That doesn't help on the bonus front, but I am trying to negotiate a deal with them on that. As it happens, my company confirmed last night that unpaid holiday will not be paid in lieu, which I'm really surprised is legal since holiday is contractual and normally you would be paid if you left with accrued untaken holiday, but since my little part of the business is being TUPE'd this doesn't affect me, only the hundreds of others who are not being taken over.

This is such a dire situation at the worst possible time of year