Unconditional Job Offer on hold

toastedmonkey

I have recently been given an unconditional job offer, the same company I am currently with but in a different department. Same salary per year, but less hours (so technically a pay rise?)

I was told last week by the head of department that HR had screwed up: They had made someone redundant to make this position available but it had only just come to light that the current occupant of the role can't be made redundant due to the Disability Discrimination Act.
I've been told there will now be a 3 month trial of this person working remotely from the rest of the team, and my offer is on hold.
There's categorically no chance this trial will fail, and if it did the role has a 3 month notice period, so it would be at least 6 months before it becomes vacant.

Is there a time limit to an unconditional job offer? It has already been 5 weeks. Will it expire after 6 months or so?
And can I pursue this at all in anyway? Or am I just stuck awaiting the next vacancy?

Thanks in advance

ohreally

toastedmonkey wrote: »

I was told last week by the head of department that HR had screwed up: They had made someone redundant to make this position available

This makes no sense, the post is redundant not the person.

There is more to this than your being told.

elsien

Disability Discrimination act is obsolete and has been replaced by the Equality Act.
I can't answer your question however if the company isn't able to get their legislation right, I'd be double checking anything else they told me.

If the role is no longer required, they can make anyone redundant. However the role can't be redundant because they've offered it to you. Did they mean to get rid of the person on capability grounds, then looked at remote working instead? That would make more sense.
Sounds to me like they've made a right pigs ear of the whole thing

sangie595

And the disability discrimination act was repealed in 2010, and never stopped redundancy anyway. I would lay bets that they have tried to get rid of someone who is disabled with a fictional redundancy, and got caught. Which might make you wonder about your employer.

An unconditional offer is pretty meaningless anyway.

toastedmonkey

Sorry, they've changed the job description, job title and moved the job from one side of the country to the other.
So technically it's a new position, but as they've now discovered they can't make the original person redundant, they will be working as they always have at their original location but the rest of the team will be in the new location.