Dismissed after 5 months without proper reason

minniemaus1970

HI A collegue took a job on in March as an IT assistant answering the phone. She was the only girl in there
She’s never been late, always answered the phone within 3 rings , not used “paper” - a big no no ( she had to make notes on screen while talking to clients). She even downloaded phone sheets on how to answer properly and only made one mistake once when saying “ we re aware of an issue with one of the servers and the department is working on it” which she was told off for and apologised and didn’t say it again. That was 3 weeks ago and today she was told she is dismissed, one month pay - notice . Reason - she didn’t improve enough. She is better than most of the boys in there
No written or verbal warning, she asked for a reason so she can improve- nothing , no explanation. Most people - even colleagues didn’t know she was dis missed ?
Even worse - they told her at 8 am and she had to pack up her things, in front of all the office staff, very humiliating, why not tell her last night at 5pm
No HR or union rep was present just a line manager and manager from different department?
Now I work for the same company - different department and know from other people she dealt with that
1 she very confident and good at solving Pc issues
2 Always answered the phone with a smile/ very happy bubbly personality
3 was never late
4 - people are shocked because of how well she done the job and how quickly she learned, and didn’t really have training.

Now the weird thing is
I found out by accident that today they sent out her p45 and 12 other people at different branches/ towns who also been there under 6 months.
Now these letters that went out company wide to different branches to people that recently been offered jobs, no written explanation as to why
What I find odd is
We rarely fired people before new management took over 2 years ago.
12 people seems a lot. 12 - that’s one in every branch
Is this happening regularly? We seem to do inductions and other courses for 12-16 people every month now. We never used to
Why would a company 700 employees strong take so much staff on and then dismiss them after 5 months ? Or are our managers that bad at interviews ? Employ double and sack half? Surely that’s not cheap either, wages and all that. Our hr/ payroll must be fantastic at doing this all the time 😧
Is it just me? Am I paranoid? Something doesn’t seem right
Anyone have a conspiracy theory ?
As far as I know - our business is doing well.
MM

marliepanda

Maybe they’ve decided those staff were superfluous to needs.

Unless they dismissed her because of a protected characteristic she has no protection until 2 years.

lincroft1710

Unless your own job is likely to be threatened, just carry on and don't worry about it. Management policies often make little sense and actually sometimes are nonsense

PersianCatLady

lincroft1710 wrote: »

Unless your own job is likely to be threatened, just carry on and don't worry about it. Management policies often make little sense and actually sometimes are nonsense

Unless the colleague is actually you or you were there every day at this lady's place of work then you don't know as much as you think you do about how well she worked there.

Regardless the company were well within their rights to dismiss her as she doesn't have two year's service.

[Deleted User]

Perhaps it wasn't really her/their environment to shine in?

Conspiracy - they wanted more money/to many things/didn't fit in and employer said best be on your way.

I often over smiled in telesales and appeared really good at it, apparently when really deep down it wasn't ever what I wanted to do. I was offered a rise to keep doing it and still got a telling off over conduct when after I recently put my notice in and events that followed - I was asked not to work any notice if they didn't have my full on commitment so effectively they could for all I know tell the people I worked alongside I was sacked, not other way around. (I really don't mind what they said, if I'm not in ear shot I never know) nearly did a MMD! Should I stay with the early days company that shows signs of being bust, but pays well in some role most hated or should I grab minimum wage job with a company of a decade strong that offers training, has a contact centre of other employees more like me and likely far more stable in the long run. But when I thought about it, there was no contest. From other jobseekers met today there seems to be a lot of nasty things happening more and more out there. Some of the things I thought only pretty exclusive to me have happened to others so no one is alone.

It could be you don't and won't ever know the full facts in the greatest respect. Really wouldn't try and reason it. Been there with a colleague last year and in end glad we never ever found out in truth.

Undervalued

minniemaus1970 wrote: »

Is it just me? Am I paranoid? Something doesn’t seem right
Anyone have a conspiracy theory ?
As far as I know - our business is doing well.
MM

I rather suspect you do!

As others have said, in the absence of unlawful discrimination the employee has no comeback and the firm is not obliged to offer any reason.

JayRitchie

My bet:

They had recruited expecting higher staff turnover or an expansion in the business which hasn't happened so needed to cut a few heads, or

They decided they needed a different level of employee and cut the cheapest people to get rid of.

These things happen. Keep your head down.

PersianCatLady

Undervalued wrote: »

I rather suspect you do!

As others have said, in the absence of unlawful discrimination the employee has no comeback and the firm is not obliged to offer any reason.

The only thing that doesn't seem right is that you think the only reason "your friend" was dismissed was because something is not right at the company.

For all you know, she COULD have been absolutely rubbish at her job.

FBaby

Maybe the company is struggling know they will have to make people redundant at some point so to make the process easier they go rid of first comers with a package probably better than they would have received if made redundant any way.

nicechap

minniemaus1970 wrote: »

HI A collegue took a job on in March as an IT assistant answering the phone. She was the only girl in there
She’s never been late, always answered the phone within 3 rings , not used “paper” - a big no no ( she had to make notes on screen while talking to clients). She even downloaded phone sheets on how to answer properly and only made one mistake once when saying “ we re aware of an issue with one of the servers and the department is working on it” which she was told off for and apologised and didn’t say it again. That was 3 weeks ago and today she was told she is dismissed, one month pay - notice . Reason - she didn’t improve enough. She is better than most of the boys in there
No written or verbal warning, she asked for a reason so she can improve- nothing , no explanation. Most people - even colleagues didn’t know she was dis missed ?
Even worse - they told her at 8 am and she had to pack up her things, in front of all the office staff, very humiliating, why not tell her last night at 5pm
No HR or union rep was present just a line manager and manager from different department?
Now I work for the same company - different department and know from other people she dealt with that
1 she very confident and good at solving Pc issues
2 Always answered the phone with a smile/ very happy bubbly personality
3 was never late
4 - people are shocked because of how well she done the job and how quickly she learned, and didn’t really have training.

Now the weird thing is
I found out by accident that today they sent out her p45 and 12 other people at different branches/ towns who also been there under 6 months.
Now these letters that went out company wide to different branches to people that recently been offered jobs, no written explanation as to why
What I find odd is
We rarely fired people before new management took over 2 years ago.
12 people seems a lot. 12 - that’s one in every branch
Is this happening regularly? We seem to do inductions and other courses for 12-16 people every month now. We never used to
Why would a company 700 employees strong take so much staff on and then dismiss them after 5 months ? Or are our managers that bad at interviews ? Employ double and sack half? Surely that’s not cheap either, wages and all that. Our hr/ payroll must be fantastic at doing this all the time 😧
Is it just me? Am I paranoid? Something doesn’t seem right
Anyone have a conspiracy theory ?
As far as I know - our business is doing well.
MM

That's all the conspiracy theory you need. Its businesses that don't anticipate change and stagnate that end up loosing loads more jobs.

No need for the illuminati, UFOs, funny handshakes or Donald Trump to explain proactive business practices.

Paul_DNAP

Unfortunately, she has few rights to appeal with such a short time (beyond the discrimination of protected characteristics as mentioned above).


As for the reasons behind it, I doubt you'll ever really know, it sounds like one higher manager's vanity project of "we need more front line staff" has been scuppered when a different manager has looked over their wage bill (seems to be times just after the second quarter results would have been finalised) and said "yes maybe, but not that many, get rid of them"