Complicated redundancy issue

ElectricEric · 16 March 2019 at 6:49PM

Hi,

I’ve been with a company (A) for 9.5 years and 51% was bought by a foreign company (B) just over a year ago. My employment contract however remained with company A.

Company A have just been closed down by company B and all staff but myself have been made redundant, and have received offers of redundancy payment.

I have had no official notification that my employment with company A is coming to an end but have received an offer of contract work from home, from foreign company B. This is something that I believe is not within uk employment law, and I should be entitled to redundancy payout the same as my colleagues.

I have informed company B of the above so I am now expecting they will come back with an offer of ‘alternative work’ rather than paying me for redundancy.

The new role will be working from home rather than in an office and I’m told there will be much more international travel involved, something I would rather avoid.

My question really is would I have grounds to refuse the alternative work offer and still claim redundancy? I would rather work in an office that alone and remotely and with a young family do not want to be travelling abroad regularly.

Any help on this would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Eric

Manxman_in_exile · 16 March 2019 at 8:37PM

Frequent travelling abroad doesn't sound like a suitable alternative to me - but I may be wrong.

YBR · 16 March 2019 at 9:12PM

My (non-expert) understanding is you either TUPE to the new company in the same role, same conditions or you are redundant. In the latter case they should try to redeploy staff and you can accept or not.
Best to try CAB or ACAS for advice.
Are you in a union? Do you have legal cover on home insurance?

ElectricEric · 17 March 2019 at 9:39AM

Thanks for the responses.

No I’m not part of a union nor do I have legal cover with my home insurance. Do I need legal insurance if I work from home?

I’m not familiar with TUPE so will have to contact Acas to find out some more info.

Thanks again.

oscarward · 17 March 2019 at 10:08AM

I think the question about legal cover was meant to be that you could arrange an appointment with a solicitor, paid for by the insurance, to assist you with your work issues. If you don't have that cover then it looks like ACAS or CAB is something to explore.