Redundancy and Protective Award

ciaranancy

Hi,
I was hoping if you would be so kind as to give me some advice if you can. I have surfed, contacted ACAS, CAB and more but each time I’m being told that they can’t advise me on what I’m asking.
Basically, I was made redundant on 12/02/‘21 and I definitely fall in the bracket of claiming a Protective Award. 

My queries are as follows:

1) The company I worked for is now showing on Companies House as c/o the administrators address. Do I use this address or the original on the ET1 i.e the one showing on my P45?

2) It states that if a company is insolvent that they are protected by an Insolvency Act of 1986 whereby legal proceeding cant be taken against them. Is this correct in the case of claiming a PA?
This follows on with the MAIN QUESTION that I have not been able to get answered from anyone and it is: How do you go about getting consent off the administrators (to lift this statutory moratorium) to go ahead with the claim? Is it a simple email request or is there a specific form? I’ve read that if the case goes to the tribunal it halts if consent has not been obtained from either the administrators or the high court.

I will be eternally grateful for any replies and advice you can give, in particular to point no 2.

superbigal

Sorry do not have answers to your questions but do have a couple of points that might help/
Work out if the protective award will actually end up being worth anything to you.  For insolvency it is capped and also then has various deductions according to whatever you have already received from insolvency payments and benefits.
As a rule of thumb if you had more than 8 years service a protective award would end up actually meaning no net gain.
I had 5 years service so ended up with 3 weeks extra pay at the capped level minus JSA payments.
I assume more than 20 people were made redundant by the administrator without notice ?  That also is the main key to "automatic success" in your case.

ciaranancy

Thank you so much for your response. 

I did question this myself as I have 7 years service and the maximum I can claim for PA is 8 weeks, due to the company I worked for being insolvent. I did email the Insolvency Dept. and asked the question to make sure:
“ Can the Protective Award be paid as well as or on top of statutory redundancy and statutory notice pay? I’m unsure that if I am applying for 7 weeks worth of statutory notice pay, that this amount be deducted from the Protective Award? If it does then it certainly isn’t worth my while financially taking it to the ET, especially with JSA and other deductions to be taken off.”
This is what they replied:  
“ Payments for redundancy pay and compensatory notice pay do not affect the payment for the protective award however, any payments for arrears of pay that you receive from the Redundancy Payments Service will be deducted from the protective award payment.”
 

In your case, was it arrears of pay they deducted? I’m not claiming for anything other than statutory redundancy and notice pay. I must say, I did think the same as you and that’s why I questioned it. 

Well done on winning your case......and thanks so much again for replying. 😀

Thrugelmir

With reference to Gov.UK.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/explaining-your-protective-award/explaining-your-protective-award

2. How do I apply for a Protective Award

If you’re included in the tribunal judgment, you do not need to take any action to claim the Protective Award. We’ll contact you if we need any information from you. We’ll write to you when we’re ready to pay you, and let you know how much money you will get.

4. When will you pay my Protective Award

We aim to pay Protective Awards within 12 weeks of receiving information about who is entitled to the award.

superbigal

ciaranancy said:

Thank you so much for your response. 

I did question this myself as I have 7 years service and the maximum I can claim for PA is 8 weeks, due to the company I worked for being insolvent. I did email the Insolvency Dept. and asked the question to make sure:
“ Can the Protective Award be paid as well as or on top of statutory redundancy and statutory notice pay? I’m unsure that if I am applying for 7 weeks worth of statutory notice pay, that this amount be deducted from the Protective Award? If it does then it certainly isn’t worth my while financially taking it to the ET, especially with JSA and other deductions to be taken off.”
This is what they replied:  
“ Payments for redundancy pay and compensatory notice pay do not affect the payment for the protective award however, any payments for arrears of pay that you receive from the Redundancy Payments Service will be deducted from the protective award payment.”
 

In your case, was it arrears of pay they deducted? I’m not claiming for anything other than statutory redundancy and notice pay. I must say, I did think the same as you and that’s why I questioned it. 

Well done on winning your case......and thanks so much again for replying. 😀

100% if you have 7 years service you will get paid that as part of your ET1 claim.
The protective award will be for 12 weeks.  But that 8 Week Cap will mean any actual payment you end up getting is negligible.
Where it was also worthwhile for me was. I told the Judge there were at least another 25 people in the same boat as me.  I was the only one who went to tribunal.   The Judge then awarded the judgement to all of the other ex employees.  So they starting getting cheques in the post from "fresh air".  I was rather popular.  Still probably got some Whisky and other stuff still to consume.
When i fought my case it was in Scotland in about 2009 and it cost me nothing.

ciaranancy

Ha ha.....good for you and sláinte!