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Looking for some specific advice that my only be known by an employment lawyer - any on here? - or very experienced HR person....

 

So, to cut a long story short, I was dismissed in December. Turned up to work as normal one day only to be sat down with the Head of HR 30 minutes later and told I was being made redundant, hand my keys in, collect my belongings and sod off with immediate effect. I know that I have got them bang to rights in terms of process as I wasn't even invited to the meeting where I was dismissed, so I'm 99.9% certain that the judge will award in my favour at the tribunal and agree that the dismissal was 'unfair'.

 

What I am looking for is some advice around the 'Polkey' argument. I've had the witness statements through and they aren't even bothering to defend their actions in terms of the dismissal process. The reason that the Head of HR gave me for the redundancy was that the company was 'no longer financially viable'. Obviously my appeal was against this - as well as the lack of process followed and the fact that there was no consultation - and the company has blatantly ignored this as well as blatantly lied about it! I recorded the meeting with the Head of HR on my phone and have since submitted this as a document as well as a full transcript of the meeting. In the appeal outcome letter that I was sent - before I told them I had recorded the meeting - they state that they have spoken to the Head of HR and she says she did not at any time state that the company was no longer financially viable - which is a clear lie!

 

They are now trying to use a Polkey argument to reduce the amount of compensation. However, they have now decided to change the reason for the redundancy and state that it was down to a reduction in business - fair enough as this is a 'fair' reason for redundancy, however, they haven't provided any 'evidence' to support this and the P&L's and audited accounts that I have had entered in the bundle show that whilst there was a small drop in turnover, it remains way above the level of previous years during my employment which didn't trigger a 'redundancy' event, so again, I'm confident that I will win that argument.

 

So, the question is, can the change the reason for redundancy and still use a Polkey argument? Fair enough if they didn't follow the process and dismissed me 'unfairly' but still shut the business due to it no longer being financially viable, I could understand that a Polkey argument would work. However, can they change the reason and ignore the original reason that was given and still use the argument? If so, how many times can they do it?

 

Whilst I appreciate that 'professional' advice may be the only way to answer this question, the way tribunal courts are set up - in that costs can very rarely be claimed, let alone costs for legal representation - it is counter-intuitive to spend money on legal advice that can never be reclaimed!

 

Any comments welcome :)

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Looking for some specific advice that my only be known by an employment lawyer - any on here? - or very experienced HR person....

 

So, to cut a long story short, I was dismissed in December. Turned up to work as normal one day only to be sat down with the Head of HR 30 minutes later and told I was being made redundant, hand my keys in, collect my belongings and sod off with immediate effect. I know that I have got them bang to rights in terms of process as I wasn't even invited to the meeting where I was dismissed, so I'm 99.9% certain that the judge will award in my favour at the tribunal and agree that the dismissal was 'unfair'.

 

What I am looking for is some advice around the 'Polkey' argument. I've had the witness statements through and they aren't even bothering to defend their actions in terms of the dismissal process. The reason that the Head of HR gave me for the redundancy was that the company was 'no longer financially viable'. Obviously my appeal was against this - as well as the lack of process followed and the fact that there was no consultation - and the company has blatantly ignored this as well as blatantly lied about it! I recorded the meeting with the Head of HR on my phone and have since submitted this as a document as well as a full transcript of the meeting. In the appeal outcome letter that I was sent - before I told them I had recorded the meeting - they state that they have spoken to the Head of HR and she says she did not at any time state that the company was no longer financially viable - which is a clear lie!

 

They are now trying to use a Polkey argument to reduce the amount of compensation. However, they have now decided to change the reason for the redundancy and state that it was down to a reduction in business - fair enough as this is a 'fair' reason for redundancy, however, they haven't provided any 'evidence' to support this and the P&L's and audited accounts that I have had entered in the bundle show that whilst there was a small drop in turnover, it remains way above the level of previous years during my employment which didn't trigger a 'redundancy' event, so again, I'm confident that I will win that argument.

 

So, the question is, can the change the reason for redundancy and still use a Polkey argument? Fair enough if they didn't follow the process and dismissed me 'unfairly' but still shut the business due to it no longer being financially viable, I could understand that a Polkey argument would work. However, can they change the reason and ignore the original reason that was given and still use the argument? If so, how many times can they do it?

 

Whilst I appreciate that 'professional' advice may be the only way to answer this question, the way tribunal courts are set up - in that costs can very rarely be claimed, let alone costs for legal representation - it is counter-intuitive to spend money on legal advice that can never be reclaimed!

 

Any comments welcome :)

 

 

It sounds like the Polkey argument may apply here as it could be argued that the wording was incorrect for the decision which would have been inevitable. I'm afraid, as you say, the only advice is to get a good employment lawyer as there is no doubt you have been unfairly dismissed but they will certainly up the compensation... I'm assuming you have over 2 years service and have argued that no discrimination has taken place thus far? And also that you received the correct redundancy and notice pay.

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No worries. Having re-read their witness statements and done some number crunching on the small amount of numbers they have provided I now have an argument against their new reason for redundancy - which they are now claiming to be a reduction in the workload - which shows that actually the amount of work required by one person actually rose by over 5% compared with 2014, ergo no redundancy event triggered in 2014 should mean no redundancy event triggered with an increase in the workload! Moral of the story, check your figures before sending them to a pedant!

 

I do, however, have a new problem!! Exactly six months to the day from my previous redundancy, I was informed by my new employer that my role is now 'at risk' due to the contract that I was working on for them being cancelled early. 29 of us are now under 'consultation' so I reckon I've got about 7 weeks to find alternative work. My question is, if I don't manage to do so and therefore have another period without income, can I add this to the original claim? It stands to reason that I should be able to as if they hadn't unfairly dismissed in the first place then I would not suffer any of the losses since dismissal, but need to know if there is any legal precedent as to why not? For once the tardiness of the courts looks like it will work in my favour as the case could have been done and dusted by now before the new redundancy was revealed :D

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  • 1 month later...
No conclusion yet - looking forward to the court date next week :)

 

Had a few interviews last week but nothing has come to fruition yet. Not the end of the world though :)

 

Weston, what do you do? I run a recruitment agency and would be happy to hold your CV. Send me a PM....

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Weston, what do you do? I run a recruitment agency and would be happy to hold your CV. Send me a PM....

 

Ironically I am currently in recruitment :)

 

18 years previously as a General Manager for pubs / restaurants but the last 4 years since moving back to Weston in recruitment - 1 year in catering recruitment and 3 years in IT / Finance rec, mainly contractors, followed by six months with Hays - before they made me redundant this month - formulating strategy and processes for recruitment for a care company....

 

All rec work has been account manager / process based and I don't consider myself to be a '360' recruiter as 'phone bashing' doesn't do it for me....

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I won :)

 

It wasn't Hays that I took to court it was my previous employer - ITF Solutions. I joined Hays after that and was made redundant by them, but they did it properly with a consultation period and a genuine reason for redundancy etc.

 

Eight months of my life is finally at an end and whilst I won't claim that I have lost any sleep over it, nonetheless it does weigh on the mind a lot of the time!!!

 

Having represented myself, I spent the best part of 2 and a half hours questioning their two witnesses - even being 'hurried up' by the judge on two occasions so we could keep to the time limits he had imposed. He needn't have bothered as their solicitor was particularly useless. He managed a staggering 12 minutes of questions for me - about a third of that time was the glorious sound of silence as he flipped around his pages to find any sort of question to ask! My witness was then called to the stand and after going through the process of swearing in, their solicitor announced that on reflection he had no questions to ask! What a waste of time that was!

 

Glad it's all over, but won't be completely happy until the cash is in my bank account!

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  • 11 months later...
I won :)

 

It wasn't Hays that I took to court it was my previous employer - ITF Solutions. I joined Hays after that and was made redundant by them, but they did it properly with a consultation period and a genuine reason for redundancy etc.

 

Eight months of my life is finally at an end and whilst I won't claim that I have lost any sleep over it, nonetheless it does weigh on the mind a lot of the time!!!

 

Having represented myself, I spent the best part of 2 and a half hours questioning their two witnesses - even being 'hurried up' by the judge on two occasions so we could keep to the time limits he had imposed. He needn't have bothered as their solicitor was particularly useless. He managed a staggering 12 minutes of questions for me - about a third of that time was the glorious sound of silence as he flipped around his pages to find any sort of question to ask! My witness was then called to the stand and after going through the process of swearing in, their solicitor announced that on reflection he had no questions to ask! What a waste of time that was!

 

Glad it's all over, but won't be completely happy until the cash is in my bank account!

 

Well done. How much were you awarded?

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£12.5k last year when this all happened, then I get the refund of £1.2k this year :)

 

I was out of work for about 2 months in total last year so the money won was a Brucie Bonus :)

 

Hey WSS you'd certainly get a kick-arse bike with that pay out!

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