need (quite urgent) advice about details of redundancy packages

[fruityfruity]

Hi

Have double posted on redundancy thread but thought I'd post here as well to get more chance of a reply

Questions of what I need to know at the end. Background here - sorry a bit long. HR director very well known to be totally supportive of management and unhelpful to other staff

I work part time 2 days in office and 2 mornings till 12pm from home( brill cos it means I pick up ds2 from nursery 3 times a week)

Director called me in to see her this wednesday and said "we are restructuring the dept and certain jobs are at risk. In the job you are doing we need someone to take on a more strategic role. We skill mapped you to the job and you are a 100% skill match so we do not need to advertise the job - we will just change your job title and increase your pay to reflect the increased responsibilitis of the role." ( Great , I thought!)

However, she said, given the increased profile, we would ask you to work 4 days a week in the office. If you would rather not do the increased hours, you can take voluntary redundancy.

I was very professional and said - thank you, this new profile looks fantastic but I would like to think about the options you discussed.

I do not want to take it on as the sort of role I am currently in is a 9-5 job and I purposefully took a job which didn't utilise my skill set while my kids are young. But people in the sort of role she describes work 18 hours a day and week ends.

So I now wish to negotiate the best possible redundancy package but have no knowledge of what to do.My questions are ( they show how little I know! so help gratefully received):

1. I have been getting £243/month ccv and am worried this may make my redundancy pay lower. Will it?

1. When me and DP met , we had both owned flats for a while so we sold his, bought a house and I kept my flat on as a rental investment in my name - the new tax changes( meaning all earnings taxed together have meant that my net salary from the company has been less this year - will that affect the redundancy? ( the package is based on your gross pay

1. How long can I have to think about it? - the director said she needs an answer asap as if i do not wish to take the job, she will need to advertise it.

1. Package includes untaken holiday leave - the leave goes from April to April. I get 18 days a year and this year carried 5 days of untaken leave over. I have taken 12 days up until the end of the december. How will they calculate my untaken leave?

Many thanks for help. I have not been in this position before so am feeling a little shaken up

[WipsGlitter]

The CCV will not affect the payment. I don't know about the rest but the government websites are quite useful. I take it you're assuming they'll give you more than the statutory required.

[lougle]

The CCV could well affect your payment. It is a salary sacrifice scheme, which means that your salary is contractually lowered and instead of receiving your full salary, you receive [(your salary -£243) + (CCV to the value of £243)] each month.

As your redundancy will be calculated in terms of x weeks salary, you will get less than if you weren't in the scheme.

[WeAllHaveWings]

CCV won't affect it, it calculated on gross

You can get £30k dunny tax free, rest is taxed as your normal pay, unless this takes your earnings into a higher tax bracket.

You are entitled to holidays pro rata to you end date.

[flowery]

Redundancy pay will be based on your actual gross salary, which is lower because you have childcare vouchers.

However leave all that aside, I think you need to start making a gigantic fuss about their failure to follow a fair and reasonable redundancy procedure. They should have informed you of their proposals for the restructuring, consulted you, explained how they planned to select people for the new roles, given you the opportunity to have a consultation meeting and be accompanied by someone, listened to any queries, suggestions or concerns you may have raised, and only then made a decision about what they were going to do and communicated that to you.

I'm in a rush but have a look on the ACAS website for their guide to redundancy process to see what process they should have followed. I would then write to the HR director highlighting that you have taken advice and are concerned that they have failed to follow a reasonable redundancy procedure and you would like her response to your concerns before you consider your position.

[fruityfruity]

Hi all,

Thank you so much. I will have a look on the ACAS site. I wasn't aware that they hadn't followed standard procedure.

For me as the decision's a no brainer, I want to get the best redundancy pay package and if possible try and keep good relations. The reason for this being is that I may wish to work freelance for them in the future ( so far 3 previous people who have been made redundant are doing this, are much happier and earn as much)

I did think that a person in my position had a month and am seeing the HR director on wednesday to find out about this but I posted here cos me and DP aren't well up on this so many thanks again

The Hr director is generally known through the grapevine to not help anyone under the exec and I have been told this by quite senior people so I need to think of how to discuss this in a measured way...
I did ask someone very senior who had been at the company for a long time to come with me because I am a bit shaken. However , as a working mother , she is furious, and she says that she will say to the HR director that this is very against family friendly policies( which they say is one of their values) and as they have noted I am a 100% skill fit, they should have offered me the job

( I have always met, sometines exceeding my objectives and got good appraisals throughout but I kinda felt they were looking for someone to give their life to this post and maybe didn't want someone like me doing this job 9-5 3 days a week which is why they have done this)

So , sorry to have gone OTT, but given the whole picture, I need to think carefully how I approach this situation in that given the way they are restructuring they are likely to need more freelancers and as you have to be trained to do the job ( for around 9 months) all their freelancers are ex employers

[fruityfruity]

didn't give this info.... colleague said as they have noted I am a 100% skill fit, they should have offered me the job 3 days a week and advertised the remaining days as a jobshare

[WipsGlitter]

Would you have gone for that? As Flowery (font of all hr related knowledge) says there is a process and one part is being allowed to suggest alternatives to the redundancy.

[fruityfruity]

I'm not sure..., I purposefully took this job as I knew it was a 9 -5 job which would be a good work life balance while our dc were young. It is (was) a really great job and I have been able to do it highly competently while not killing myself!

I think if I suggested the 3 day a week thing and they agreed, I would probably do the job badly because all the other people on similar jobs are part of a culture where it is normal to work 18 hour days which I couldn't and wouldn't want to do....so on balance I probably don't want this option.

Posting here and getting responses is helping me clarify what I'm after. I think, despite the shock, redundancy might not be a bad thing.

I want to do 2 things in tandem and I'm not sure it's possible - I would like to keep good relations so that if I want to I can work freelance for them in around 4 months time but get a fair redundancy package.

I forgot to say that there were some redundancies a while back and a work colleague made me aware that people employed after we were, were on 3 month notice periods rather than 1 month. I wrote a letter to Hr asking who I should contact if I wanted to be considered for changing the notice period on my contract to 3 months.... and I got no reply! - I realise why now....but is it worth jeopardising my chances of getting freelance work by negotiating on more pay for notice period?

[TheDoctrineOfSanta]

I don't think you'd want more pay for your notice period, you could draw a parallel that others at your level have a longer notice period as part of your argument for a higher than statutory package but you wouldn't formally want to change your notice period.

[fruityfruity]

Thanks - I met with HR today so have far more info that I wasn't aware of about leave and that they will give me statutory leave. Feel that knowledge is power and know so much more now.

I really didn't know what to do/ where to look when it first happened and MN has been a bit of a life save