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Original poster

Redundancy after Maternity Leave

11 replies

Roxyoc · 16/10/2023 15:40

Hello - I am in a Senior Manager in client facing role as a business consultant at one of the big accountancy firms. I have been with the company for 10 years and was consistently rated a high performer prior to going on maternity leave. On returning in May of this year from my 2nd maternity leave, my boss told me my knowledge was already "one year out of date" and he would struggle to sell me onto client projects. He is now making me redundant. I feel this is discrimination as there are people in my team with the same skillset not being made redundant. Please help? Any advice would be welcome. I dont have the money to hire as lawyer.

OP posts:
Peach0123 · 16/10/2023 15:45

Aww that sounds stressful. Seems like it would cost them more to make you redundant than pay for training to get you up to speed. Did they do any keeping in touch days or offer training while you were off/before you returned. I'd contact ACAS immediately to be honest.

Cantthinkofadifferentname · 16/10/2023 15:46

Have you got house insurance? A lot of policies including legal cover including employment law advice

MintJulia · 16/10/2023 15:49

Yes, ACAS.

Also, did you include family legal cover on your house insurance? If so, you are covered for employment disputes.

I was 'made redundant' first morning back from maternity leave. My £15 legal cover (2010) saved me £60,000 in legal bills and lost earnings.

For anyone else reading this, take legal insurance BEFORE you tell anyone you are pregnant or even ttc.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about this subject:

Employment advice
parietal · 16/10/2023 15:52

Look up PregnantThenScrewed who give advice and campaign on discrimination around pregnancy

SecondUsername4me · 16/10/2023 15:55

Do they not have to fund a lawyer as part of any sort of enquiry?

SecondUsername4me · 16/10/2023 15:56

Surely the fact that they are making you redundant because you are "a year out of date" and that year is due to Maternity then it's a clear case of discrimination?

Rosecoffeecup · 16/10/2023 15:57

Deloitte by any chance? I know a few people affected

You should be going through a proper consultation period with HR, is that happening?

Kfjsjdbd · 16/10/2023 16:10

Totally unacceptable. Do you have that phrase ‘a year out of date’ in writing? If not, try and get it. And yes Pregnant Then Screwed will support.

PosteriorPosterity · 16/10/2023 16:14

Speak to ACAS. I’m a director at Big 4 and would be disgusted to hear of this happening in my part of the business.

Also escalate to your HRBP if you feel comfortable, and look at pregnantthenscrewed.

This sort of behaviour is unacceptable and can’t be allowed to happen unchallenged.

Original poster
Roxyoc · 16/10/2023 16:15

Thanks everyone. Some good suggestions here for me to follow up. I have my first individual consultation on thursday so want to know what my options are before this.

OP posts:
gotomomo · 16/10/2023 16:59

As it's 5 months later it will be hard to prove pregnancy discrimination unless that conversation was recorded. Redundancy has to be done in a certain way to be legal, speak to Acas. If it's a case that each department needs to loose a member of staff for instance they would need transparent criteria, if that happens to be billing in the last 12 months putting you at a complete disadvantage then pregnant then screwed might be able to help, if it's billing in the last 3 months pro rata it's much harder to prove

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