To think 4 months is an excessive notice period?

[CulturalBear]

There's a chance I may be offered a chance to upgrade to next band at work (public sector job, sigh) following lots of departures plus the fact that I'm supervising people on the same band as me.

Going up a band would give me a hefty payrise - £3-4k and presumably a title. Downside is that I'd have to sign up to a 4-month notice period, which I think is ridiculous.

It's not a hugely specialised role, would involve supervising 3-5 people, and certainly not difficult to replace. If I were to move to a similar role externally, I anticipate that businesses would be very unhappy for me to honour that.

AIBU to think it's so excessive that I'd consider not taking the promotion (if offered?)?

It's fairly standard in a lot of jobs. Middle management roles are usually 3 months notice ime. (Hr background)

Argue it. 3months is standard though as you are civil service you might find that it was hard fought to get 4 months and it would be handy if they did redundancies.

Can you carry over tons of leave from one year to the next?

well, clearly your first step is to just try to negotiate a shorter notice period.

If they say no.... tbh the employer's options if an employee does not give full notice is (1) sue them for the value that their work to the end of the notice period would have brought and/or (2) get an injunction preventing employee from working anywhere else until the end of the notice period. would it be worth it for them to sue you? Highly unlikely if you'd be easy to replace. You could just take the risk that they wouldn't.

To be fair, there's not a lot that they can do to enforce said notice period.

I had a 2 month notice period but ended up giving them a week after something better came up. They weren't happy but they couldn't force me to come in.

"AIBU to think it's so excessive that I'd consider not taking the promotion (if offered?)?" - hell, yes, you are, if it's a good job in all other respects.

It's not that long - it's no doubt based on how long they think it would take to replace you - and gives you valuable rights in the event that you were to be made redundant or dismissed for anything other than gross misconduct. Obviously it is open to you and them to agree a shorter period if it doesn't suit when/if you resign.

And, as Jeremy points out, slavery is illegal in this country - they cannot force you to attend work for the full period if you've got a job elsewhere (they can strictly speaking sue you for breach of contract to cover their losses, if they have any, by you walking out early; they could get an injunction to stop you starting elsewhere if by doing so in breach of your notice period you caused their business problems but that's unlikely in the public sector).

It's never a good idea to assume that there is nothing an employer can do to enforce a notice period. They can, for instance, sue you for the cost of arranging temporary cover.

OP, you need to think about whether it might be beneficial to you to have a 4 month notice period, e.g. in a redundancy situation. If not, then I would strongly suggest trying to negotiate 3 months, which is the norm in senior positions.

It is pretty standard. I went up from 1 month to 3 months with one promotion, and then 3 months to 6 months with my last one.
It is probably standard across the banding, but you can always ask if it can be reduced.
Certainly companies in the private sector know that negotiating notice periods is part and parcel with hiring senior people and wouldn't automatically see it as a negative mark when hiring you. You can always save up holiday before moving jobs to 'buy' yourself out of a bit of your notice period.

Something else to consider is that if this is standard in your roles then a future employer will understand and also have a similar notice period to whatever job you are going on to with them.

they can't enforce a notice period against you by forcing you to work, but they can take action against a third party employer for inducement to breach contract if you go to work for someone else within that notice period, and that's never a great look for a new employer - Flowery required here for the full skinny.
In reality, I've only seen that with senior people / people with proprietary information - they have been held to six month / year long notice periods and not given garden leave but not given usual work either so that they no logner have current business knowledge when they leave.
Four months isn't overly long depending on the role.

Some really interesting thoughts - thanks... :)

The role would be an improvement, mainly in terms of pay, but it's not what I'd see as being a forever job by any stretch of the imagination. It's just something that I'm fairly good at (at the moment) and it would be very nice to be rewarded financially for a little while.

If I were to leave, it would likely not be within public sector as it's essentially a general marketing role, and there isn't another organisation that could offer a like-for-like equivalent within about 60 miles. It is though easily replaced by external applicants, especially if it's on the higher pay end for this neck of the woods.

Four months just seems excessive for low level of responsibility and expertise after, what three years of working in the organisation, two and a half of which in a different role! I can imagine there are some where I work on that band who would be very specialised and therefore much harder to replace, but I would not be one of them.

Even if you accept there is a (IMO small) risk of suit if you leave after a few years the cost of settling (a couple of months wages?) may very well be less than the increase in earnings you'll see over the period of your working there. And combined with the fact that the situation of not being able to give notice may never transpire and even if it does the employer may not make a fuss, taking the job is very likely be worth it (as the increased earning power is certain).

While a company can't force you into work every day, they don't have to issue your P60 until the end of your notice period, and some employers won't put you onto the payroll until they've got your P60, or will at least put you onto an emergency tax code until they've got it.
So if you do go down that route, be prepared for several months with a reduced pay packet

How long do you think is a reasonable notice period for that role then?

If they won't negotiate and you don't want to have 4 months then can you stay in your present role? If there are other people on your band then there is a good chance one of them would accept those conditions.

Standard, I'd expect any staff member in a relatively important role to be on at least 3 months notice. We have staff here on 12 months in some cases.

I'd rip their hand off for the offer. Whilst points above about not assuming they won't hold you to a notice period is good advice. The reality is this gives you additional protection in the event of redundancy, and if you did get your dream job and needed to leave within 2 months the chances are you will be able to come to an agreement. An employer doesn't want to keep an unhappy and demotivated staff member unless they absolutely have to.

Well done on the job!

Take the job, enjoy the extra money, and negotiate the 4 months down when you want to leave, all the while safe in the knowledge that if they do make you redundant they have to pay the full 4 months.

What do you worry will happen?
I have visions of the 'contract police' arriving at your new job to take you back to the old one for a week. As long as you have given them reasonable notice (eg three months) it will be fine.

I'm on 6 months notice: if I got another job they'd put me on gardening leave immediately which is a waste of money: in reality they'd let me go.

I'd say 4 weeks - or one week for every year worked (to a max of 12 weeks) is reasonable in this side of the organisation.

There are some roles out there that would reasonably be tied to very long periods eg teachers (and this would impact incoming and outgoing staff the same way), but there is no basis for that applying to me.

If I declined (a still hypothetical promotion) then I would still be doing the exact same job but for less money than I could have been on. They will still keep using my ideas - the only one losing out would be me.

I think I'll try to negotiate it before signing anything - and at least find out what justification they would have for me being tied there that long.

Meant to say above, the organisation doesn't have good form for allowing people out early - a friend recently emigrated and the only leeway they would give her was the five days of leave she managed to accrue in that time!

Sorry OP not sure I made my main point.

You work in the public sector

The "evil Tories" have a majority

And you don't want to increase your notice period?

Does not compute!

I dontvreally get the problem - I'd just go for it. I'm on a3 month notice period in the public sector. I would expect to tty to negotiate that a bit but it wouldn't be a problem for my next employer as they would be expecting it at my level. If it was a really short notice period I would expect them to wonder why.

4 weeks would be really short. Employers need to allow time to recruit a suitable replacement, with only 4 weeks you could have accrued holiday so leave them within a few days, then they would be stuck. 3 months seems normal for most roles with any kind of responsibility.

Haha MNpostingbot good point! Though I'd never say never, the department is on the brink of a major restructure, but will almost certainly be going up in numbers, especially my team.

I think I'm mostly worried about private sector employers. Even though a band promotion would have (nominal) added responsibility, it wouldn't have the word manager or team leader etc in the title, so on paper, you don't get the benefit of the cost of a four-month notice period.

Ie if I wanted to go somewhere as a manager, they might accept a long notice period as standard, but I'll have had no proof on paper of having leadership responsibility. Maybe I should be negotiating a better job title as well?

I never knew three-months plus was so widely accepted, that's for sure.

It is true they can sue you for the cost of a replacement but assuming they've stopped your wages that won't amount to much. You definitely can leave when you like. A bigger issue is that your new employer wouldn't necessarily like it. My contract actually says that if I leave without giving notice they will stop my wages with immediate effect, seems reasonable enough.

But op in our company I'm on 3 months and the grade above are on 6 so yabu it's normal.

And I work in the private sector btw

I always go for the longest notice period I can get simply for my own protection. I know that if I want to leave then its negotiable however if they want me to leave then its not negotiable...