Settlement figure for maternity discrimination?

[GoldieLocks09]

I’m due to take part in a ‘without prejudice’ meeting with my employer in the coming days. Ultimately my position at the company is no longer there and they have not followed recent maternity laws as they:

1. have offered me a job that is not suitable at all (lower level, much less senior)
2. told me I can apply for a more senior position (but backhandedly told me I wouldn’t get it)
3. made the decision 9 months ago when I first went off and have only just told me

and there’s a few other things but I don’t want to be too outing..

I think both myself and the company know the outcome and that there will be a settlement. My question is how much should I push for?

I earn approx £120k OTE (bonus & basic salary), have already lined up childcare and paid a 6 month deposit, missed out on my annual bonus last year because they didn’t pay me it as I was on maternity leave, been there 6.5yrs and have a 3 month notice period. AIBU to go for a full years salary plus bonus and my notice period?

Can anyone share examples of what they’ve received as a settlement (or a friend of a friend, etc?) or how I’d go about calculating it. I’m aware I could get more taking them to a tribunal but for ease & the ability to get passed this awful period I’d rather just settle but for as much as I can?

As a starting point I’d have a look at the company’s redundancy policy and see what you would be entitled to if you had been made compulsorily redundant.

I had similar happen to me many moons ago & eventually did get a year’s salary - but our redundancy scheme was generous and that is what I’d have been entitled to if I’d been made redundant. Not sure if many companies would give this now.

So are they making you redundant? Is it a big employer with enhanced redundancy terms?

We get one month for every year to a max of 12 or statutory redundancy (usually a week or every year) plus notice period.

They owe you last year's bonus. It's discrimination not to pay it. We get full bonus during mat leave.

Check out what is tax free or not? I believe the first 30k of redundancy is tax free. Not sure if settlement agreements are taxable completely?

Good luck.

I'd push for returning to the same job and let them make you an offer OP, otherwise you're negotiating against yourself.

When considering their offer, don't forget to factor in the value of pension and other benefits. Also, compensation for injury to feelings. Plus add in the bad publicity factor if you have to bring a claim. Seek legal advice asap.

Do some research and find out how long you're likely to be out of work for and whether a new job would be at the same salary and go from there.

Did you have enhanced mat leave pay?

do you have any non compete/exclusions in your contract?

how much is bonus worth?

di you have any share options?

I think unlikely to get a year plus notice plus bonus.

id say 9 months pay would be a good out come with full tax free ex gratia mopped up. Bonus on top if you can. Don’t pay back any enhanced mat pay. Remove all non compete so you can work as soon as you want. all pension contribution paid

OP I can’t speak to settlements but in case you haven’t already contacted them ACAS and pregnant than screwed were both really helpful for me, when experiencing pregnancy related workplace discrimination. Can’t imagine how stressful this has been for you. Hope you have some support over the next few weeks to see your case through x

I've recently been through a similar situation, not pregnancy related but other grievances and settled for 6 months salary and 6 months bonus, works out at roughly a year's salary in total, which I am happy with. Also get good leaver status for share options.

My company has enhanced redundancy and usually pays 1 month salary per year worked, which is much more generous than the statutory 1 week pay per year worked

Ultimately my position at the company is no longer there

Why do they say it is no longer there? Would it no longer be there irrespective of whether you were on maternity leave I.e have there been a number of redundancies/a restructure? Would they have made you redundant last year but did not because you were on maternity leave?

Or do they just want rid of you because you had a baby?

In the nicest way OP you earn enough money to pay a solicitor to give you informed expert advice and I suggest you do so sooner rather than later.

But in short if you think you will get 15 months pay I think you are likely overreaching.

Honestly, push back the meeting and get an employment lawyer ASAP and do the meeting with them or get them to do it without you and cone back to you with the offers. They will entirely outweigh their costs in their involvement in what you end up settling upon and on the speed of settlement. Not to mention knowing exactly where you stand in terms of how lawfully you are being treated and the correct language and laws to quote. I have been through similar and didn't want to be heavy handed or appear difficult so started all the conversations myself, got treated terribly until I got a lawyer, then there was a considerable shift. Good luck and don't be rushed into agreeing anything!

Try talking to Pregnant then Screwed.

Get an employment lawyer. You need proper legal advice. They will try and screw you otherwise.

Lawyer.

And don't forget to cost to compensate for your stress and their reputation. If you settle I would imagine they will want to keep their name out of the public domain. Dontninderestimate the value of that to a renowned company.

OP, please be very mindful of the time limits to make an employment tribunal claim. It's your leverage to make sure you get your settlement.

Three months minus a day from the act of discrimination.

I would speak to an employment lawyer now.

If you can't do this in time, I would attend the meeting, listen to what they say and not say anything in return. Ensure the meeting is minuted and make your own notes.

If they ask you to make any decisions, dont. Say you'll think about it.

And then speak to an employment lawyer.

You need proper advice and a lawyer will need more info than you've given here.

Get some advice from an employment solicitor. Push back the meeting if you have to. If you're in a union, contact them first - they might refer you on to their solicitors. Also check if you have legal cover on any insurance policies or with any professional bodies you belong to. If you can't get free legal advice from any of the above, contact an employment lawyer - a lot of the unions use Thompson's.
No one on here can really advice you - we don't know your terms and conditions and we don't know the financial resources of your organisation or how damaging an employment tribunal would be to their reputation. These are all key factors in how much they will be willing to pay.

If they offer you a pay off they'll usually cover the fee to run it by a lawyer too

OP, do this. A lawyer will make sure you get the absolute maximum pay off. My friend got her fees paid for a lawyer by her company and the lawyer negotiated a higher amount of money.

15 months pay is not overreaching. If they take you to tribunal it's is an uncapped amount and they have to pay for your "financial losses"

What this essentially means is if you take five years to find an equivalently paid job, they'd need to pay you five years salary, plus an award of injury to feelings between 5-50k on top I believe.

There was a woman recently who got made redundant on mat leave, couldn't find an equivalent job seven years later, and I believe she got around £3million in compensation - as they projected that she'd never find another equivalent role. Maternity discrimination is uncapped.

The flipside of this though is that if you get a BETTER paid job straight afterwards, you'd incur no financial loss so you'd be entitled to very little form the tribunal. Taking you to tribunal is a HUGE financial risk to your employer.

To your original Q - I was in a similar scenario (sadly). I negotiated 115% of a year's salary (so 15% over).

However, I kept pushing that it was illegal/threatening tribunal and in the end they called off the redundancy as they could tell I was serious. However at that point I didn't want to stay, so took the payout, then found a better paying job.

It knocks your confidence, but you'll definitely recover from this OP. Good luck - and seek legal advice!

Jesus OP is not going to take 5 years to find a job and any tribunal would laugh their head off if she claimed this. She is a successful high earner.

What Case are you talking about where a woman is in the Employment Tribunal 7 years (!) later.

It’s great you got an amazing pay out but it’s unusual and likely based on company culture and the particular facts. Hence why OP should get legal advice, each case is unique.

Been in this situation 3 times

I got £38k once - 6m pay
I got £30k plus 3m pay off other two times

Tbh if job market isnr great id go back
Hard to get hired at senior levels, you were off a long time
You will be back same level in 18/24m if you work hard/ impact
Anywhere else u go os statting again from scratch and huge effort

Hi all, thanks for your responses. Unfortunately it's all happened really quickly, I got told about this a week ago and suddenly it's moving very fast since I pushed back having spoken to ACAS initially, they have straight away pushed me towards this conversation (probably sped up by the fact I asked where I could find a copy of our grievance policy), so I haven't yet found a lawyer and don't think I'll be able to get one quick enough (especially with the childcare options I have this week!) to get them up to speed and to fight my corner for me so I think this one I'll have to go solo for and if I feel like I need support or they're not offering me the package I want I'll look to get a lawyer involved ASAP.

To answer a couple of the questions:
My maternity cover basically has been given my job - but it's been spruced up and I'm told it's not my job (it is)
They've not actually told me that it's a redundancy, just that my job's not available - so it is a redundancy - but they've been very loose about the whole thing
The company is a large PLC who has a great share price at the moment, they wouldn't want bad publicity because of this. I do have shares in the company.
I need to check what our redundancy package is, I'm not aware currently so will make sure I do that ahead of the meeeting.
I have tried to get through to Pregnant Then Screwed at least 3 times and always end up on hold for an hour and then it hangs up on me... I've given up with them now unfortunately.

Check your home insurance and if you've paid for legal cover it often includes this sort of thing. My mum used hers to take her employer to tribunal for unfair dismissal and won.

REALLY really annoyingly, we don't have home insurance right now - we had to move out of our house just over 6 weeks ago as our buyers were getting really annoyed and threatening to pull out after a more delays (there'd been a few) on the property we're buying. We agreed to move out and stay with family until our new house was ready, so for the first time in years I don't have it. Sod's law!

So your position at the company IS still there OP. They can't replace you with your maternity cover. If they want to do that, they really have to pay out or face the consequences. Also do not be pushed into agreeing something your not happy with during the without prejudice meeting. If they apply unfair pressure on you that in itself could be discrimination and withdraw the "without prejudice" status of the meeting.

Also if you need time to prepare for the meeting, tell them you can't make the date they suggested and push it back by a week or so to get yourself some time to buy legal advice.

They’re saying it’s not available because the business has decided my role isn’t needed, but surprisingly my cover seems to be doing a pretty similar role / leading my team / taking my place in the board meetings… but it’s definitely ‘not my role’….apparently