Notice period-them 1 month, employee 3?

[wantmorenow]

Posting for help for my DP. He is currently on probation and in his contract it states that they can terminate with 1 month's notice but he has to give 3 months notice. He wants out. Is this lawful please? Seems heavily weighted against him?

Thanks in advance.

Yes it is, but normally within a probation period the notice is a lot less.

Seems his notice period is the same whether he is on probation or not but theirs changes from 1 month to 3 after probation - which is currently 10 months!

Major headache fir us.

He might be able to negotiate a shorter notice period, nothing to lose by asking.

So the notice period he has to give is 3 months from day one of employment? That's unusual. And his employer has to give him one month from day one and then three months from the end of probation?

Nothing unlawful about it, although it's not usual good practice, and it's certainly very odd to require someone who's potentially been there three days to give three months' notice.

As Stink says, he might be able to get them to release him early, no harm in asking.

Thanks flowery, that's correct. It's a college and they issue it as standard. He's not even on any management scale. Wish we'd spotted it earlier.

It's a standard notice period for many companies, not just further and higher education OP - has he tried to negotiate?

I think it would be entirely reasonable to give a month's notice and tell your future employer the situation so they know if it is mentioned in a reference. References can't be misleading, and while it would be factually correct to say he had a 3 month notice period and walked after one, it would arguably be misleading by omission not to admit to the one-sided notice period.

3 months is standard, but it is usually, and should be, mutual.

If he has another job to go to, and all that's stopping him is the elongated notice period, I'd definitely get into a negotiation. Ideally this is something to put in writing as a proposal when handing in his notice in the form of "I would like to request a leave date of xxx so that I can take up my new role on yyy date. I commit to giving a new encumbent a clean handover before my final day".

Your DH could reason with them (if they want to get into a discussion) what's best - a good quality committed 1 month handover or you holding me here for a further 2 months against my will? No reasonable employer would want a demotivated leaver sitting there feeling disgruntled, let's face it.

No other job to go to - he can do supply or something easily. He's leaving due to a breakdown in relationship with management so would like out sooner than later for peace of mind. Guess he can negotiate. He has very specific skills and they need his good will to finish a project he is on for an external body which noone else can do and is not part of of his timetable. It's all good will from him. Thanks everyone.