Redundancy having been employed less than 2y

[Aparecium]

If an employee has been employed for less than 2y, do they have to be informed that they are at risk of redundancy, or can they just be given notice and dismissed?

This person is a member of a small team that is losing the equivalent of one's person's salary from its budget, and one person's workload from its responsibilities, but nothing has been said to the team.

Given notice and dismissed

What if that person is potentially more valuable to the employer (skills, training etc) than a different team member of longer employment? Would they have to go through redundancy consultation? Presumably the shorter tenure employee is the easiest to get rid of, if the other team members have been there for longer than 2y.

If there are a number of equivalent jobs and more eligible employees they can all be invited to apply for the remaining roles. Otherwise they can just give notice to newest.

Dismissal is about individuals and redundancy is about roles. So they could choose to dismiss someone with less than 2 years service for whatever reason (as long as it’s not based on protected characteristics). If the team are all doing the same role but they need one less, they could be pooled and eg 4 people apply for 3 roles and the unsuccessful person would be made redundant. That would be based on skills, experience etc not length of service. If the team have different roles, the employer could make a case for which of the roles was no longer needed, based on the business needs rather than who has been there longer. So if the newer person counts beans and a longer serving person counts chickens, they could consult on no longer needing to count chickens and delete that role, keeping the bean counter.

My understanding is that all the team members do similar roles. If the employer plans to have all of them apply for the remaining roles, what notice do they have to give of the process? AFAIK this is the only team affected, but the communication from senior management is minimal, and the person concerned does not know whether any other teams are also losing work.

If the employer is running a consultation, there is a process they need to follow, but it’s more about steps than timeframes. Have a look at the ACAS website which sets it out, but they should have an initial information meeting where they set out the plans, followed by individual consultation meetings. They might also offer voluntary redundancy. Even if cuts are happening in other teams they might not be made aware so I wouldn’t worry about that, they only have to hold a group consultation where everyone is informed if I think 20+ roles are affected.

I have been through redundancy on both sides more than once and it’s horrible, especially if communication isn’t great. If the person concerned is in a union now would be a good time to talk to their rep, otherwise do direct them to ACAS as it’s really helpful to understand everyone’s rights and responsibilities.

There is no requirement to give any notice of a redundancy meeting for anyone with less than 2 years service. On a very basic note, their skills knowledge and experience do not need to be considered, and a company can, if it wishes, proceed with a short service redundancy to reduce their headcount.

this can become tricky in some instances because, just because you can do something, it doesn’t mean that you should. So, if you have several people in the same role or carrying out similar work, and the person with less than 2 years service is more valuable to the company, and they feel they may want to keep them, they would need to pool all employees in the same group, consult and score and go from there.

timescale depends on how many people are affected and how many people they are reducing headcount by. You’ve said only 1 will be affected, so therefore, there is no minimum period of consultation - it would be reasonable notice.

it could look like this:
call all affected employees into a room. Make them aware of the situation and potential outcome.
same day, hold first consultation meeting.
3-4 days later, hold second consultation meeting
the following week: hold final redundancy meeting for the person affected.
If people need to reapply for their roles then they would need to hold interviews etc - this would prolong the process until such time as they’ve managed to hold them all, and then they could move to final redundancy meeting.
There is no requirement for the company to make other teams aware of the situation although building a good culture should really be taken into consideration and allowing people to be sensitive to their colleagues who are having a difficult time, and providing reassurance across the rest of the company is often a good thing to do.

My advice for friends in this situation would be that currently you can’t control the situation - assuming it’s you or a partner worrying about being made redundant so if you can, update your CV, LinkedIn etc and look at a plan B.. that way you’re prepared if the ‘worst’ happens. And for me redundancy has always led to better things so I think of it positively overall.

Makes no difference. The employer can still just give them notice and dismiss them. The employer may choose to put them in a pool with others who have been there longer and give them a chance of getting one of the remaining jobs, but they don't have to do so.

Employment rights kick in after 2 years.

The person who has been there less than 2 years will be free to get rid of and the employer won't need to go through a consultation which is stressful for all, takes time and effort and costs money. Said employee might be "better" than other people on the team, but the employer might want to avoid a consultation and just get rid so it's quick and cheap.

If said employee really is the best thing since sliced bread then and the employer really wants to keep them and doesn't mind the expense, they will need to go through a consultation where team members are pooled and scored against eachother.