Can an employer dismiss you?

Nicliam

If you are on the standard 6 months probation, can an employer dismiss you merely by saying that they are not going to keep you on until the end of probation and want to let you go? My query is because I have a friend who started a new job some months ago (still within 6 months probation). Approx. 6 weeks ago the boss called her in for a chat and said that they didn't feel she was up to the capacity they expected - i.e. they felt she was working at 70%. The boss said that he expected her to "up" her game and would have another chat with her the following week. He never did have that chat. Just last week, he called her in for a chat towards the end of the working week. There have been no discussions between the first time (six weeks ago) and last week. He told her that they would not be keeping her and gave her two weeks notice. He expects her to work out her notice.

My query is: (a) are they entitled to do this without giving the employee the chance to rebuff the criticism and (b) whilst she would feel uncomfortable now staying with them, should she look for a reference (as she is worried now about how this will look to any future employer and it is the first time in her working career that something like this has happened).

Any advice welcome!

the_syco

In the 1st six months they don't need to give a reason to let someone go.

munstergirl

Your friend could be giving 110% and let go for any reason in 1st 6 months.

Employer has to give 1 weeks notice.

Its an awful position to be in for your friend.

TouchingVirus

Seek a reference, in writing. Then your friend can read it and decide whether to photocopy and send along with a CV to other job applications or bin it if it's not painting the applicant in a good light.

Eoin

Written references don't always really mean that much at the best of times; especially if the employer can say without any risk of legal action that they decided to let her go for performance reasons.

As the others have said, they're absolutely entitled to terminate in this manner.

Approx. 6 weeks ago the boss called her in for a chat and said that they didn't feel she was up to the capacity they expected - i.e. they felt she was working at 70%. The boss said that he expected her to "up" her game and would have another chat with her the following week. He never did have that chat.

I've said this to a few people in similar circumstances - it is so important that the employee makes an effort to take control in this situation. Don't let it go 6 weeks without the meeting, just because the manager didn't arrange it. Arrange regular update meetings and agree on what needs to be addressed and how that will be done. I do realise that she might have indeed made this effort, but in too many cases the employee won't take the initiative.

Corruptedmorals

This is the whole point of probation, so that they can weed out people who are for example, awful.. late all the time (not your friend) without having to go through the full procedure of warning..warning..warning..dismissal. Unfortunate that your friend can be dismissed so easily, but they do cover themselves with it and have to really.

sealgaire

sounds like thye were just after cheap labour for the 6 months

krd

Probation periods are nonsense. Ireland is a fire at will country. You can be dismissed at any time without reason. Unfair dismissal is difficult to prove.

Irish workplaces have become very abusive in the last few years. I have never seen anything like it.

I was fired from a job a while back simply because a ****ty little manager - who wasn't my manager - didn't like me.

I went from glowing performance reviews one month to getting sacked the next month.

It's complete bull****.

People have become really scummy. In the past, if someone didn't like you, usually you wouldn't get sacked because of it.

Forget HR. They're on the side of the scummy managers.

gerrycollins

krd wrote: »

Probation periods are nonsense. Ireland is a fire at will country. You can be dismissed at any time without reason. Unfair dismissal is difficult to prove.

Irish workplaces have become very abusive in the last few years. I have never seen anything like it.

I was fired from a job a while back simply because a ****ty little manager - who wasn't my manager - didn't like me.

I went from glowing performance reviews one month to getting sacked the next month.

It's complete bull****.

People have become really scummy. In the past, if someone didn't like you, usually you wouldn't get sacked because of it.

Forget HR. They're on the side of the scummy managers.

probation periods are there for a host of reasons. unfair dismissal in this country occurs after 1 yr employment and actually its becoming quiet easy to prove. the onus nowadays is on the employer to prove they were right and not the employee wrong. thats why there are various best practise steps to take before dismissing an employee.

the law of the land dictitates that the 1st year of employment is unprotected and I agree again for a host of reasons. however there have been a few(i'll admit a few) cases where unfair dismissal was proven within the first year based on the sacred 7.

for your incident what happened, how long were you employed etc? you can be the most upstanding member of staff but commit one incident of gross misconduct and your out. I wold not accecpt that form a member of my senior staff they should know better.

krd

gerrycollins wrote: »

probation periods are there for a host of reasons. unfair dismissal in this country occurs after 1 yr employment and actually its becoming quiet easy to prove. the onus nowadays is on the employer to prove they were right and not the employee wrong. thats why there are various best practise steps to take before dismissing an employee.

the law of the land dictitates that the 1st year of employment is unprotected and I agree again for a host of reasons. however there have been a few(i'll admit a few) cases where unfair dismissal was proven within the first year based on the sacred 7.

for your incident what happened, how long were you employed etc? you can be the most upstanding member of staff but commit one incident of gross misconduct and your out. I wold not accecpt that form a member of my senior staff they should know better.

As far as I've been advised the laws protecting employment - such protections after the first year went out in the 90s. The Irish labour market is very liberalised. That's the advice I got from a solicitor specialises in employment.

You can be fired or fire someone without due cause. BUT very crucially the reason you fire someone - if you put it in writing can get you into big trouble. Unfair dismissal on the basis sex, age, or racial discrimination can be easy to prove. Unfair dismissal on the basis of someone not liking you is a very difficult to do anything about - even impossible.


I'm not a young naieve - I've worked in a few very vicious places where I've seen the tactics from both sides. Someone may be picked on, on pure whim - word goes out to get rid of them and then a very systematic campaign of spurious performance reviews - disciplinarians, warnings etc and then the sack.

As long as no one writes down on a piece of paper "let's fit so and so up for the sack" you can get away with it. It's a crazy way to work and live - but it's how some people like it, and believe the world to be like that. They think you're crazy if you think it's mad.

My last job was one of the worst experiences I've ever had. I wasn't fired for gross misconduct or poor performance. I'm very contentious. I'm make sure to be at my desk at least half an hour early in the morning. I was fired because one crazy bitch hated me - she tried to have me on a disciplinary one time because I came in on Saturday morning just to be sure I hadn't been scheduled (They had a habit of re-scheduling people and being too flaky to get the new schedule to the people) - I had double checked with my manager on the Friday night and they weren't sure - So I went in. The disciplinary procedures in the company were abused non stop. I had allies in management but they were not enough to stop what eventually happened to me - getting sacked for absolutely no reason. Well the reason being - this woman didn't like me.

In my experience, there is a woeful lack of professionalism in Irish businesses. You can't run a business like a social club or school yard. The last place I worked in the management were completely unqualified - had zero understanding of the business. It was run and is run like a children's teaparty. Now I've heard they're heading for very serious trouble - but it's not the recession. They're haemorrhaging clients - and it's more than anything a simple case of the management not understanding the business.

It's a niche business where many of the people working in it know each other. The peculiar thing - the managers in the company, none of them have experience working in that industry - and their only previous work experience is things like being a manager in Pizza Hut. They're still in Pizza Land. It's a disaster.

Shelflife

"Ireland is a fire at will country. You can be dismissed at any time without reason. Unfair dismissal is difficult to prove."

Have to disagree with you there krd, a while ago we had to sack someone for alleged till irregularities, we had all our evidence on camera and we had to go through the whole 3 strikes procedure to get rid of her with exposing ourselves to an unfair dismissals claim.

this was a person who made mine and my wifes life hell for a 2 year period, allegelly stole from us and was like a cancer in the workplace and it took us ages to get rid of her. she just did enough to get by.

imo its a crazy situation where someone can make the owners of a business hate going to work and we can do very little about it, whereas an employee can just walk off the job with no penalty.

gerrycollins

krd wrote: »

As far as I've been advised the laws protecting employment - such protections after the first year went out in the 90s. The Irish labour market is very liberalised. That's the advice I got from a solicitor specialises in employment.

You can be fired or fire someone without due cause. BUT very crucially the reason you fire someone - if you put it in writing can get you into big trouble. Unfair dismissal on the basis sex, age, or racial discrimination can be easy to prove. Unfair dismissal on the basis of someone not liking you is a very difficult to do anything about - even impossible.


I'm not a young naieve - I've worked in a few very vicious places where I've seen the tactics from both sides. Someone may be picked on, on pure whim - word goes out to get rid of them and then a very systematic campaign of spurious performance reviews - disciplinarians, warnings etc and then the sack.

As long as no one writes down on a piece of paper "let's fit so and so up for the sack" you can get away with it. It's a crazy way to work and live - but it's how some people like it, and believe the world to be like that. They think you're crazy if you think it's mad.

My last job was one of the worst experiences I've ever had. I wasn't fired for gross misconduct or poor performance. I'm very contentious. I'm make sure to be at my desk at least half an hour early in the morning. I was fired because one crazy bitch hated me - she tried to have me on a disciplinary one time because I came in on Saturday morning just to be sure I hadn't been scheduled (They had a habit of re-scheduling people and being too flaky to get the new schedule to the people) - I had double checked with my manager on the Friday night and they weren't sure - So I went in. The disciplinary procedures in the company were abused non stop. I had allies in management but they were not enough to stop what eventually happened to me - getting sacked for absolutely no reason. Well the reason being - this woman didn't like me.

In my experience, there is a woeful lack of professionalism in Irish businesses. You can't run a business like a social club or school yard. The last place I worked in the management were completely unqualified - had zero understanding of the business. It was run and is run like a children's teaparty. Now I've heard they're heading for very serious trouble - but it's not the recession. They're haemorrhaging clients - and it's more than anything a simple case of the management not understanding the business.

It's a niche business where many of the people working in it know each other. The peculiar thing - the managers in the company, none of them have experience working in that industry - and their only previous work experience is things like being a manager in Pizza Hut. They're still in Pizza Land. It's a disaster.

i agree with your point on a certain professionalism within certain parts of irish business however been no legal eagle myself i cannot quote against him however I know from my position as an employer you have to be extremly careful when dealing with dismissal

i know for a fact that any company who fail to keep appropiate records will face the consequences. now the way the courts look at it is for the employer to prove that they were right in the action they took and they cannot simply say they have to prove it.

for your case why not contact the rights commissioner its cost v little and you dont need legal reperesentation initally

Mr. Presentable

krd wrote: »

. I'm very contentious.

The peculiar thing - the managers in the company, none of them have experience working in that industry - and their only previous work experience is things like being a manager in Pizza Hut. They're still in Pizza Land. It's a disaster.

Being contentious is not a good trait in most businesses.

Managing (successfully) an outlet like pizza hut is very highly considered in many industries because to manage such a franchise requires skills with staff, interaction with customers, budgeting, dealing with suppliers and services. It is not quite the monkey job you seem to think - which is why the manager of a certain pizza franchise in Dublin is on €100,000.00 per annum.

Mr. Presentable

Nicliam wrote: »

If you are on the standard 6 months probation, can an employer dismiss you merely by saying that they are not going to keep you on until the end of probation and want to let you go? My query is because I have a friend who started a new job some months ago (still within 6 months probation). Approx. 6 weeks ago the boss called her in for a chat and said that they didn't feel she was up to the capacity they expected - i.e. they felt she was working at 70%. The boss said that he expected her to "up" her game and would have another chat with her the following week. He never did have that chat. Just last week, he called her in for a chat towards the end of the working week. There have been no discussions between the first time (six weeks ago) and last week. He told her that they would not be keeping her and gave her two weeks notice. He expects her to work out her notice.

My query is: (a) are they entitled to do this without giving the employee the chance to rebuff the criticism and (b) whilst she would feel uncomfortable now staying with them, should she look for a reference (as she is worried now about how this will look to any future employer and it is the first time in her working career that something like this has happened).

Any advice welcome!

For the first six months all the cards lie with the employer - you can be let go without justification. Thereafter most of the cards lie with the employee. Perhaps your friend just wasn't suitable without being wrong in any way.

krd

Shelflife wrote: »

"Ireland is a fire at will country. You can be dismissed at any time without reason. Unfair dismissal is difficult to prove."

Have to disagree with you there krd, a while ago we had to sack someone for alleged till irregularities, we had all our evidence on camera and we had to go through the whole 3 strikes procedure to get rid of her with exposing ourselves to an unfair dismissals claim.

this was a person who made mine and my wifes life hell for a 2 year period, allegelly stole from us and was like a cancer in the workplace and it took us ages to get rid of her. she just did enough to get by.

imo its a crazy situation where someone can make the owners of a business hate going to work and we can do very little about it, whereas an employee can just walk off the job with no penalty.

As far as I am aware. The three strikes procedure isn't law. It's a voluntary code of conduct.

You have to be careful but you should look into the costs of a successful wrongful dismissal case. If an employee is that bad - it can be worth taking the risk. You have to weigh up the costs.

The vast majority of cases don't go to court. If you had to pay out, it might not be that much. BUT, you have to be very careful. The burden or proof for racial or gender discrimination is much much lower than what's needed for other cases of unfair dismissal. Gender and racial discrimination is rife in the Irish work place. Many people believe it's right - and in a Irish context, it's normal - as it's the norm. The payout on a race or gender discrimination case can be much higher than a plain unfair dismissal case.

I know one woman who successfully threatened her employer (my employer at the time) with a racial discrimination case over a promotion. They backed down and gave her the promotion. In reality there had been no racial discrimination. It had been croney discrimination. She had being doing the job for six months - and when the position officially came up - they tried to boost one of the clique into the position. Everyone knew it was a dirty trick but a la guerre. The croney was eventually let go because she was incredibly lazy, she would always find a way to avoid doing her job, finding little bits of admin work that should take minutes and stretching them into weeks. She was simply made redundant (she really made herself redundant). No unfair dismissal. She more likely than not probably now has a comfy little niche in some company where she does nothing all day.

I've worked for companies where there was literally a fetish for firing people. Often with no real grounds for dismissal. I never heard of anyone taking a case against any of them.

The money in employment law is actually working on the employer's side. An employment solicitors jobs is usually to coach an employer not to get caught out. A solicitor can (and will, though they're not meant to) teach you all the dirty tricks.

The last company I worked for, and this is common practice in Ireland, everyone is permanently on disciplinary warnings. It's a management tactic. And in most cases the disciplinaries are completely bogus. It's a horrible condition to work under. Everyone is permanently depressed because there's no way out of it other than walking out the door. Absenteeism in there is atrocious. Everyone has a permanent sick stomach. Any "smiles" or "enthusiasm" is fake.

Another company I worked for, my manager bullied me into signing a document saying I was ten minutes late for work, when I had been at my desk before my starting time. At first I refused to sign, as it was surreal I had been at my desk before my start time - other people trooping in late all around me, nothing being said to them. It was intimated that I had no choice in the matter - had I not signed I would have been dismissed without cause. Everyone else on the team was also on disciplinary warnings. Do you see the trick. And there are many more tricks like it.

gerrycollins

krd wrote: »

As far as I am aware. The three strikes procedure isn't law. It's a voluntary code of conduct.

correct its a best practise routine nearly every company uses

krd wrote: »

You have to be careful but you should look into the costs of a successful wrongful dismissal case. If an employee is that bad - it can be worth taking the risk. You have to weigh up the costs.

correct but this only applies to paying their notice period and holiday pay etc. however you have to have some evidence to back up you claim even though you might not have got them red handed.

krd wrote: »

I know one woman who successfully threatened her employer (my employer at the time) with a racial discrimination case over a promotion. They backed down and gave her the promotion. In reality there had been no racial discrimination. It had been croney discrimination. She had being doing the job for six months - and when the position officially came up - they tried to boost one of the clique into the position. Everyone knew it was a dirty trick but a la guerre. The croney was eventually let go because she was incredibly lazy, she would always find a way to avoid doing her job, finding little bits of admin work that should take minutes and stretching them into weeks. She was simply made redundant (she really made herself redundant). No unfair dismissal. She more likely than not probably now has a comfy little niche in some company where she does nothing all day.

now that is bad management because a simple use of a scoring system would eradicate this and pove another would be more suitable to the role and they need to grow a pair honestly.

krd wrote: »

The last company I worked for, and this is common practice in Ireland, everyone is permanently on disciplinary warnings. It's a management tactic. And in most cases the disciplinaries are completely bogus. It's a horrible condition to work under. Everyone is permanently depressed because there's no way out of it other than walking out the door. Absenteeism in there is atrocious. Everyone has a permanent sick stomach. Any "smiles" or "enthusiasm" is fake.

while this is somewhat true from a management perpespective you hav eto keep your staff on their toes and if they are not up to the job then find someone else who is. however it does sound a little bit odd at this company because in my positions absenteeism at most was 1%

ps first time doing this kind of response it might go horribly wrong

krd

Mr. Presentable wrote: »

Being contentious is not a good trait in most businesses.

Managing (successfully) an outlet like pizza hut is very highly considered in many industries because to manage such a franchise requires skills with staff, interaction with customers, budgeting, dealing with suppliers and services. It is not quite the monkey job you seem to think - which is why the manager of a certain pizza franchise in Dublin is on €100,000.00 per annum.

I meant conscientious. That's spell checkers for ya.

Yes and no. Successful running a business in food or hospitality is far from monkey business. The margins can be very tight and it can take little to badly screw it up.

It depends on the franchise. Some franchises are very systematised. All the budgeting, dealing with suppliers and services is all done elsewhere. There are companies in Ireland who do remote control management of franchise food out lets (some are ok - some are bad). Even if you are the owner of a MacDonalds franchise - you will have zero input in the choice of suppliers. You'll have a say on staffing and that's it.

There's no dough rolling done in the back kitchen of Pizza Hut. No moustachioed Italian chefs twirling pizza base in the air, while singing their favourite arias - no hot tempered prima donnas - they're not there. The pizza bases turn up partially cooked. The toppings are assembled according to a diagram on the wall. Then the monkey puts the pizza in the oven and presses the button - then it just needs to be walked to the table. The manager monkey just has to make sure the other monkeys turn up and follow the system. It doesn't take any skill or intelligence to mops a floor or press a button - and it doesn't require much skill or intelligence to make sure someone else mops a floor and presses a button.

Of course there's dealing with staff and customers. But everyone's had awful experiences in places like Pizza Hut. Dumb staff. Rudeness. Filth. Tardiness. I know of one Pizza Hut, where friends worked, where the manager used to come out and fight with customers when they complained about the food. The woman was an idiot. A fierce bully, who thought her powers extended to a right to upset customers. Thick as bad tempered brick - but still in charge. The Pizza Hut still did great business. Great location - great franchise system. It would take more than a idiot to screw it up.

Working in food is low paid, high stress, awful hours. Anybody who can, avoids the business. It's not a great money maker. At the minute many operations are facing bankruptcy. It's not simply the recession. They're poorly managed. In boom times any idiot can look like a genius.

Systematisation in business means you can do away with the need for intelligence and initiative. This extends across many businesses. There are many "managers" out there, who manage nothing. They tick boxes. They follow the system. Give them a chip van to run - they wouldn't know where to begin.

There's a huge difference between the job of a manager running an independent supermarket like Supervalue to a manager running a Tescos. With a Supervalue, the store management often have to deal directly with suppliers, manage staff, all kinds of things. With a Tesco, nearly all decisions are made remotely. Staff just have to turn up and stack the shelves and follow the system.

The turnover of a well located MacDonalds may be in the millions. The beauty of the MacDonalds' system, is that all is required of most of the staff is minimum intelligence, minimum language skills, minimum initiative. They get minimum wage. Since the main business is carefully devised elsewhere, all you need is one person with cop on. I know of a MacDonalds franchise owner, who has two outlets. He has both places rigged with cameras, he watches from his home office. He has very little to do. It works like Bentham's Panopticon. Every so often someone gets flaky and needs to be picked off - that's it.

In Ireland there's a very aristocratic attitude towards managers. That if somehow someone is promoted to a management position. No matter how dumb and flaky they are - they're value and worth is dictated by some magical aristocratic quality. When you look at how often people are promoted to management for all the wrong reasons. Promoted as their dumb enough not to be a threat to whoever promoted them. It's become a part of the culture of management in Ireland. Manager's are expected to have this dumb demeanour. The in demand "soft skill" is dumbness with a little animal cunning. Initiative and intelligence scream trouble maker.

All too often stupidity is no obstacle to success.


Hire a Tesco's manager to manage say a bunch of software engineers. If the manager is thick, they'll try to run the project as if they're having shelves stacked and floors mopped. I've seen it. I've seen the tears roll down the faces of the engineers and the company collapse.

krd

gerrycollins wrote: »

correct its a best practise routine nearly every company uses

correct but this only applies to paying their notice period and holiday pay etc. however you have to have some evidence to back up you claim even though you might not have got them red handed.

The advice that I believe has been adopted over the last few years has been to put as little as possible in writing. Even if you have caught someone red handed, it can backfire badly if you put your evidence in writing. The common practice if you catch someone stealing is to verbally put pressure on them to resign.

A company I was with. A few staff members stole customers' credit card numbers and went on internet shopping sprees. They even had their goods delivered to the workplace for convenience. Needless to say, they were caught. The Guards weren't called. The customers were refunded by the company. The staff voluntarily left.

For many reasons - it would have been too messy to punish or have the staff prosecuted.

now that is bad management because a simple use of a scoring system would eradicate this and pove another would be more suitable to the role and they need to grow a pair honestly.

Scoring systems can be abused. If you have bad management they'll manipulate the process. I've seen it done to the max.

while this is somewhat true from a management perpespective you hav eto keep your staff on their toes and if they are not up to the job then find someone else who is. however it does sound a little bit odd at this company because in my positions absenteeism at most was 1%

ps first time doing this kind of response it might go horribly wrong

I think 'keeping people on their toes' is not a great term. It's one thing to make sure people are performing. Having people in a constant state of fear and misery all the time is not good. 1% absenteeism is very very low. That's lower than the national average. High absenteeism - and I've seen really high absenteeism - is often down to bullying. People are really getting sick. There are all kinds of bullying tactics that can be used in the workplace. Constant psychological games make people literally sick to their stomach - then they really get sick. I mean, I do know people who were completely feckless and just wouldn't turn up. But if you see a high absenteeism rate, it usually means people are waking up in the morning and thoughts of going in and facing the games has them vomiting. Simply, sack the manager. They're useless if their motivational "skills" are motivating staff not show for work.

krd

Mr. Presentable wrote: »

For the first six months all the cards lie with the employer - you can be let go without justification. Thereafter most of the cards lie with the employee. Perhaps your friend just wasn't suitable without being wrong in any way.

If someone comes to work on time - does their job - meets all their targets - is presentable and doesn't cause problems. Sacking them because they don't give you a warm feeling in your belly is kind of on the obscene side of wrong.

It's simply unfair. It's scummy. That's what unfair dismissal is. Sacking someone just because you don't like them.

Sacking someone can completely derail someone's life and career. Every prospective employer they go to will look on the sacking as meaning the person is a serious troublemaker. It can completely destroy their life. In a country like Ireland it can make someone virtually untouchable.

Is it fair to destroy someone's life - just because you don't like them?

It's also absolutely unprofessional. Work places are not social clubs or school yards.

Newaglish

Mr. Presentable wrote: »

For the first six months all the cards lie with the employer - you can be let go without justification. Thereafter most of the cards lie with the employee. Perhaps your friend just wasn't suitable without being wrong in any way.

I'll probably put together a proper response to this shortly but I just thought I'd point out for now that the above is factually inaccurate.

A person cannot be unfairly dismissed until they have been employed for at least 12 months*, not 6 months as the above post seems to suggest. After 11 months, you can pick someone at random and fire them for whatever reason you like, or no reason at all*.

Thereafter, the employee can bring the employer to the EAT/LRC and the onus is on the employer to prove that there are fair grounds for the dismissal (on the grounds of capability, competence, qualifications, and/or conduct). It's actually quite difficult to "fairly" dismiss someone and generally the EAT/LRC will expect you to follow the verbal notice/disciplinary meeting/written notice steps if you do dismiss and employee. I have seen a lot of cases where the EAT/LRC come down in favour of the employee despite there being pretty reasonable grounds for dismissal.

*Dismissal on the basis of any of the discriminatory grounds is automatically unfair, regardless of service.

Mrs OBumble

krd wrote: »

The beauty of the MacDonalds' system, is that all is required of most of the staff is minimum intelligence, minimum language skills, minimum initiative. They get minimum wage.

You were making sense until you got to that bit.

If you'd ever worked in fast-food for more than 2 minutes, you'd know why.

Eoin

Newaglish wrote: »

I'll probably put together a proper response to this shortly but I just thought I'd point out for now that the above is factually inaccurate.

A person cannot be unfairly dismissed until they have been employed for at least 12 months*, not 6 months as the above post seems to suggest. After 11 months, you can pick someone at random and fire them for whatever reason you like, or no reason at all*.
.

Yes, by law, the maximum term of probation is 12 months (some professions aside). 6 months is the standard probationary period for many industries, which is probably where s/he was coming from.

JustMart wrote:

If you'd ever worked in fast-food for more than 2 minutes, you'd know why.

I'm curious - I've never worked in the fast food industry - can you elaborate?

krd

JustMary wrote: »

You were making sense until you got to that bit.

If you'd ever worked in fast-food for more than 2 minutes, you'd know why.

Mary, if you noticed, crucially, I said most.

I know people who've spent years working in fast food. McDonalds or Burger King are set up so they can employ people who are idiots with no English, who can press buttons on the till that have pictures of the food - it's point and grunt - Could you please point and grunt your order again.

The system was originally developed so McD's outlets could employ Mexican workers to work in North American outlets, who didn't have a word of English - or could even read or write their own language. Not that Mexicans are stupid. Just many Mexicans were too poor to even have a basic primary education, let alone have had English lessons.

Newaglish

eoin wrote: »

Yes, by law, the maximum term of probation is 12 months (some professions aside). 6 months is the standard probationary period for many industries, which is probably where s/he was coming from.

What I meant was that the "probationary" period doesn't really mean anything. You can give someone a 100% permanent contract and they still can't be unfairly dimissed before employee has 12 months' service.

krd

Newaglish wrote: »

What I meant was that the "probationary" period doesn't really mean anything. You can give someone a 100% permanent contract and they still can't be unfairly dimissed before employee has 12 months' service.

In other words contracts of employment are completely bogus and dishonest. And you have no right to the grievances processes outlined in them.

It's like being in the Soviet Union.