redundancy question

bazery

Gf has Been working in a company for 7 years, was reduced to part time last April 28. She is being made redundant(business closing) and the boss is trying to pay her redundancy based on part time hours. Surely it should be based on her full time hours. Her boss said company will be closing in 2 to 3 weeks about 2 weeks ago. She has extended the date to after the 28th of April so her time working part time will be a full year and a few days to only pay part time redundancy. Is this legal? What can she do, if anything?

Stheno

Yes they can.

See Citizens Information

Pay refers to your current normal weekly pay including average regular overtime and benefits-in-kind, but before tax and PRSI deductions, that is your gross pay.

However it depends on how long you are on reduced/part time hours.

Reduced hours and short-time work

If you were made redundant within a year of being put on reduced hours or pay, your redundancy payment would be based on your earnings for a full week. If you are made redundant after working reduced hours for more than a year, how your payment will be calculated depends on whether you accepted being on reduced hours or not. If you fully accepted the reduced working hours as your normal week and never asked to return to full-time work, then your redundancy payment will be based on your gross pay for the reduced working hours. If, on the other hand, you never accepted the reduced working hours as your normal hours and continually asked to be put back on full-time working, your payment would be based on your normal weekly earnings.

If you have been put on short time and then are made redundant your redundancy payment may be based on your pay for a full week.

If you have a dispute about this with your employer you could make a claim to the Employment Appeals Tribunal.

So essentially your gfs boss is manipulating the system so that she is on reduced hours more than 12 months, and therefore redundancy is based on part time hours.

Sucks but it is something they can do as above

Unless your gf can demonstrate that she repeatedly asked not to be part time and has proof of that

bazery

The only proof she has is an email saying the part time hours will "hopefully be a temporary measure" when she was made part time. I wonder is that enough.

imported corkonian

I think she could get some more out of it, but she'd need some professional help.
Lawyers are expensive, but perhaps something like lawyer.ie helps

I think she will have to prove that she took a decrease in working hours with the idea that it was temporary and did not alter her contract, a lawyer would be best to advice her on what and how to prove anything required.

They have a "contact me" option on their website. I'm not sure when/if/how they charge, but i think just contacting them with a query would get you an answer.

=edit= sorry about the links, but i'm not allowed to post urls as a new user.

After rereading the post, i noticed that it appears the owner changed the end date of employment.
This doesnt sound like the redundancy act is being followed.
You can check details here citizensinformation.ie/en/employment/unemployment_and_redundancy/redundancy/

Or read the whole act yourself here irishstatutebook.ie/1967/en/act/pub/0021/index.html

If it gets too confusing, contacting a lawyer should still be a priority step.

If the redundancy in the company matches the standards for a collective redundancy, then without a doubt, the owner of the company (by your explanation) is in huge fault (and trouble)

A collective redundancy is >

Collective redundancies arise where, during any period of 30 consecutive days, the employees being made redundant are:

5 employees where 21-49 are employed
10 employees where 50-99 are employed
10% of the employees where 100-299 are employed
30 employees where 300 or more are employed


If it meets any of these standards, then check whether there has been a consultation period and whether it has ended or not.

If you have some more information, please add it, but bear in mind that contact a lawyer before 28th of April is a very good idea.

Basically, if the employer manages to complete a year with your girlfriend on reduced hours, without your girlfriend being able to prove that she did not agree (and that she has repeatedly protested against this) she will be paid based on her reduced hours. And the chances that this is legal could be high.