some advice

lizm

Hi

any advice on this would be much appreciated :

My son is doing his electrical apprenticeship, he's in his last year. He started with a company 6 weeks ago and was doing well, the boss then sent him to another site for 2 weeks on loan, on the last day of his 2 weeks he got a phone call from the boss saying " oh i have no work for you monday, I've taken on a few more lads and at the moment i have nothing for you, i'll see monday for definite but at the moment there's no work and if i cant find anywhere for you i'll send you your p45".

Can he do this, can he take on other staff and then just let my son go due to there being "no work", also this company has secured a new 1 1/2 yr contract which gives them work until 2016.

My son has had no run ins with the boss, has not had any complaints about his work, anyone he's worked for he's always got on well with in any job he's done or any company hes worked for.Plus he obviously thought he worked well enough to send him out to do electrical work on his own on another site for 2 weeks!!!

does my son have any rights that he can take this further, if it's a case that this guy comes back to him and says "here's your p45 i have no work for you".??

Mrs OBumble

[QUOTE=lizm;93263311
Can he do this, can he take on other staff and then just let my son go due to there being "no work", also this company has secured a new 1 1/2 yr contract which gives them work until 2016.
[/QUOTE]

Yes. Your son is on probation, he can be let go for any reason, or none, and within the first 13 weeks no notice has to be given at all.

Sounds like a weird way to have taken on an apprentice, though. And your 2nd sentence makes me think there's more too it: either there's something your son isn't telling you - or there's some family / neighbourhood back story which your son is getting the fallout for.

somefeen

AFAIK

Apprentices have different rights to normal employees and can only be let go if the company closes or they are found guilty of gross misconduct (stealing, absenteeism, abusive behaviour etc)
He should talk to FÁS asap about the situation.

lizm

@Mrs O bumble, thanks for your advice, though i think you're looking for things that aren't there, it's a simple case of being let go for no good reason. Quote:
" And your 2nd sentence makes me think there's more too it: either there's something your son isn't telling you - or there's some family / neighbourhood back story which your son is getting the fallout for."

I think you're slightly insulting my son to insinuate that he's a liar and maybe has done something bad that i should know about,my son is not a child, he's a 23 yr old man, he's past the stage where he feels he has to lie to his parents!!! as for you thinking family/neighbourhood fallout........we don't live in a small village we live in the city, so being associated to his employer through family or neighbours is so far removed from the situation!!

I think you're thinking way too much and coming up with stories that aren't there!!

@Somefeen, thank you for your plain and simple advice, I will get him to talk to Fás and see what they say, thanks!!

LegacyUser

Definitely contact Fas about this as he is an apprentice

Mrs OBumble

lizm wrote: »

I think you're slightly insulting my son to insinuate that he's a liar and maybe has done something bad that i should know about,

I never said he's a liar. Just that he may not be telling the full story. He may not even know the full story - eg has the boss's daughter got interested in him, maybe he supports the wrong soccer/GAA team, whatever.

If apprentices have greater protection than usual employees, that's great and he should follow this up.

Otherwise, your son just has to accept this as a particularly nasty feature of Irish employment law. If he wants to complain about it, then his TD is the right place to start, because it's the law that needs changing.

MouseTail

Priority is finishing his apprenticeship, can he talk to the boss and iron out what the issue is, or get the SOLAS rep to do so? He is going to find it very difficult to get taken on elsewhere as a final year apprentice. I don't know if the Redundant Apprentices Programme is still operational, he needs to act asap to either mend bridges or find another host.

therecklessone

At the very least your son should contact his SOLAS Training Advisor to let him/her know of this, and ask for advice.

It does seem odd that he has been replaced, and it is likely that this is not considered a redundancy situation.