New contract for employees after Tupe

ScouseMouse

Am I right in thinking, after a takeover of a business, where the staff are kept on under TUPE, can new contracts with different terms and conditions be declined.

The place got taken over in January, but now staff have been given new, adjusted contracts to sign. Changes include 12 month business opening instead of closing for the summer, and loss of holiday pay.

Thanks all.

Xterminator

Hi Op

good news - no they cant and even if you sign it its not enforceable.

furthermore if they insist you can leave your job, & it will be treated as a dismissal by the employer 7 you get redundancy etc.. huge amount of information on this & its hard to belive you employer doesn't know what they are doing is so wrong its almost inevitable they will end up being held accountable.



https://www.williamfry.com/newsandinsights/news-article/2012/09/14/employee_rights_on_business_transfers

Terms and Conditions of Employment must be preserved

The Regulations provide that the new owner of the business must honour an employee’s existing terms and conditions of employment. They specify that where an agreement provides for a less favourable term or condition, it will automatically be deemed to be modified so as not to be less favourable. This is so even where an employee consents to the less favourable term. A provision which is more favourable to an employee, however, is permissible.

It is not possible for parties to a transaction to contract out of the Regulations. Any provision in an agreement which purports to exclude or limit the application of the Regulations is deemed to be void.

If an employee terminates his employment because a transfer has involved a substantial change in working conditions to the detriment of that employee, the employer concerned is regarded as having been responsible for the termination – it is treated as a dismissal.

Dismissals

A dismissal of an employee, the reason for which is the transfer of an undertaking, is deemed to be automatically unfair, unless it can be justified by economic, technical or organisational reasons which entail changes in the workforce. It is often difficult to establish these grounds until after the sale of the business has been completed.

Following the transfer of a business, the new employer shall continue to observe the same terms and conditions agreed in any collective agreement on the same terms applicable to the previous employer, as set out in Regulation 4(2) of the European Communities (Transfer of Undertakings) Regulations 2003.

ScouseMouse

Apologies. Original post should say loss off SICK pay