Consultation Period

A question about : Consultation Period

Hi All,

I'd appreciate any guidance in relation to a change of terms at work and what procedures should be followed for an employee consultation.

In December of last year we received letters indicating that all staff in one part of the company were going to be subject to a consultation period in January regarding salary and overtime.

This did not happen until February, and before formal letters were issued we were all told the firm had a legal duty to highlight one section of this whereby notice was given that the firm reserved the right to give notice to people who did not accept the firm's final offer when determined, and offer to re-employ them under the new terms.

This to me looked like an end around redundancy payments and possibly a breach of good faith as the consultaton had not yet begun?

Researching, I understand that legally a consultation is required before a material benefit is changed in a contract of employment but our concern is that this is more for show than anything else - the firms is not sending out notices via email, nor making other parts of the business aware of it, it's taking several days for minutes of meetings to be issued and these are coming from employee reps rathe than the company itself... any guidance or stories of people's own experiences with this would be much appreciated!

Thanks,

Finn

Best answers:

• it will come under some other substantial reason(SOSR) dismissal plenty on the web and ACAS to get you started.