ADJ-00007874

Complainant

Respondent

Parties

An Account Manager

A HR Company

Act

Complaint Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under Section 39 of the Redundancy Payments Act, 1967

CA-00010550-001

31/03/2017

The complainant had been employed as an ‘Account HR Manager’ by the respondent from March 4^th, 2014 to March 31^st, 2017 on a gross salary of €480.00 weekly (€12.02 per hour).

A redundancy situation arose and following his refusal of alternative employment he is claiming a redundancy payment.

The complainant was served with a redundancy notice on March 1st 2017.

He was told that efforts would be made to find alternative employment for him. In due course he was offered alternative employment which he declined.

He submitted a list of thirteen reasons for his decision.

These included that it would involve him working with new systems and in a different environment, his current flexible starting hours arrangement would be adversely affected, and, he felt, that the manner in which he was being assigned to the new position would give rise to tension with his new co-workers.

He regarded the offer as a demotion.

He resigned from his employment on March 31st. and seeks a redundancy payment.

The respondent says that on March 15th the complainant (and others) attended a formal redeployment meeting at which he was told that the search for alternative employment was continuing.

Firm options crystallised only on March 28th and the following day the offer was made orally to the complainant and was then followed up by email in which details of the new position were included.

The complainant responded setting out his objections (as above) and the following day, March 31st served the respondent with form RP77 claiming a redundancy payment.

The respondent replied on April 4th stating its view that the offer made was one of ‘suitable alternative employment’ and that they took his resignation as a rejection of the offer of alternative employment.

The respondent rejects the complainant’s criticism pf the alternative offer.

It would have been at the same site, on the same salary and on the same hours. Also while there was some change to the flexibility in relation to the starting time this could have been the subject of further discussions.

A number of his co-workers did avail of the opportunity to redeploy and others, who would have been required to move from part-time to full-time roles declined and were given redundancy payments.

In that context the complainant resigned on the very same day that he served the RP77 and did not give the respondent the opportunity to address any issues which might have arisen. The respondent saw this as a determination on the part of the complainant to quit his employment and that he had no genuine interest in looking seriously at any alternative being offered.

The respondent rejects many of the thirteen points made by the complainant as not being true.

The respondent submitted that it acted well within the limits laid down by the Labour Court as to what constituted a reasonable offer of alternative employment and a number of sample cases were submitted in support of its position

Section 15 (1) of the Redundancy Payments Acts, 1967-2012 says that an employee shall not be entitled to a redundancy payment if

a)                  his employer has offered to renew that employee’s contract of employment or to re-engage him under a new contract of employment.

b)      the provisions of the new contract as renewed, or of the new contract, as to the capacity and place in which he would be employed would not differ from the corresponding provisions of the contract in force immediately before the termination of the contract

c)       the renewal of re-engagement would take effect on or before the termination of his contract, and

d)      he has unreasonably refused the offer

(Underlining added.)

There are two aspects to the current case.

The most important by far is whether the offer of alternative employment was a ‘suitable’ one, and therefore whether the complainant’s actions were ‘unreasonable’ as referred to in Section 15 (1) (d).

As noted above the alternative employment was to be on the same site as the complainant worked at the time the offer was made, so there was no additional travelling or other inconvenience.

It was on the same pay rate and, in general involved a similar type of work.

While undoubtedly some adjustment to the new workplace would have been required a refusal to accept this relatively minor disruption will not provide grounds that will meet the Act’s requirements for ‘reasonableness’, that is to say, to justify a reasonable refusal as referred to in Section 15 (1) (d) above.

There is no requirement on an employer to replicate in every detail the terms of the redundant post; merely that the new terms do not ‘differ from the corresponding provisions of the [previous] contract’.

In my view, the complainant’s reasons for rejecting the offer were insubstantial and without merit.

That is further reinforced by the second aspect of the matter referred to above; his somewhat peremptory decision to resign.

There is some validity in his criticism of the delay in the offer being made, but it is a minor aspect of the overall situation in which the respondent appeared to be doing its best to keep the complainant in employment.

The outcome to these efforts was an admittedly belated offer of job, but a perfectly acceptable one nonetheless and his decision to resign reinforces the suspicion that he had no serious interest in considering the proposal on its merits. The fact remains he had the offer of continuing employment which was perfectly open to him to accept; the delay notwithstanding.

I could see nothing in his list of objections of sufficient merit to justify his refusal to accept the alternative employment.

Accordingly, I conclude that the complainant has unreasonably refused the offer of alternative employment and that he is not entitled to a redundancy payment.

For the reasons set out above I do not uphold complaint CA-10550-001 and it is dismissed.

Redundancy, reasonable offer of alternative employment,