Redundancy
As part of your redundancy package, you should be asked to sign a compromise agreement surrendering your right to sue your old employer. For such an agreement to be effective you need to have had independent legal advice and some severance packages may offer to pay for this - so take the opportunity to speak to an employment solicitor.
An employment lawyer can tell you if you have grounds for a legal action, such as in the following examples:
- It is not a genuine redundancy situation, or your employer has not followed the correct procedure and/or been fair and reasonable;
- Breach of contract
- Employment discrimination - if you were discriminated against on the basis of race, sex, religion, sexual orientation or pregnancy
- Oral promises: a promise made to induce you to do (or not to do) something. For example, you may have looked at moving earlier, got a job offer but turned it down after your employer asked you to stay and promised you that your job was guaranteed and, indeed, you would be promoted on your next review. This type of case is difficult to prove but it is less important to consider taking it to court and more important to view it as leverage to get the deal you want
Obviously a cautious approach needs to be taken when deciding whether to raise the possibility of suing your old employer - you may just annoy the people who would otherwise be on your side. However a good employment lawyer may well decide to give the advice from behind the lines without your employer being aware of them until such time as it becomes clear that negotiations are exhausted.