Morning Folks

Does anyone know about a "TUPE 2 year law" ?

Just been informed an employee has to have 2 years continual service on a "contract", (this must be proven) - otherwise TUPE doesnt apply.

News to me, can anyone shed any light.

Is anyone else finding with Companies cutting back, a lot are outsourcing purley from a monatary view, there seems to be a blatent disregard to TUPE.   

Thanks, Melanie

Dear Melanie,

Dealing firstly with your last question, in my experience as an employment lawyer companies aren't disregarding TUPE.  They may decide to outsource a function as a way of saving money, but in the vast majority of cases employee rights are honoured and employees transfer to the new employer.  On the rare occasions where employees do not transfer, there is often a good reason for this, and the two employers concerned will usually reach agreement among themselves as to the actions that will be taken to ensure that employees receive redundancy money and other compensation at a realistic level reflecting what an employment tribunal might have ordered the transferee employer to pay.

I accept there will be exceptions to this, but in my experience TUPE tends not to be avoided.

In relation to your main question, if you are talking about whether an employee needs to have 2 years service to have TUPE rights, then what you have been told is incorrect.  Once an employee has 12 months' service, they have the right to pursue a claim of unfair dismissal if their employment does not transfer along with the change of ownership of the business in which they are employed.  If they do not have 12 months' service they do not have the right to make this claim, although that does not mean that they will be dismissed as a matter of course.  On many occasions, all employees within a business will transfer even if they have only a few weeks/months service.

I hope this answers your query.

Kind regards

Paul