Redundancy Advice for Employees.

To qualify for statutory redundancy pay you must be an employee with at least two years' continuous service. The amount is calculated using a formula based on your age, length of service, and weekly pay — subject to a statutory cap of £751 per week from 6 April 2026. The multiplier per year of service is half a week's pay for each year worked under age 22, one week's pay for each year worked between 22 and 40, and one and a half week's pay for each year worked aged 41 or over. Service is capped at 20 years, giving a maximum statutory payment of £22,530. Your employer may pay more than the statutory minimum — check your contract. Statutory redundancy pay up to £30,000 is tax-free.

An employee on maternity leave has enhanced protection: if her role is redundant during maternity leave, she has the right to be offered any suitable alternative vacancy before other employees — she must be given first refusal. Dismissing a pregnant employee or someone on maternity leave for redundancy without following this process is likely to be both automatically unfair and pregnancy discrimination. Employees on sick leave do not have equivalent automatic protection, but dismissing someone whose absence is related to a disability without proper process and consideration of reasonable adjustments carries significant legal risk. In all cases, using redundancy as a pretext for removing someone in a protected period is extremely high-risk for employers and commonly gives rise to successful tribunal claims.

No — selecting an employee for redundancy because of or in connection with a protected characteristic is unlawful discrimination. Common examples include selecting someone because they are pregnant, because of their age, because of a disability, or because they have taken maternity or parental leave. Selection criteria that appear neutral but disproportionately affect a particular group — for example, part-time workers, who are disproportionately female — may constitute indirect sex discrimination unless objectively justified. Where discrimination is found alongside unfair dismissal, compensation includes injury to feelings and is uncapped — significantly increasing the potential liability for an employer who has discriminated.

Yes — if the redundancy is not genuine, or the process was unfair, you can bring an unfair dismissal claim in the employment tribunal. Common grounds include: the role was not truly redundant and continues to exist; the selection process was unfair or discriminatory; the employer failed to consult properly; or no consideration was given to suitable alternative roles. The burden is on the employer to show the redundancy was genuine and the process fair. Even where the redundancy is genuine, a procedurally flawed process can still result in an unfair dismissal finding — though compensation may be reduced if a fair process would have led to the same outcome. The time limit is three months less one day from the date of dismissal, extending to six months from October 2026.

Yes — several changes affect redundancy either directly or indirectly. The qualifying period for unfair dismissal reduces to six months for dismissals from 1 January 2027 — meaning employees dismissed for redundancy with between six months and two years' service will be able to claim unfair dismissal for the first time. Fire and rehire restrictions introduced by the Act make it significantly harder for employers to use dismissal and re-engagement as a mechanism to impose new terms, which affects some restructuring exercises. Enhanced family leave protections strengthen the redundancy priority rights of employees on or returning from maternity, adoption, and shared parental leave. Collective consultation obligations are also being strengthened. The tribunal time limit for redundancy-related claims extends to six months from October 2026.

You are entitled to your contractual notice period — or statutory minimum notice if that is greater — when made redundant. Statutory minimum notice is one week per year of service up to a maximum of 12 weeks. You may be asked to work your notice, placed on garden leave, or paid in lieu of notice — depending on your contract. All accrued but untaken holiday must also be paid on termination. Payment in lieu of notice is taxable income; statutory redundancy pay up to £30,000 is tax-free. If your employer is insolvent and cannot pay, you can claim statutory notice pay, redundancy pay, and unpaid holiday from the National Insurance Fund through the government's insolvency service.

If your employer offers you a suitable alternative role before your redundancy takes effect, you are expected to consider it reasonably. If you unreasonably refuse a suitable alternative, you may lose your entitlement to statutory redundancy pay. Whether a role is suitable depends on factors including the nature of the work, pay, location, status, and terms and conditions compared to your current role. You have a statutory four-week trial period in any alternative role — if it proves unsuitable during that period, you can still claim redundancy pay. What counts as unreasonable refusal depends on your personal circumstances: refusing a role that requires relocation when you have caring responsibilities may well be reasonable.

Collective consultation obligations are triggered where an employer proposes to make 20 or more employees redundant at one establishment within a period of 90 days. The employer must consult appropriate employee representatives — trade union representatives where a union is recognised, or elected employee representatives where it is not — for a minimum of 45 days before the first dismissal takes effect (30 days for between 20 and 99 redundancies). The employer must also notify the Secretary of State using form HR1 before consultation begins; failure to notify is a criminal offence. Failure to collectively consult can result in a protective award of up to 180 days' pay per affected employee — the maximum doubled from 90 to 180 days on 6 April 2026, making it a significant financial penalty.

Redundancy is a specific form of dismissal that occurs where the employer's need for employees to carry out work of a particular kind has ceased or diminished — or is expected to do so. It is not a catch-all reason for ending employment: a dismissal labelled redundancy that is actually driven by performance concerns, cost-cutting without genuine role elimination, or a desire to remove a particular individual is not a true redundancy and can be challenged as unfair dismissal. For a redundancy to be legally valid, the genuine business reason must exist, the selection process must be fair, and the employer must follow a proper consultation process. Meeting all three requirements is what distinguishes a lawful redundancy from an unlawful one.

Individual consultation is required in all redundancy situations — the employer must consult with each affected employee meaningfully before a final decision is made. There is no statutory minimum period for individual consultation, but it must be genuine: a meeting at which the decision has already been made does not constitute proper consultation. Where fewer than 20 redundancies are proposed, the consultation period is determined by what is reasonable in the circumstances. Where 20 or more redundancies are proposed within 90 days at one establishment, collective consultation rules apply and the minimum statutory period is 45 days — or 30 days for between 20 and 99 redundancies. Failure to consult properly is one of the most common grounds for unfair dismissal claims arising from redundancy.

Where an employer is making redundancies from a pool of employees doing similar work, it must identify a fair pool and apply objective selection criteria consistently. Common criteria include skills, performance, attendance, and disciplinary record — though length of service alone is increasingly viewed as potentially discriminatory by age. An employer must not apply criteria in a way that discriminates against employees with protected characteristics. If you believe you were unfairly selected — because the pool was too narrow, the criteria were subjective or applied inconsistently, or the process was used to target you — you may have grounds to challenge the redundancy as unfair dismissal. Keeping records of your scores and asking to see how colleagues were assessed can be important.

Start by engaging with the process — attend all consultation meetings, ask questions, and put your concerns in writing. Request details of how you were scored against the selection criteria and ask to see the scores of others in the pool. If you believe the process is flawed, raise a grievance during the process rather than waiting until after you have been dismissed. Use the appeal process if one is offered. Keep a record of all meetings, what was discussed, and any responses you receive. If you are dismissed and believe the redundancy was unfair, take legal advice promptly — the time limit for an unfair dismissal claim is three months less one day from dismissal, extending to six months from October 2026.