A redundancy arises when a person (or group of people’s) role(s) cease(s) to exist due to a closure of the company, the downsizing or restructuring of a company, or if there is not enough work available for the employee. The employee is not replaced in this situation.

In a redundancy situation, it is recommended that you give your employee as much notice as possible. An employer should give at least two weeks’ notice to an employee who has worked more than 2-5years, four weeks to an employee who has worked between 5-10years, 6 weeks for those who were employed for 10-15years and 8 weeks for those employed for 15 years or more.

What type of redundancy situations might arise?

• A ‘collective redundancy’ means that those eligible for redundancy are a group of employees.
• A ‘voluntary redundancy’ means that a company wishes to offer certain reductions and has requested that employees eligible for redundancy apply for it based on their interest in being made redundant.
• A ‘mandatory redundancy means that redundancy is not optional.