What is the correct Redundancy procedure?

In a small company of less than 20 persons, how does one go about making redundancies? We have a need for at least 1 redundancy to be made but are unsure as to timescales and procedure. Our intention is as follows:

1. Hold a consultation meeting with akll employees advising of the need to make redundancies and the selection process we intend to apply. We intend to do this two weeks before commencing the selection process.
2. Apply the selection criteria to all employees - namely qualifications, skills and attributes, experience, disciplinary record, attendance, punctuality - and score employees on this basis.
3. The person with the lowest score will be the one selected and we will hold a meeting with him to discuss the provisional selection and discuss ways in which to avoid the redundancy.
4. We will hold a second meeting with the employee and if necessary inform him that there is no alternative employment available and confirm his selection. He will be given the right to appeal but we do not intend to give him details of any other employees scores other than his own.

Is this going to be considered fair?

Any help would be much appreciated?

Hi Badderman

This seems pretty good to me. A couple of things to remember - if you are planning to make the redundancy before 6 April, you will still need to follow the statutory dismissal procedure, so make sure you invite the selected employee to the meeting in writing and give him or her the right to be accompanied. Make sure the letter explains that the outcome of the meeting may be dismissal. Also, ensure that the selection criteria you have chosen can be objectively measured as much as possible and are not discriminatory in any way (for instance, you would need to clearly discount any absence on pregnancy-related grounds when scoring attendance).

There is a free guide and Q&A document on my website which may give you some further help:

http://www.etherington.co.uk/redundancymain.shtml

Regards

Pete