Was your redundancy real?
You were told your role is redundant, and you want to check that it is true.
Employers sometimes use the word redundancy because it sounds neutral. Whether it truly applies to your situation is a question of fact worth checking closely.
What it means
A role is redundant when the business genuinely no longer needs it. Causes include falling demand, automation, restructuring, or the closing of a department or branch.
It is not enough for your employer to say the word. The business change has to be real and provable if the reason is challenged.
Why it matters to you
A dismissal dressed up as redundancy can still be challenged as unfair if the real reason was something else. Examples are a personal conflict or performance concerns your employer did not want to raise.
Choosing who goes must also follow a fair, objective process. The usual principle is to release the most recently hired staff first, unless there is good reason to depart from it.1
How do you check if it was real
Compare your job description with what happened afterwards. If someone was hired into a similar role soon after, or your tasks were simply given to existing staff, question that.
Read about retrenchment to see how this reason plays out once your employer ends your job. Read about LIFO to see how selection is meant to work.
If you suspect the reason was not genuine, check your 60-day window on the deadline calculator before it closes.
If you were made redundant and are considering a claim, an independent employment lawyer can look at your facts. They can advise whether it is worth pursuing.
For people seeking legal representation. For general information, please use our guides and tools.
First contact: general facts only, such as date, location, employment status and a short summary. Keep documents private until an identified independent lawyer contacts you and specifically requests them.
Common questions
How do I know if my redundancy was real?
Ask whether the work you did really stopped, moved elsewhere or was absorbed into another role. Compare that with whether it carried on much as before under a different job title.
Is redundancy the same word as retrenchment?
They are closely related and often used together. Redundancy usually describes the business reason, while retrenchment describes ending employment because of it.
Sources
- Last In First Out is the conventional, objective principle for selecting employees for retrenchment, and an employer may depart from it only if it can justify doing so with sound reasons, for a genuine redundancy. Richard Wee Chambers, 5 Points on the Law of Retrenchment in Malaysia
Keep reading
If you were made redundant and are considering a claim, an independent employment lawyer can look at your facts. They can advise whether it is worth pursuing.
For people seeking legal representation. For general information, please use our guides and tools.
First contact: general facts only, such as date, location, employment status and a short summary. Keep documents private until an identified independent lawyer contacts you and specifically requests them.