Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Fiona  Berry

Acolad Content Solutions Ireland Ltd

Act

Complaint Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under Section 8 of the Unfair Dismissals Act, 1977

CA-00075730-001

25/09/2025

The complainant gave evidence on affirmation.

She commenced employment at Acolad in or around September 2018 as a Senior Project Manager and was promoted to Team Lead in April 2024.

At all stages of her employment at Acolad she received positive feedback from managers. At no stage prior to the meeting with her line manager, Magdalena Strojny, on March 26th, 2025, had any concerns regarding her personal performance or her team’s financial performance been communicated to her.

The specific reasons that she believe that a genuine redundancy did not exist are as follows.

She  believes she is the victim of retaliation for raising health and safety concerns with management. Additionally, she says that Acolad has failed to conduct itself reasonably throughout this process as it has not adhered to fair procedures including a fair selection process and the taking of reasonable steps to identify alternative employment.

The speed with which Acolad responded to the correspondence from her solicitor dated  April 14th, 2025, is indicative of the casual approach the respondent took to this redundancy process.

Acolad has failed to provide details of the specific selection criteria used in making her redundant despite being asked for them. By specific selection criteria she refers to the criteria used to distinguish her from other team leads reporting into Magdalena Strojny who were not made redundant.

Acolad declined to investigate the possibility of supporting her redeployment to their UK office.

Additionally she relies on the recent decision of the WRC in the case of Henderson v The Bohemian Football Club (ADJ-00056820). In that case reference was made to the requirement an employer bears to (1) establish that a genuine redundancy situation existed and if so, that the dismissal resulted wholly or mainly from redundancy and (2) conduct itself reasonably throughout including adherence to fair procedures.

This includes a fair selection process and the taking of reasonable steps to identify alternative employment.

The timetable of events was as follows. Copies of all documentation were submitted in evidence.

(All  March 2025).

24th. Invitation to an online meeting scheduled for 11.30 am on March 26th, 2025, with Magdalena Strojny (Line manager) and Evi Xira (HR)

26th.  First consultation regarding proposed redundancy.

27th.  Email from complainant to Evi Xira requesting details of the specific selection criteria.

28th. Email from Evi Xira replying to her email dated March 27th, 2025.

31st  March.  The complainant sought legal advice.

Then on April 2nd,  2025 there was a follow up consultation meeting with Magdalena Strojny (Line manager) and Evi Xira (HR). At this meeting her redundancy was confirmed, and she was advised that that day; April 2nd 2025 would be her final day at work.

At this meeting she was invited to make comments regarding the redundancy package she was being offered which she did by email later that day.

Subsequently on April 14th, 2025, her solicitor corresponded with Acolad on her behalf setting out the grounds under which she believed her redundancy was a sham and as such why she was unfairly dismissed under the Unfair Dismissals Acts 1977 - 2016.

The respondent replied that same day.

The respondent did not attend the hearing.

The respondent did not attend the hearing. I am satisfied that notice of the hearing was sent to the correct company address and no explanation was provided for its failure to attend.

Accordingly the hearing proceeded.

The complainant has set out the timeframe of events starting with her receipt of an invitation on Monday, March 24th to an ‘at risk of redundancy’ meeting to take place two days later on the Wednesday of that same week. She was then formally told at that meeting that her employment was at risk due to redundancy.

She was reassured in writing that the respondent was ‘committed to following a fair and transparent consultation process’.

She was told she could bring a representative ‘such as a colleague’, although she was not given any other example of the type of representative the Code of Practice entitled her to bring, specifically a trade union official.

In the context of what followed this was a telling omission on the part of the respondent. It is not being transparent to omit a key element of the Code of Practice in relation to representation because it does not suit. A person employed in a non-union environment, not aware of the provisions of the Code would hardly work out for themselves that the category ‘such as a colleague’ extended to the professional services of a trade union official, even where unions are not engaged in collective bargaining.

Nor is it very realistic to expect that a person will be able to arrange the appropriate level of representation for a consultation meeting in relation to a matter of such gravity when given only two days’ notice of such an important meeting. It raises serious questions about the respondent’s self-proclaimed commitment to a ‘fair and transparent process’

It appears from correspondence from the complainant‘s solicitor (on April 14th) that this on line meeting lasted about thirty minutes and was immediately followed about forty five minutes later with transmission of the terms of the proposed redundancy package.

In that same letter the solicitor opined.

It is patently obvious that a decision had already been made to terminate our client’s employment and any suggestion that the Company was embarking on a consultation process is disingenuous and simply not credible based on the facts.

The following day (March 27th) the complainant requested details of selection criteria etc., and got a reply the day after that, Friday 28th. Specifically she said.

I'd like a further explanation of the full process the company went through when deciding which team leader was selected for redundancy including the criteria used and alternatives considered, and I believe this is a reasonable request given my concern stated above. If I have misunderstood the reason please explain.

The company responded.

Redundancy Selection Criteria and Process: As explained in the consultation meeting, thedecisiontoplaceyourroleatriskofredundancyispartofabroaderrestructuring initiativeresultingfromabusiness-widecostreviewandtheneedtostreamline management structures. The decision was based on the operational need to consolidate two Team Lead roles within Magda’s team into one, as part of a cost-saving measure.

 The consideration was based on several factors such as the current size of the business, the team size and geographical scope and the broader team structure and anticipated resource needs moving forward.

We fully understand your concern about not having influence over the clients assigned to yourteam,andIwanttostressthatthedecisionwasnotmadeasareflectionofyour individual performance. Your contributions have consistently been appreciated and valued. This decision was driven solely by operational restructuring and business needs.

Alternative options were reviewed, including the possibility of retaining both roles through reorganization or redeployment. Unfortunately, after assessing these options against our current business requirements and budget constraints, it was determined that one of the twoTeamLeadroleswithinthestructurecouldnotbesustained.

As can be seen from this there is no response to the complainant’s question regarding the selection process and there is a fundamental lack of appreciation of the respondent‘s legal obligations to conduct a fair and transparent process, as it promised it would.

This simply re-states the justification for redundancy by reference to generalised, and not very informative considerations such as ‘operational restructuring and business needs’. While it is important to do this, it is but a necessary first step and the respondent does not address the selection criteria which would be used to assess the complainant, and anyone else within scope.

She was told that the ‘next consultation meeting’ would be on Wednesday, April 2nd and it appears nothing further happened until,  at that meeting, far from engaging in any further consultation, she was told her redundancy would take effect that very day.

This was described as having happened ‘following our consultation process’.

As already noted, in the letter of invitation to the ‘at risk’ meeting it was promised that the consultation process would be fair and transparent. Frankly, the respondent  might have been better not to mention it at all if it had no intention of doing so.

Specifically, it appears that between the meeting on April 26th and the decision to terminate the complainant’s employment, the only consultation, if it may be so described, was the correspondence between the parties on Thursday, 27th (from the complainant) and 28th (from the respondent), specifically, among other issues on the selection criteria, which as I have noted were not provided.

It appears the respondent either overlooked or ignored this rather critical component of a ‘fair and transparent consultation process’ in a case of redundancy, and one which goes to the heart of the ‘impersonality’ concept which is a central legal requirement of redundancy.

Put bluntly, there was no consultation process worthy of the name. Indeed, the process was conducted in a manner for which the phrase ‘indecent haste’ barely seems adequate.

This is not to say that redundancy may not be effected quickly, as it often arises in situations where serious trading or other financial issues have arisen and speed is of the essence. But the requirement to act fairly is not inconsistent with the need to act speedily. Put the other way around, the need to act speedily does not excuse the obligation to act fairly.

Acting fairly in these circumstances must be visible from the actions of the parties.

There must be proper notice and full disclosure. There should be a fair selection process with transparent and impersonal selection criteria, and which should be known to, and understood by all affected. There should be a genuine effort to find alternatives.

None of these things happened, and as has been noted in the letter from the complainant’s solicitor, this has every appearance of a predetermined process.

There was nothing resembling a consultation process. The complainant’s request for selection criteria was ignored. The lightning speed with which the process was conducted further underlines that lack of an objective process and smacks of a predetermined decision to terminate the complainant’s employment.

Accordingly, I find that the termination of the complainant’s employment to have been grossly procedurally unfair and that she was unfairly dismissed.

The complainant was out of work from the date of her dismissal on April 2nd, 2025, until September 9th, 2025, a period of five months and one week.

Section 7 (2) (c) of the Act makes it clear that in determining the amount of any compensation consideration must be given to ‘the measures (if any) adopted by the employee or, as the case may be, his failure to adopt measures, to mitigate the loss aforesaid’….

In Sheehan v Continental Administration Co Ltd UD 858/1999.the Employment Appeals Tribunal considered the efforts to mitigate in pursuant to Section 2(1) of the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977. In the judgement it was held: -

“A Complainant who finds himself out of work should employ a reasonable amount of   time each weekday in seeking work. It is not enough to inform agencies that you are available for work nor merely to post an application to various companies seeking work.

… The time that a Complainant finds on his hands is not his own, unless he chooses it to be, but rather to be profitably employed in seeking to mitigate his loss.”

The complainant gave oral evidence on affirmation of her efforts to secure employment during the period she was unemployed and also submitted supporting documentation.

While this confirmed that the complainant actively and continuously sought employment in the period, the evidence showed that her efforts fell somewhat below the threshold set out above and I am obliged to take some account of it in making my award.

The complainant earned €4992.82 per month and I note that she received payment of statutory redundancy of €8532.00

On the basis that she will retain this payment, and making some adjustment for the shortcomings in her efforts to mitigate her loss I award her a further €10,000.00 as just and equitable compensation for her losses attributable to the unfair dismissal. .

The complainant was unfairly dismissed. I award her €10,000 as compensation for her loss of earnings subject to statutory deductions based on her current tax status.

Redundancy; unfair selection, unfair dismissal.