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March 30, 2012

How to Assess Suitable Alternative Roles

As part of a fair redundancy exercise, an employer must consider suitable alternative employment. The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has now confirmed in Samsung Electronics (UK) v Monte-D'Cruz UKEAT 0039/11 that an employer has considerable flexibility when assessing an employee's suitability for the alternative role and may use an element of subjectivity.

Samsung reorganised its print division and, as a result, the Claimant was identified as being at risk of redundancy. He was unsuccessful in securing any of the alternative roles that were available and was made redundant. The Tribunal found his dismissal unfair, in part because the selection process for alternative roles had not been objective. The EAT overturned the Tribunal's decision. It said that the process for selecting employees for redundancy and the process for considering alternative employment are to be treated differently; an employer can use subjective judgment when considering an employee's suitability for alternative employment. This will be a relief to employers as it means that when considering alternative employment they will not be required to adopt exclusively objective criteria.

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