Redundancy: the correct process step by step (England & Wales)

Before any letters go out, consider alternatives to redundancy: a recruitment freeze, reducing overtime, offering voluntary redundancy or early retirement, or redeploying staff to other roles. Acas guidance treats this as the first real step — dismissing without first considering alternatives is one of the most common ways a redundancy process is later found unfair.

If you are proposing to dismiss 20 or more employees at one establishment within a 90-day period, the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992, s.188 requires collective consultation with a recognised trade union or elected employee representatives — not just individual conversations — starting at least 30 days before the first dismissal (45 days for 100 or more). Below that threshold, you can consult individually, but the consultation must still be genuine and meaningful.

Use the at-risk letter to notify each affected employee, explain why their post is at risk, and set out how the consultation will run.

Consultation should cover: ways of avoiding or reducing redundancies, the criteria for selecting employees, and any suitable alternative employment within the organisation. Employees may bring a colleague or trade union representative. No final decision should be made until consultation has concluded.

Use the consultation meeting invite letter to arrange each meeting.

If you are selecting from a pool of employees, the criteria should be objective and consistently applied — for example skills, experience, attendance or disciplinary record (excluding any absence related to a protected characteristic) — rather than subjective judgement alone. Selecting because an employee is, for example, pregnant or has raised a grievance can make the dismissal automatically unfair.

Employees with at least 2 years' continuous service are entitled to statutory redundancy pay, based on age, length of service (capped at 20 years), and weekly pay (capped at the current statutory limit). Use the redundancy pay calculator embedded in this process pack to get the figure before writing the notice letter.

Once selection is confirmed, give written notice of dismissal. Statutory minimum notice rises with service (one week after one month's service, then one week per full year up to a maximum of 12 weeks) — contractual notice cannot be shorter than the statutory minimum. The letter should also cover untaken annual leave, the redundancy payment amount, and the right to appeal.

Use the redundancy notice letter for this step.

Acas guidance recommends giving the employee a window (commonly around 7 days) to appeal the selection decision in writing, and holding an appeal meeting before the process concludes. This is not a strict statutory requirement in the way collective consultation is, but its absence can weigh against the employer at tribunal.

Sometimes redundancy discussions end with a negotiated exit instead. A settlement agreement is only legally valid if the employee has received independent legal advice — Verstia does not offer a fill-and-download settlement agreement for this reason. Read why, and where to go instead.