Tupe (transfer Of Undertakings)

[GWilso]

Hi all, As it says on the tin has anyone had any experience of TUPE? my work are looking into outsourcing my job to a managing firm the transfer will probably take place in April so far they seem to be promosing the earth, and that my current working pay and conditions will remain the same nedless to say I don't believe them has anyone had any previous experience on this that would willing to share any thoughts or comments

Any help appreciated

[aido]

I used to work for the IT department at Royalmail which was outsourced to CSC, BT & Xansa a few years ago, to be honest it was good at first as it gave us much more scope to do things, although admittedly the management were constantly looking for ways to cut costs everywhere!

Eventually they offered a big redundancy programme which I took up as did many others, and I now work for another outsourcing company (by choice this time!) although we don't focus on the IT, which is actually one of the smaller departments there!

Things were ok, I never signed another contract so kept all the original terms and conditions, although the one thing we did lose was the RMG pension which is one of the best in the business from what I was told!

Hope things go ok - which company is it you'll be going to?

[GWilso]

Thanks Aido

I currenlty work for local goverment we are a small team of 12 covering security and building maintenece etc i have a very favourable goverment pension, probably "the best" pension in the market i will loose this however the company that takes over (kier Group) must by law have a "comparable" pension scheme and we are told most of our benefits/perks will have to also be comparable, I have heard horror stories of companys coming in draining you for all your knowledge regarding the building and set up etc and then making life so difficult you would'nt want to stay anyway

I guess if i'm honest i'm very well paid for what i do, So no money making business would keep me on (i don't think) if they were able employ a couple of bodies elswere at half the price of me and my team if you know what i mean.

[aido]

To be honest I don't think Kier Group will be anywhere like how bad CSC were, they were literally obsessed with the bottom line!

We actually do some stuff for Kier Group I think, they took a lot of Sheffield Council's maintenance stuff on I believe, can't really comment on them as I've not dealt with them in the short time I've been at this place!

I'd assume you'll be fine seeing as Kier Group seem to do a lot of work for local councils - if there were any major issues I'd have thought we'd have heard the unions screaming the roof down!

Hopefully things will all go well with them!

To be honest you have the initial people coming in when they take over but it's not too bad, in fact if you really wanted a good job when they take over you'd get onto the area which does new business - all outsourcing companies quite happily haemorage money when they think they can smell the business coming their way!

[DaveEllen]

I used to work for the IT department at Royalmail which was outsourced to CSC, BT & Xansa a few years ago, to be honest it was good at first as it gave us much more scope to do things, although admittedly the management were constantly looking for ways to cut costs everywhere!

Eventually they offered a big redundancy programme which I took up as did many others, and I now work for another outsourcing company (by choice this time!) although we don't focus on the IT, which is actually one of the smaller departments there!

Things were ok, I never signed another contract so kept all the original terms and conditions, although the one thing we did lose was the RMG pension which is one of the best in the business from what I was told!

Hope things go ok - which company is it you'll be going to?

Keir are an OK firm...........

I'm 99% sure they (Keir) have to offer a final salary scheme which is what you must be offered

[Jiberjaber]

To be honest I don't think Kier Group will be anywhere like how bad CSC were, they were literally obsessed with the bottom line!

It's all about bottom line because it costs so much to tupe staff over sometimes due to needing to match T&C's etc. So if you take over a good contract it's not so bad.

[aido]

Yeah but in that case they were that obsessed with cutting costs they went and let a lot of key staff leave the company in order to reduce wage bills!!!

Surely that can't be good for anyone, letting service suffer just to save a pound here or there?

[Steve ( West Mids )]

Sounds like they are trying to buy your experience to then transfer it on after takeover. Do you take your redundancy years with you or does it start again from zero?

[eXOBeX]

Working in local government myself I don't see how we can gain by outsourcing to a company that (unlike the council) is in it to make a profit. Council Tax payer ends up paying for it all. Keeping jobs within the authority means that any payments between departments are in reality just "funny money" whirling around within, neither a profit or a loss. As soon as money goes out, money is spent. Doesn't matter if for example in-house sparkies charge £75 per hour but Cowboy Electrical Ltd do it for £50. In-house sparkies in reality would be cheaper, just costing wage+fuel+parts, not the £75 levied by their department, which in fact would just be pushed from one council pot to another.

But hey, that's just my opinion...

[GWilso]

Have to agree with you exobex the company coming in are there to make a profit, so services we currrently provided will probably be reduced or alterd to to line there pockets, which will have a knock on effect on the good job/service we currently already provide

Thanks for everyones comments

Working in local government myself I don't see how we can gain by outsourcing to a company that (unlike the council) is in it to make a profit. Council Tax payer ends up paying for it all. Keeping jobs within the authority means that any payments between departments are in reality just "funny money" whirling around within, neither a profit or a loss. As soon as money goes out, money is spent. Doesn't matter if for example in-house sparkies charge £75 per hour but Cowboy Electrical Ltd do it for £50. In-house sparkies in reality would be cheaper, just costing wage+fuel+parts, not the £75 levied by their department, which in fact would just be pushed from one council pot to another.

But hey, that's just my opinion...

[Jiberjaber]

But the problem is that local authorities (LA's) have to make these Gershon efficiencies as dictated by central gov, so it is either achieved by sheding staff or outsourcing - which depending on the contract and the model can work well given the bigger picture....

I am defo sure we will see more LA's moving to this way of achieving what they need (in terms of their gov targets). There will be a few eggs broken on the way of course, but if the LA is achieving it's targets by outsourcing then they will continue to do so.

Keeping the money flowing between departments is a red herring. If the same old inefficiencies are there then there are no tangable savings.

Look at it another way, if a car tunning co charges £75/hr and another charges £50/hr, both achieve the same standard, who would you go to???

Sorry I don't buy the view of 'them being their to make a profit and sod the job'

If this is happening, then it is not the fault of the contracting company, it is the fault of the inexperianced and commercialy unaware person in the LA who let the contract in the first place. I have seen this happen at both extremes having consulted for both central gov and LA arena for the last 8 years. There are some Counties I have worked in where I have thought I am glad not live there, if I knew where my money was going then I would have been up at arms!!! At the scale of contracts I am now involved in, this would never happen as most of them have to run through [county council] member review followed by sanction and also external audit by the likes of KPMG.

Shortly, the balck art of working within the LA arena will no longer be that, it will be transparent and as a tax payer, it will be a good thing. For the more un-scrupilus (sp?) contractors it will be the death knell, which in a twisted way is a good thing!

Unfortunatly it is a commercial world, there are a lot of lessons which can be employed within the non-commercial world of local gov which would reap huge benifits, just because that is how something has been down for the last 20 years doesnt make it the right way to do it etc... it is the resitance to change which holds this back. As a tax payer it saddens me greatly, as a person trying to achieve this change, it is a brick wall which my head is very familiar with!

anyway... rant mode off :) YMMV :D

[DaveEllen]

My "paying" job is working for LA's dealing with revenues and benefits.

In the mid to late 90's there was a move to contract out benefits to private contractors such as ITnet (now SERCO) Capita,Liberata et al the idea was that these companies would bring commercial working practices into this area of work and reduce costs and increase efficiency.

In a nutshell it didnt work. They tried to cut costs as you'd expect and introduce performance based pay blah de blah.

What they would do is look at the contract and concentrate on the area which brought most profit ignoring those which didnt make money...same with penalties they would weigh the cost of having to pay one penalty against the profit they could make in another area and if the profit outweighed the penalty then hey ho.

Problem is in my line of work you are messing with peoples lives. If the claim for Housing Benefit is not paid then people get evicted - Period.

I've also been involved in bid preperation for one of the above companies. That was an eyeopener. Bid document specifically said no offshore call centres to be used by the contractor......so they were going to create another company which they would "sub contract" to with the offshore call centre....

However my experience of nearly 20 years in local government is that there is enormous wastage of money & resources largely due to middle managers empire building and then protecting said empires and senior managers embarking on personal career building schemes with no regard to the financial cost to the LA.

I'd also say central government is guilty of the same from what you read about the Home Office etc....

my mini rant over

[eXOBeX]

There are some Counties I have worked in where I have thought I am glad not live there, if I knew where my money was going then I would have been up at arms!!!

<rant>

There are certainly some directorates in certain LAs in which money seems to be no object. For example, can you see the gain involved in swapping everyone on the first floor of a small office building (a building used entirely by one directorate) to the third, and vice versa? I certainly can't, nor can I see the gain in effectively taking two floors of people out of action for a whole day whilst these moves take place. And this is one of the key public-dealing departments which will wail "Services will suffer! People will suffer!" if you threaten to cut their budget!

And all this despite a multi-million pound cut in funding hanging over the LA next year!

It's a pity the staff aren't forced to take annual leave for office moves, the resulting uproar (they'd play hell and refuse to budge) would at least stop the management shuffling their staff like playing cards. At the moment the only beneficiaries appear to be the removal companies hauled in to move the cabinets and equipment!

A few carefully worded FOI questions (regarding money spent on office moves by said directorate) coming from the local paper and I'm sure it would hit the fan big time! I'm just amazed nobody's done it yet.

</rant>

[Jiberjaber]

I was expecting to come back to this post with a mini-war going on, not to start agreeing! LOL :D

Dave, yes, middle management empire building is very evident sometimes and to the detriment to the end game. It's good news for the contractor carrying out the works though as inevitably they end up doing the job twice (first one being part of the empire building thing, second being the way it should have been done in the first place!). There are some things which need a non-commercial view to be taken. You will never get a commercial co whith share holders to look after not at least considering the how do we leaver out more money! This is why maybe some roles can only ever be carried out by a not-for-profit organisation. That said, not making the penalties large enough would have been a nieve approach or a case of not testing the market fully when assessing the tender returns....

Martin - classic case highlighted! If there is an office move in our organisation, it happens over the weekend or overnight, not during office hours!

Anyhow.... I've said enough now ;)

GW - Hope the Tupe process goes OK for you, there realy shouldnt be too many issues, after all the gov bashing, perhaps this will help :)

http://www.direct.gov.uk/Employment/Employ...mp;chk=OQ%2BdKc

[keywest]

I was TUPEd from a large County Local Authority to a Consultancy in October 2006.

In the contract docs the issue of the good pension scheme was separated from the Terms and Conditions. All of the bidders were required to show they could achieve 'Admitted Body Status' which means that for the TUPEd staff only the new compnay can be a part of the Local Government Pension Scheme. In the case of my transfer this means thay have to contribute a significant percentage (double figures)on top of my salary. I can stay in this scheme as long as I wish as long as I am working on at least 50% of the transfering Council's workload.

This then leaves the T&Cs eg working hours, holidays, car allowances etc which still apply and will continue to apply. there is no pressure so far to harmonise to the company's T&Cs althouigh this will be offered in the next few months. It will then be up to the individual to compare the benefits of the two packages eg better car allowances but less hols, BUPA v no BUPA etc.

The company would clearly like as many staff on the same T&Cs so some enhancement to make them more attractive may be offered.

You need to find out if your existing employer is separating pension and T&Cs. This was important to my ex-Council as they wished staff to transfer and did not want this to be an issue.

I have no doubt that eventually offers to transfer from the final salary local government pension scheme to the money purchase version the Compnay offers will eventually come. This could be offered on a neutral cost basis which for a younger member of staff would give them more in their pocket now which could be attractive. I'm an old fart with less than 8 years to go so retaining the pension and the option to go at 60 is very attractive.

Good Luck.

So far my new employers have been ok but I have doubts at times that they realise what they have taken on. Time will tell !!

One

[GWilso]

Thanks for all your comments on this

I'm pleased to say a desision was made on this last night, the council development committee decided not to outsource the department, luckilly myself and my team have a close woking relationship with the members and as all you council staff know the members like their home comforts :winky:

We spent many hours talking to the right people (councillors making the desision) and having meetings on the sly trying to persuade them to come to the right desision.

Now staff (the wrong staff) have found out about these meetings the people who have spent so many man hours on looking at the option of outsourcing and spent a lot of hours on tenders etc are not happy:

I recieved a warning letter yesturday to say that we have a standing order within the council that anyone who lobbies councillors regarding jobs/salary/payments or pensions faces disaplinary action

I JUST CAN'T WIN HERE

[eXOBeX]

I remember back in August 2004 Swansea Council looked into a call centre plan which threatened to privatise the IT jobs. The result? The entire IT department went on strike , closely followed by the binmen who went out in support of them. Whilst the binmen went back shortly afterwards, the IT guys stayed out for eight weeks! Goodness knows how the council coped (or how much it cost them trying to).

[Mike_B]

I remember back in August 2004 Swansea Council looked into a call centre plan which threatened to privatise the IT jobs. The result? The entire IT department went on strike , closely followed by the binmen who went out in support of them. Whilst the binmen went back shortly afterwards, the IT guys stayed out for eight weeks! Goodness knows how the council coped (or how much it cost them trying to).

Some might note sarcastically that it's probably only the IT dept that could afford 8 weeks unpaid...

But speaking as an IT consultant myself, (and currently in the middle of an extensive project for the Scottish Executive) obviously we're worth every penny!!!

[Jiberjaber]

I remember back in August 2004 Swansea Council looked into a call centre plan which threatened to privatise the IT jobs. The result? The entire IT department went on strike , closely followed by the binmen who went out in support of them. Whilst the binmen went back shortly afterwards, the IT guys stayed out for eight weeks! Goodness knows how the council coped (or how much it cost them trying to).

Some might note sarcastically that it's probably only the IT dept that could afford 8 weeks unpaid...

But speaking as an IT consultant myself, (and currently in the middle of an extensive project for the Scottish Executive) obviously we're worth every penny!!!

OT...

/waves at Mike B and wonders who he works for in Epsom ?

[Mike_B]

OT...

/waves at Mike B and wonders who he works for in Epsom ?

You have PM - but it's not all that exciting! :)

[Jiberjaber]

OT...

/waves at Mike B and wonders who he works for in Epsom ?

You have PM - but it's not all that exciting! :)

NP - Recieved :)