Business transfers

It is automatically unfair to dismiss an employee where the sole or main reason for the dismissal is the transfer and there is no economic, technical or organisational reason for the dismissal entailing changes in the workforce (regulation 7, Transfer of Undertakings Regulations 2006 (TUPE)). Changes to TUPE became law on 31 January 2014. The effect of these changes on unfair dismissals is explained on page 385. The general effect of these changes is to make it easier to carry out dismissals for transfer-related reasons.

Unlike most automatically unfair dismissals, a claim based on TUPE requires two years’ service (see Chapter 12).