When will the transfer take place?

A transfer under the Acquired Rights Directive must take place at one single moment. There can only be one “transfer date”. There is no such thing as “transfer over a period” (North West Training and Enterprise Council Limited (t/a Celtec v Astley) [2006] UKH29).

It is crucial to be clear about the transfer date because TUPE takes effect automatically on the transfer date, meaning that this is the moment at which the employer’s identity automatically changes. In practice, mergers and reorganisations are often structured so that there are a number of separate TUPE transfers, with groups of employees transferring to their new employer on different transfer dates. Rather confusingly, Regulation 3(6) states that “a relevant transfer may be effected by a series of two or more transactions”. In any event, the law is clear that there can only be one “transfer date” for each TUPE transfer.