Earlier quoted context omitted.
Crazy. They're advertising quite a lot on LinkedIn at the moment too. :(
I wouldn't be surprised if this was a method of rotating staff to reduce salary spending.
The Met Police (London, UK) love to do this
Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
71–80 of 593 posts
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#72I wish there was some kind of list for the UK. Our news services are shockingly bad.
Mandatory consulting period for UK redundancies is 30 days or 45 days for larger employers - while some may have started it won't be hitting yet. It's the small companies to watch out for; can't have a consultation if you're insolvent.
I suspect many will not bother with consulting periods given the circumstances. It opens them to possible tribunal action, but rulings and penalties are usually mild, tribunals take ages to go through, and very few people bother or even know that you have to start the process within 3 months.
(If morbidly curious, you can keep an eye on tribunal outcomes at https://www.gov.uk/employment-tribunal-decisions .. I just checked this month's unfair dismissal outcomes and not a single one was in the complainant's favour, though some may have been withdrawn due to negotiating an offer.)
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#73a quote i remembered from twitter: "This is the best time to get rid of employees". a startup based in London just fired 10% of their workforce. all were given two options: government's furlough scheme where the state pays 80% of the salary, or outright dismissal. interestingly, half chose to quit.
Do you have an idea if they chose to quit because they expect finding new jobs is easy right now, or any other aspect?
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#74Can someone please change the title of this - just as with other similar posts - to use "laid-off" instead of "fired"? Regardless of how loose some may be with language, there's a clear distinction between these terms. For example, my home state's Employment Security Department: https://esd.wa.gov/unemployment/laid-off-or-fired Given that there are non-US readers here, maybe there's another pair of phrases that Hacke…
A distinction without a difference.
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#75It's not all bad. We've just wrapped up our first two completely remote hires. A full time project manager and a part time HR assistant. It's been an interesting experience for a small-but-growing (30ppl) company, especially because we had a very strong focus on physical presence before.
Remote interviews were an interesting challenge. Remote paperwork went somewhat smoother than expected. Introducing the new hires to the rest of the team is something we need to get better at.
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#76a quote i remembered from twitter: "This is the best time to get rid of employees". a startup based in London just fired 10% of their workforce. all were given two options: government's furlough scheme where the state pays 80% of the salary, or outright dismissal. interestingly, half chose to quit.
For a bit of context, at London startup the furlough scheme is very unlikely to be 80% of their salary because it is capped at 30k per year pre-tax/80% of your salary whichever is lower.
That said, I'm surprised half of people turned down 2k/month to job hunt.
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#77Playtech in London isn't firing but cut all employee salaries by 10% across the board.
The CEO just awarded himself a 30mil bonus: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/playtech-plan-to-pay-boss...
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#78a quote i remembered from twitter: "This is the best time to get rid of employees". a startup based in London just fired 10% of their workforce. all were given two options: government's furlough scheme where the state pays 80% of the salary, or outright dismissal. interestingly, half chose to quit.
Do you have an idea if they chose to quit because they expect finding new jobs is easy right now, or any other aspect?
It's definitely not easy, more candidates on the market -> higher competiton. As a side note, furlough only covers up to a certain salary level (2500 pounds I think).
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#79No severance?!
I, as an expat, am absolutely grateful and have changed my tune on the “European welfare state” trope to “this just makes sense”. I got let go from a Berlin based fintech and got 3 months pay plus a small severance. They did this likely because funding fell apart during the pandemic but it could have also been to cull people that they didn’t need but they did do right by us.
Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
In UK employees are more likely to get furloughed, where they are paid 80% of their salary from the government, do not work but keep their job.
In the Netherlands similar. Government pays 90%, employer the other 10% and can't fire anyone.
Same with Germany. We call it Kurzarbeit.
The company I'm in hasn't fired anyone and is safe.
Some neighboring countries have similar programs.