Hello

Has anyone ever been made redundant?  Our organisation is being 'restructured' (personally I think it is poor management of the budgets).  Anyway as of August my job is no more.  I am looking at jobs in other cities as I know I wont get the same wage I am on now working at another company in this City. 

Anyone else experienced this?  Have things worked out OK?

Yes, we've been there a couple of times.

The first thing is, don't panic!! Tell your mortgage provider as soon as you can, in case you need to make temporary arrangements. You're lucky in that you've been given plenty of notice, so have time to look around. Don't worry, things will work out okay. In fact, we're desperately hoping my husband will be made redundant - we'd be a lot better off, but we can't afford for him to quit.

Luckily my mortgage is protected if I was made redundant.  Thing is I live alone so havent got a second wage coming in. 

I have been made redundant twice and both times ended up with a far better job :D

It is sometime a blessing in disguise ;)

It is rather a long time to give you Have you been given officila notification yet ?

I bet they are hoping that people will leave before so they avoid paying out compensation :rolleyes:

We were unemployed for just under a year the first time, and a few months the second. It's tough, but there's help out there. I became an economical cook ... we didn't go hungry. :)

Happened to me twice too.  First time was a blessing in disguise until ten years later I was made redundant from that one too

Haven't found anything to match up yet, starting a new job next week, but won't be anything like the money I was earning. 

Luckily this time around we are in a better position financially, only got the minimum payout both times though.  Other people I know who have worked for different companies have come out laughing. :rolleyes:

Good luck, it is tough.

Check the small print though as some policies don't cover first couple of months.

Hi u, i am in the same boat, as of 10/2/06 i am officially redundant, this is my 2nd time in 3 years, scary though it is it worked out for the better last time, i am keeping my fingers crossed that it will be the same this time!

Don't panic, it feels worse building up to it than it does when it has actually happend! if you are insured then even less reason to panic, just make sure that jobs you do apply for are jobs you want to do and don't be tempted into "panic" applying for anything and everything as you will hate where you end up!

pants though is'nt it!

Yes, a few years ago. The whole branch of the company was made redundant, it was a very unpleasant feeling. But I found somewhere else in the end, don't worry you'll be fine. :-)

My company made everyone redundant a month after I left :rolleyes: I had worked there for 10.5 years :rolleyes:

Hubby was made redundant 12 years ago - he had been with the company 23 years :( All he got was 5 minutes notice (told to clear his desk and shown to the door) and the legal minimum. He had no help/support at all and he also lost virtually all of his pension as the company eventually went into liquidation. He was 47, which in his industry was too old to get another job. He set up a company with 3 others who had also been made redundant - did him a favour in the end, but he had a negative salary for the first few years. Fortunately we had a very small mortgage over 15 years and were able to stop paying the interest until the endowment paid out.

Good luck to you :)

Daisy

My Dad took voluntary redundancy from a job he had done for over 20 years because he was starting to find the shift pattern difficult. He got another job quite quickly but was made redundant from that due to a downturn in business. He was very worried at that point as he was 55 and thought his chances of being employed again were limited. He took the opportunity to use a skill he had learned almost 30 years ago (HGV licence - always kept it up-to-date but never actually used it) and got some agency work driving for various companies on a casual basis. One of the companies were impressed by his enthusiasm and reliability and offered him a permanent job :) For the first time in his life he has a job that he really enjoys.

Sorry, I'm rambling. What I'm trying to say is sometimes these things work out for the best, even if it seems bleak now.

Good luck with the job search :)

I think, having read all the reply's, and having been in this scary situation too, is that when one door closes, another one will open.

Rather ironically, my OH designed the very restructuring of the service he managed that structured him clean out of the organisation! However, he was lucky to have had nearly 30 years service and a local authority pension which since he was 54 at the time he could claim immediately. Given that there was a deal of behind the scenes manouevering to get an inexperienced "yes" man into his post, he also got a backdated pay rise from a very guilty chief officer! For all that, his income dropped by half which wasn't helped by mine dropping even more drastically due to the first accident to my increasingly mangled foot.

However, it's amazing how much less money you need when you aren't on the corporate ladder - I worked out that I saved over £15,000 a year just on travelling, office clothes, needing to run two cars and the sort of incidental expenses you don't count when you are earning a good salary. You also get the chance to sit back and take stock of your life and realise what is important to you and I made a career change that has paid dividends in ways I never imagined. My OH now works 22 hours a week in a management role that he took up "temporarily" and which he could, in theory, give up tomorrow if he tired of the rat race again. Despite not having the financial pressures we predicted our lifestyle is simpler and we have a greater quality of life for it. So whilst redundancy is a horrible shock, the chance to take control of your own life again can be incredibly rewarding.

Yep, me too, OH too, many friends too in the Ontario, Canada provincial govt. and in the private sector.  One friend in the civil service was actually made redundant FOUR times by the same employer but always was saved by the bell with a last minute new, and higher paying job.  The OH got it three times from the same employer.  We all survived and moved on but it is pretty demoralizing and the worst thing for the OH was when he found all his research work thrown out in the company dumpster.

If professional help with the adjustment is offered to you I'd advise to take it, no matter how much you feel you are coping fine on your own.  If nothing else it helps you to make new contacts.  I also advise professionals to help you determine what your rights are regarding pension, transfer of any funds you might have built up and compensation that might be due to you.  Check out which public, govt. etc agencies may help you.  In my new career of Certified Financial Planner I see many people make bad mistakes because they do not understand this area and think they can do it on their own or fall prey to bad advice.  Seek out as much advice as you can and talk to people who have gone through it before, (well, I guess that's what you are doing here, isn't it?) and people who have been through it with the same company if you can.  Be aware that others in the same, or other companies, may have signed agreements to not disclose their compensation arrangements.

Yep I was in IT/Management Consulting and made redundant 3 times in 8 years. Third time I finally got the message and became self employed now Im the only one who can make me redundant :D

It can be a great time to reassess and with so much notice you will be able to have a good think about what you really want out of life and how much you actually need to live on. As others have said it may be a lot less than you currently need.

It may also be worth speaking to DFW&P as they often do training packages if a number of people are being made redundant from the same business. Even if it is only help in updating your CV it may be worth a look.