Around 300 former Garlands call centre employees laid off over the summer have filed claims against the company claiming their redundancy rights were violated.
Over 1,000 employees were made redundant at the Garlands call centres in South Shields, Middlesbrough and Hartlepool after the company called in administrators.
The Shields Gazette reports that the company's chief executive Chey Garland announced the lay offs on May 17 over the "in-house radio system".
In dramatic circumstances, Ms Garland explained the firm could no longer support trading after the "termination of key contracts" and gave staff one hour to collect their belongings and leave the call centres before the doors closed.
At the time, Ms Garland paid tribute to the workforce and said she was "devastated" by the course of events.
She said: "The North East is losing a world-class contact centre business -- one that took 30 years of hard work to build and just 18 months of economic recession to destroy.
"My heart goes out to all the people who have worked so hard to make Garlands a success and who will now lose their jobs and face hardship through no fault of their own."
However, a former Garlands operations manager, who did not wish to be named, told the Shields Gazette that following the closure the company provided "no real guidance in terms of where to turn, or what to do next".
"I became inundated with questions from ex-colleagues wanting to know what to do, how to cope and where to turn. I decided to set up a Facebook page to hopefully become a central point of reference and, within a few days, I had well over 400 ex-staff signed up to my page.
"It also became clear that the company had not followed guidelines for making people redundant.
"Because of this, we decided to pursue this through the employment tribunal route."
Staff made redundant have a number of legal rights, including notice, consultation and redundancy pay -- click on the links at the bottom to learn more.
The laid off Garlands employees say they were legally entitled to a 90-day consultation period before being laid off, which they did not receive, and are still owed money in unpaid wages.
A hearing on their claims will take place in Newcastle next Monday. If the employees win, they could be entitled to thousands of pounds in damages.
Links:
- Call workers' tribunal D-day (The Shields Gazette)
- Redundancy rights (Findlaw.co.uk)
- Redundancy rights news (The Solicitor)
- Employment law Q&A (Community)
- Find an employment solicitor (Contact Law)
