What if I’m not happy with the settlement agreement?

No Win – No Fee Available

If you are not happy with the settlement agreement, then there are a number of routes you can take. You can reject the agreement outright and make a claim to the employment tribunal. Such a claim would need to be made within 3 months (less one day) from the last day of your employment.

Alternatively, and a more usual situation, is that the financial compensation and other termination arrangements are re-negotiated with your employer.  A more favourable settlement is possible if there are reasonable grounds to justify better terms, and where the right strategy and tactics are adopted. For example, your employer may not have followed the correct steps in pursuing a performance or redundancy process against you, or the actual instigation of the processes  may be bogus. We will, of course, have a much better idea of the strengths of your position once we are fully aware of the facts.

A settlement agreement may be presented to you either at the end of your employment or whilst you are still employed.  If it is offered to you at the end of your employment, such as in a redundancy situation, it will be a little more straightforward to negotiate. This is because the main focus would be on the financial compensation as you will already have an offer on the table..

If, however, you are still employed when the agreement is being offered to you (for example, against the background of a performance improvement plan) then you will need to decide whether to accept the settlement offer, or focus on remaining employed (assuming this is, in fact, an option).  

You have the right to lodge a formal grievance against your employer if you wish to remain employed which will give you an opportunity to say why you are not happy- regardless of the offer that has been proposed. This doesn’t mean the settlement agreement  is no longer relevant, or cannot be re-negotiated during or after the grievance process. Far from it. What it does mean is that there are some active steps you can take to register a formal complaint against your employer against the background of the settlement offer. Having a lawyer on your side at this time can also help enormously. Indeed, most employers would expect this.

If you wish to negotiate a higher compensation sum or reject any settlement proposals outright and bring a tribunal claim against your employer,  a no win-no fee funding option will be considered as an alternative to fixed fees or hourly rates. This means if we do not recover a sum that you are happy with, you do not pay us. Your payment is contingent on us negotiating a settlement or winning an award at tribunal and will be expressed as a percentage of additional sums only recovered from your employer. This is known as a ‘contingency fee’ form of funding.

Philip Landau and his employment law team have a high success rate of negotiating an enhanced settlement from employers for those cases that we take on. This is due to years of acting only for employees (in over 7,000 cases), and the different tactics and considerations that apply in these cases. We certainly will not advise you to sign the settlement agreement if we do not believe it is in your best interests to do so.

We can advise you wherever you are in the UK. We do not need to see you.

Please do not hesitate to contact Philip Landau  to discuss tactics, or any of the above. You can call Philip on 020 7100 5256 or email him on pl@landaulaw.co.uk

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