Darlington Association on Disability

What is redundancy?

There may be a time when an employer has to make their personal assistant (PA) redundant. Redundancy is dismissing a PA because the role is no longer required. There are different reasons for a redundancy situation including:

• The person receiving support moves to residential care and the role is no longer required
• The person who receives support unfortunately passes away and the role of the PA no longer exists
• The support plan has been reviewed by the local authority and a direct payment is no longer received

The above are some examples of when redundancy can occur, the Direct Payments Support Service will help you determine whether redundancy applies in each situation.

What is redundancy pay?

A personal assistant who has been employed for 2 years or more continuous service will be entitled to a statutory redundancy payment. The actual amount of redundancy pay is based on a PA’s date of birth, weekly earnings and length of employment.

Do I need to pay notice?

Notice pay applies in certain circumstances and will be calculated as part of the redundancy process. Your PA will also be entitled to holiday pay on holidays occurred and not taken.

What happens first?

If you are in a redundancy situation please contact DAD by telephoning 01325 489999. You will be allocated an Independent Living Advisor who will ask questions to support you to get the redundancy process started, it would be helpful if you have the following readily available:

• What date is the PA’s employment expected to end or What date did the PA’s employment end
• What are the circumstances?
• If the direct payment funds are held in the persons own bank account what is the balance
• What are the PA’s contracted hours and hourly rate?

The Independent Living Advisor will support you to go through your employer’s liability insurers, you must follow their guidance throughout the redundancy process to stay insured should there be any dispute arise.

The Independent Living Advisor will also confirm with the social worker date and reason for the direct payment stopping.

IF the existing employer is no longer available DAD will need to establish who will provide instruction until redundancy resolved this could be next of kin or social worker.

What happens next?

Usually a series of meetings is to be held between employer and PA which covers the fact that there is a potential redundancy situation, whether any alternative can be found and to confirm that redundancy is not avoidable and notice issued. DAD will support you throughout this process, including liaising with your insurance company, taking notes and issuing template letters.

Sometimes a redundancy occurs and meetings cannot be held (for example if the employer is urgently taken into residential care). In this case it is still important to contact DAD for support.

DAD will then send out the final letter and financial statements to the Employer.

Final Pay

The PA's final pay would be processed at the next payroll cycle and the final payslips sent to employer to arrange payment.  

For those who have a managed account:
The final wage will be paid to the PA through the managed account.

Opportunities for PA’s who have been made redundant

There may be other direct payment employers who are advertising, should the PA wish to apply they can view current vacancies on this website or call 01325 489999.

There is an opportunity to join a Personal Assistant Register, this is a list of people looking to work with disabled people who use a direct payment. By joining the PA Register, you are not applying for a specific role. If successful, you will be directly employed by the person you support and not Darlington Association on Disability.

Return to Support DAD can provide to help you manage your Direct Payment