What is an unfair dismissal?

You can say that you are unfairly dismissed by your employer, in the following cases:

• Your employer do not have a strong reason for your dismissal (i.e.) you have performed all your tasks perfectly.
• Your employer has not followed the right procedure when dismissing you (i.e.) if the employer has not followed the dismissal laws of the company.
• You are dismissed for an automatically unfair reason. For instance, if your employer has dismissed you since you asked for maternity leave.

What are automatically unfair dismissals?

A dismissal is said to be automatically unfair dismissal, if it comes under the following categories:

• If your employer sack you for attempting to exercise or exercising one of your lawful employment rights. The legal employment rights of an employee are as follows:

1. Adoption, paternity or Maternity leave
2. Taking off for public duties like jury service
3. Remuneration during suspension on medical problems
4. Parental leave
5. Protection against unlawful deduction from wages
6. Right to request for flexible work timings
7. Definite pay even when work is not available
8. Taking break for prenatal care
9. Requesting a written statement of employment particulars
10. A minimum notice period
11. Requesting pay statement

• In case, the organization for which you are working is taken over by another company, you should be protected under the ‘Transfer of undertakings’ protections. If you are covered under this act and even after this, if you are dismissed by your new or old employer due to transfer of the undertaking, it is an automatically unfair dismissal. But, there is an exception to this case (i.e.) if your employer shows that the dismissal is for organizational, technical or economic reason, it will not fall under the category of automatic unfair dismissal.
• Generally, the employees have the rights for rest breaks, paid leaves and even limiting the average working hours per week. In this case, your employer cannot dismiss you for the following reasons:

1. Giving up your working time rights
2. Even when your employer asks you to work, you are breaking the working time rights and
3. If you are signing an agreement on workforce that affects your working time rights.

• You cannot be dismissed when you are insisting your employer to pay the national minimum wages or for reporting against the employer for not paying the minimum wages prescribed by the government.
• If your employer sack you for taking part in the legal industrial action, it is regarded an unfair dismissal. But, if you are taking part in unlawful industrial action, your employer can fairly dismiss you.

Hope, with the above-mentioned information, you might be clear whether you are unfairly dismissed.

Selection for redundancy:

• The employer will have to follow the following procedures while selecting employees for redundancy:
• If the employer has agreed with a trade union for deciding the method of redundancy, it should be properly followed. If your employer is not doing so, he should follow some general approaches in selecting the employees for redundancy.
• When the group of employees to be made redundant is clear, the employer need not follow any selection procedure. For instance, if a particular operation in your company is going to be stopped, then the employer need not consider redundancy of employees engaged in other operations since he will have to make the employees engaged in the operation that is going to be closed as redundant.
• The employer can follow the method called ‘selection pool’. Under this method the employer can consider a group or section from which redundancies can be selected. Once the employer identifies the selection pool, the employer should select some people from that group and can then narrow down the list of employees who should be made jobless. Here, it would be better, if the employer uses objective selection criteria, which can be applied fairly and equally across the workforce.
• The employer can select people for redundancy on the basis of disciplinary records, experience, capability, appropriate skills and competences and not on the basis of race, religion, gender, marital status, age, trade union membership or disability. If the selection for redundancy is made on the basis of later grounds, then the redundancy becomes an unfair dismissal.
• Your employer can follow the method of last in first out (i.e.) he can consider the number of years of service of the employees and select people with shortest service for redundancy. But, when this method is followed by the employer, it can be indirect age discrimination if people of certain age group are affected by the redundancy.

Redundancy notice period:

In case your employer has selected you for redundancy, he should give a notice period before the end of your employment. According to law, your employer should follow the points given below as far as redundancy notice period is concerned:

• 12 weeks notice if you are working for the past 12 years or more.
• In case you have experience between two and twelve years in the organization, one week notice for each year.
• If you are employed between one month and two years a minimum of one week notice should be given.

Even though, these periods are prescribed by law, you should also check your employment contract, where in your employer might have specified longer notification periods.

In case, your employer is not following the above-mentioned procedure for redundancy, first you can talk to your employer or you can also get the help of your trade union official.

The languages used by the people within the countries coming under the European Union are called European languages. There are about 23 official languages in the European Union. According to a research, German is the widely spoken mother tongue in European Union. The European Union encourages its citizens to be multilingual; particularly it encourages people to learn two languages apart from their mother tongue. If you are interested in finding a job in the countries belonging to the European Union, it is better to make yourself familiar with the local language of the country apart from English. But, you need not worry about the certified institutions offering European language diplomas since many certified institutes are offering foreign language diploma courses. The details regarding the certificates that approve the knowledge in different European languages and the website link of the institutions offering language the certificates by conducting proficiency tests are given below:

Employers are always on the lookout for multilingual employees even if the languages are not used on a daily basis. The language skills of the employees will be of great use to the employers in communicating with the clients in such a way that they can develop their business.

Nowadays, with the advancement of technology the foreign language courses are being offered online and the aspiring candidates can make better use of this opportunity to learn as many foreign languages as they can.

Get your European language diplomas and add super value to your curriculum vitae!!!

• It would be better if you could take some time off before joining your new job, this time will be helpful for you in separating yourself from the previous job. During this time, try to collect some useful information regarding your new job, their line of products, corporate culture and philosophies.
• Try to find out whether any of your friends or relatives know some people working in your new company and ask them to introduce the existing employee of your new company. This will be helpful for you to find a friendly face when you are entering your new company for the first day.
• Plan the outfits you are going to wear during the first week and keep them ready by properly washing and ironing them and check whether any tailoring work needs to be done on those outfits. This is because once you have started your new job, you might be returning home tired after a day’s work and it should be remembered that the first week of work might be emotionally and physically exhausting.
• Also, properly plan your route of travel to your new organization and also plan for some alternatives routes as well in order to avoid last minute hurry.
• Before beginning your new job, complete the important grooming tasks like nails manicure or filled, getting a haircut, color, etc…You might not have belief in judging other, but your co-workers might try to judge you on the way you have dressed.
• Next comes social interaction, try to remember the names of your co-workers so that you can easily associate with their job responsibilities and position. If you have called a person by wrong name, try not to hide your mistake, on the other hand, accept that you have forgotten his name and politely ask him to remind his name. It is quite normal to forget the names in the beginning and it is acceptable.
• Try to clearly understand your job responsibilities and get doubts regarding your job clarified then and there to ensure that you understand what is expected of you.
• Professional ethics is very much essential. You should try to prove that you are a reliable, capable, responsible and dependable person. Particularly, when you are in your new job, do not forget to follow the mantra ‘start early and stay late’. Do not ever focus on your personal life when you are at work.
• Try not to skip your job unless and until the situation demands. Also, try to accept the additional responsibilities of your co-worker being given to you and this will make others to understand that you are a team player.

The European countries take into consideration different factors like general health of the economy, rates of unemployment, economic growth, inflation rate, budget of the companies, productivity, level of collective bargaining, etc… while determining the pay setting. In many countries like Belgium, some form of index linking system is being followed to make sure that the pay rate to workers is not overtaken by inflation.

As said earlier, level of collective bargaining is one of the key factors used for determining the minimum wages. In most of the European countries, sector-level bargaining is being followed, while in the UK, company level bargaining is being followed.

According to experts in the field of wage rate determination, in many European countries the minimum wage rate has increased considerably and this has brought about a considerable increase in the productivity as well. On the other hand, moderation has brought about pay rise in the recent years in some countries, which are aiming at achieving the macroeconomic convergence criteria for the purpose of joining the monetary union and European economic.  Some countries like Portugal, Germany, Spain and Belgium are exercising pay moderation recently for the purpose of remaining competitive. The table given below will give you the list of minimum wages in some of the European countries for the year 2009/10.

The minimum wage had been generating significant amount of debate as far as the level, up-gradation and settings are concerned. Recently, the countries like Germany and France had the most prominent debate in the minimum wage issue.  The National Minimum wage system has been followed by France for the past several decades and this has enabled the country to embed the same in the wage formation system. But, in the recent years the subject of minimum wages has become an issue and this has forced the government to increase the hourly minimum wage rapidly for the purpose of maintaining the monthly level of minimum wages. In France, the employers are demanding that the minimum wage rate is high, while the trade unions are showing their disapproval to the government stating that they are not awarded with additional discretionary increase.

Therefore, the minimum wage rate has considerably increased in almost all the European countries and the present trend show that there will further be an increase in the minimum wages. Therefore, not only workers from European countries, but also from other countries can be rest assured that they will be paid well in European countries.

Job hunting newspapers in the United Kingdom:
The important national daily newspapers like „The Guardian”, “The Telegraph”, “The Courier”, “The Independent” and “The Times” provide information on current vacancies on a regular basis. You can visit the website of these papers, where you will be able to find current job vacancies in different sectors.

Job hunting newspapers in Ireland:
Some of the popular newspapers like the “Irish times”, the “Irish independent”, “Irish Examiner” are published on a daily basis and these newspapers provide information on job vacancies in Ireland. Apart from this other newspapers like “Sunday Independent”, “Sunday Times” and “Sunday Tribune” also offers job vacancy information.

Job hunting newspapers in Norway:
Some of the job hunting newspapers in Norway include “Norway Post”, “Agderposten”, “Driva”, “Finnmark Dagblad” and “Aftenposten”. Apart from this, there are popular job agencies like “Adecco”, “Manpower” and “Proffice” in Norway.

Job hunting in Sweden:
Some of the job hunting newspapers in Sweden include “Dagens Nyheter”, “Svenska Dagbladet” and “Dagens Industri”. “Dagens Nyheter’ offers a number of job advertisement during Sundays and Thursdays and the other two newspapers will be helpful for you in finding business-oriented opportunities.

Job hunting in Poland:
In the country of Poland, the newspaper called “Gazeta Wyborca” offers a supplement newspaper called ‘job’ during Mondays and this newspaper will have around 400 vacancies every week. Apart from this, other newspapers like “Parkiet”, “Gazeta Prawna”, “Fakt” and “Super Express” also offer job information.

Job hunting in Spain:
Some of newspapers offering details regarding job opportunities in Spain are “La Gaceta De los Negocios”, “La Vanguardia” and these are regional newspapers. Apart from this, the other newspapers like “ABC”, “El Mundo” and “El Pais” also offers details regarding job vacancies in Spain.

Job hunting in Germany:
Some of the English language newspapers in Germany like the “Munich Times”, “Stars and Stripes” are offering details regarding job vacancies.

Job hunting newspapers in Italy:
Some of the job hunting newspapers in Italy include “La Stampa”, “Il Giornale”, “La Repubblica” and “Corriere Della Sera”. Apart from these newspapers, the Monday edition of the ”Il Sole 24 Ore”, which is a financial magazine, will also help you in finding jobs in Italy.

Job hunting newspapers in France:
Some of the popular English newspapers offering job vacancy information in France are the Connexion and the French paper. Apart from these, the other newspapers like “Le Monde’s Initiative” and “Le Figaro” also offer job news on Wednesdays and Mondays respectively.

1.If you are a non-EU citizen looking to work in European countries, the first thing to be done by you is to find an employer, who is ready to sponsor you. Finding a job when you are not already having a visa might be a difficult task. Therefore, the best option would be to look for jobs in multinational companies in your place and find whether, the company would be willing to transfer you abroad and sponsor your visa application. In the case of blue card, you will have to get a paid employee blue card application. These application forms can be downloaded online and are issued by working with children check.
2.The next important thing to be done is to collect the essential documents. The documents include a valid passport, proof of your clean criminal records and employment contract. This is applicable both for ordinary work visa and blue card.
3.Be very cautious about your paperwork. It is very much essential that all the documents are present with the perfect number of copies specified in the application and in perfect order. In case of any mistakes in the paperwork, there are chances of your request being denied or at least there might be some delay in the processing of your visa request. Ensure that your name is spelled in the same manner as in your passport in all the papers. You will have to fill up each section properly in the blue card application. Information like employer’s name, field of employments should be provided properly in the application.
4.Next procedure is the submission of application. In the case of blue card, you will have to submit the application with two forms of signature identification, application processing fee, birth certificate and passport. In this application, you will have to mention the mode of payment of application fee.
5.The next step is to participate in the screening process. In the screening process, the officials will review your application and your criminal history.
6.Finally, you will receive your approval notification and blue card through mail.