Termination of an employment relationship and lay-offs

There are some preconditions for employee to apply this leave, like for instance 10 years of working history. If this leave would cause serious inconvenience to the employer's production or service operations that cannot be avoided through reasonable arrangements of work, the employer may refuse to grant this leave.

(Österberg 2007, p. 67.)

Österberg (2007, p. 66) has recommended that a HR specialist shall draw up, together with the management, principles concerning longer leaves and holidays at the latest when the first employee asks to get a longer leave from work. In the Company, managers think that there should be only some rough policy instead of a universal one, because tasks and departments differ so much from one another. They recommend that these longer leaves shall be negotiated always case by case with the head of department.

substitutes. It is important that superiors shall know this risk of tacit extension and be careful with it.

The Employment Contracts Act and the Act on cooperation within Undertakings have many regulations for ending an employment relationship. Forbidden grounds for termination are for example:

- illness, disability or accident affecting the employee, unless working capacity is substantially reduced for a long time

- participation of the employee in industrial action

- the employee's political, religious or other opinions or participation in social activity or associations

- resort to means of legal protection available to employees

Termination of employment contracts have been realised by the law in the Company. Superiors will not fire anybody without real and justified reasons.

They will give a warning to an employee before giving notice. In production, the foreman discusses with the production manager about the situation and reasons for possible warnings. Then the manager decides whether or not there are enough grounds for giving a warning. In the sales department, superiors contact the sales director, who will discuss with the CEO about possible warnings. The decision is made after that discussion. Other departments haven't faced this kind of situation yet. Although practices differ in every department, warnings haven't been given too loosely, and managers have striven for fair and equal practice. According to Nieminen (2009, p. 58) the purpose of warnings are to give the employee a chance to amend his / her conduct. If the employee getting the warning doesn't sign it, an independent witness may be called to prove that the warning has been given.

The employer may terminate an employment contract if work to be offered has diminished substantially and permanently for financial or production related reasons, or for reasons arising from reorganization of the employer's operations. In the case of high probability, diminishing of work shall continue after the notice period at least for 90 days. If the period of diminishing work is less than 90 days, the employer has only the right to lay off an employee.

(Nieminen 2009, pp. 58–59.) The Company has not used wide lay-offs, although those have been discussed on a few occasions.

The Employment Contracts Act doesn't include regulations for terminating employment contracts in a certain order. Therefore the employer has the power to choose the object for notice. However all three collective agreements used in the case company have agreements on protection against dismissal with quite similar content about the order of deductions. Those are recommendations, and not binding. It has to be reviewed carefully in every single case. The Company has fulfilled the regulations of the Act on cooperation within Undertakings accurately. The managers have had to familiarise themselves to the act with care, and it has required lots of time.

The period of notice is regular employment time. An employee has a right and obligation to do tasks mentioned in his / her employment contract. If the employer has decided that the employee doesn't have an obligation to work during the period of notice, this shall be written in the notice. The employee has a right for full pay with fringe benefits during this period, and also a right to use occupational health services. The employee has the right during period of notice to get an employment leave with full pay for job seeking, an interview or participating actions promoting new employment. The number of days for these activities depends on the duration of the notice period. The duration of the notice period is defined in the Employment Contracts Act in chapter 6. (Act 6;

Österberg 2007, p. 174.) In the Company, the head of department has defined on a case by case basis whether or not there is an obligation to work during the period of notice.

On termination of the employment relationship the employee is entitled to receive, on request, a written certificate of the duration of the employment relationship and the nature of the work duties. On specific request, the certificate shall include the reason for the termination of the employment relationship and an assessment of the employee's working skills and behaviour.

The certificate shall not provide any information other than that obtainable from normal perusal. It is not allowed to write on the certificate, for example, family

leaves or other absences if the employment relationship has continued without interruption during these absences. (Act 6 § 6:7; Österberg 2007, p. 59;

Nieminen 2009, pp. 64–65.) Usually in the Company the head of department writes this testimonial. The production department is an exception; if the employee doesn't ask for certificate then he / she will get a short testimonial from salary administration.