When do collective redundancy consultation obligations kick in?

March 10th, 2026

Whenever a business is looking to make multiple redundancies, it must give consideration to whether the obligation to collectively consult has been triggered. Where 20 or more redundancies are proposed at an ‘establishment’ within a 90-day period then there is an obligation to collectively consult for at least 30 days. Where 100 or more redundancies are proposed, that period is extended to 45 days.

Failure to collectively consult, where the duty has arisen, carries significant legal and financial risk. From April 2026, under changes introduced by Employment Rights Act 2025, the maximum tribunal award for failure to inform and consult in a collective redundancy situation will double from 90 days gross pay to 180 days gross pay per affected employee. That figure is uncapped. The stakes, which were already high, are about to get higher.

Key facts

Against this back-drop, here are the key facts for employers to consider when working out whether or not they are in a collective consultation situation:

• The Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 (‘TULRCA’) sets out the rules on collective redundancy consultation, including when the requirement is triggered.

• Although the name ‘collective redundancy consultation’ suggests that it only applies in redundancy situations, it actually applies a lot more widely than that. ‘Redundancy’ is defined widely – to bite in any ‘non-fault’ dismissal scenario. It will catch many dismissals which would ordinarily fall under the heading of ‘some other substantial reason’. These dismissals all need to be counted when considering whether the trigger-point of 20 has been reached.
• A dismissal occurring at the end of a fixed term contract does not have to be counted towards the threshold. However, if the fixed term is brought to an end early then the dismissal will count.
• Voluntary redundancies count towards the threshold of 20 or more dismissals.
• When working out whether you have reached the key figure of 20 proposed redundancies, you should look at employees of each company in a group separately.
• Under the current law, if redundancies are proposed by an employer at several different locations, there is generally no need to aggregate the number across all locations. Each establishment can be dealt with separately.
• However, the Employment Rights Act 2025 will introduce (likely in 2027) a new threshold for triggering collective consultation obligations which ignores the concept of ‘establishment’ and instead focuses on the number of total redundancies proposed (either as an actual number or percentage of the whole workforce) and sets a trigger figure/percentage. The government recently launched a consultation on this proposal, putting forward a preferred option of using a figure trigger only, with the trigger proposed to be between 250-1000 redundancies across a business.
• Collective consultation arises whenever the threshold number of redundancies is ‘proposed’ within a 90-day period. The recent EAT case of Micro Focus v Mildenhall made it clear that employers should focus on forward-looking at planned redundancies rather than looking backward at past, completed redundancy exercises. The 90-day period for calculating the 20-employee threshold for collective consultation applies to prospective dismissals, not past ones.

Key takeaway

Employers need to take the time to consider carefully, whenever redundancies (or large scale ‘no-fault’ dismissals) are in the offing, whether their proposals trigger collective consultation obligations. If they do, and the business has not taken the time to understand and comply with their obligations, then the exposure is potentially huge:

• An award of up to 90 days gross pay (uncapped) for each affected employee (with the maximum award due to rise to 180 days from 6^th April).
• The potential for an uplift on any award made of up to 25% for failure to comply with the statutory code of practice on fire and rehire if the proposals form no-fault dismissals but are not ‘redundancies’ in the classic sense.
• A potentially unlimited fine, and criminal liability for directors, managers, or company secretaries if it is shown the failure to complete and file a HR1 form (required wherever collective redundancy obligations are engaged) was due to their consent, connivance, or neglect.