The Legal Test for Fair Selection
A redundancy dismissal is unfair if the selection process was unfair. The employment tribunal asks whether the employer acted within the range of reasonable responses available to a reasonable employer. That means the selection criteria must be objective and consistently applied, the pool of employees at risk must be properly defined, and the scoring must be carried out honestly and accurately.
An employer who uses selection criteria that are inherently subjective, that are manipulated to achieve a predetermined outcome, or that are applied inconsistently between employees in the same pool has not conducted a fair selection process. The resulting dismissal is unfair regardless of whether the underlying business case for redundancy was genuine.
Step One: Get Your Scores in Writing
The first thing to do when you are selected for redundancy is ask for your scores against each selection criterion in writing. Your employer must be able to tell you how you scored and why. If they cannot or will not provide this information, that failure itself is evidence of an inadequate process. Keep the request and any response as evidence.
Also ask for the anonymised scores of the other employees in the selection pool. You are entitled to compare your scores against others in the pool, though you are not entitled to the names of those individuals. If your scores are at the bottom of the pool but your appraisals, attendance record, and performance reviews do not support that position, there is a discrepancy worth investigating.
Step Two: Check the Criteria Against Your Records
Take each criterion and check the score awarded against your own documented evidence. If the criterion is attendance and you scored poorly, check your actual attendance record for the relevant period. If absences were included that should have been excluded -- for example, disability-related absences, maternity-related absences, or absences covered by a doctor's certificate -- that is a specific legal error.
Disability-related absences must be excluded from attendance-based selection criteria. An employer who includes them is potentially applying a selection process that discriminates against employees with disabilities. Disability discrimination claims are uncapped and available from day one of employment. If your attendance scores were affected by absences connected to a disability, raise this specifically -- both as a challenge to the selection and as a separate discrimination claim.
Step Three: Challenge the Pool Composition
Ask in writing how the pool of employees at risk was defined and why. The pool must include all employees doing the same or similar work. An employer who defines the pool narrowly to include only certain employees while excluding others doing substantially the same role has constructed an unfair pool. If colleagues with similar roles were not included in the selection pool, ask specifically why they were excluded.
A pool of one -- where only your role was considered for selection with no others -- is not inherently unlawful if your role is genuinely unique. But where your role is effectively the same as others who were not put at risk, a pool of one is very likely to be challenged successfully at tribunal.
Step Four: Look for Subjective Criteria
Criteria such as "future potential," "flexibility," "attitude," and "team contribution" without specific objective measurement are inherently difficult to apply consistently. If your employer has used criteria that are not clearly defined or measurable, and you have scored poorly on them without being able to understand why, challenge the criteria themselves. Ask for the definition of each criterion and the methodology used to score against it. If no clear methodology exists, the scoring was too subjective to be legally defensible.
Step Five: The Appeal
Use the appeal to raise every specific concern about the selection process in writing. An appeal is not a rehearing of the business case for redundancy -- it is a review of whether the process was conducted properly. Focus on the specific discrepancies between your scores and your documented record, the criteria definition and methodology, and the pool composition. If the appeal decision does not address your specific points, note that in writing and retain the correspondence.
At Tribunal
A tribunal considering an unfair selection challenge will look at the criteria used, how they were defined, how scores were applied, whether the scoring was consistent across the pool, and whether the employer genuinely considered the employee's representations during consultation. An employer who cannot produce contemporaneous scoring documentation, who changed scores between meetings, or who cannot explain why a particular criterion was scored in a particular way will face significant difficulty at tribunal. Contact ACAS within three months less one day of your dismissal date to protect your limitation period while you pursue the appeal internally.