The Employment Appeal Tribunal has this week held that all administrations will not be considered to be proceedings commenced with a view to the liquidation of assets for the purposes of regulation 8(7) of the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 ( "TUPE") and the associated EU Directive.
As a result, regulations 4 and 7 of TUPE will apply where the business of a company in administration is sold by an administrator , which includes pre-packs . This means that, as many of us thought in any event, the employees of the company in administration will transfer to the buyer and have special protection against unfair dismissal and the buyer will take on liability for such claims by those employees.
The case is OTG Ltd v Barke and others UKEAT/0320/09 and other cases.
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