Is there a financial penalty for not honouring the notice to resign/retire period?

[acequion]

My question is in the title. My contract, secondary teacher in a voluntary secondary school, requires three months notice to resign or retire. Therefore teachers retiring at the end of the school year on 31st August would have given notice by 31st May at the latest. My question is, what happens if, for whatever reason, you're not on time with your notice and likewise with your application to retire? Suppose you only give 6 or 8 weeks notice? While I understand that this may lead to a delay in paying the pension and lump sum, is the employer, in my case the DES, still legally obliged to date and pay pension from the date of retirement, even if the payment is delayed? Or is there a financial penalty for late notice? Thanks in advance to anyone who can answer this.

 

[Marsupial]

My question is in the title. My contract, secondary teacher in a voluntary secondary school, requires three months notice to resign or retire. Therefore teachers retiring at the end of the school year on 31st August would have given notice by 31st May at the latest. My question is, what happens if, for whatever reason, you're not on time with your notice and likewise with your application to retire? Suppose you only give 6 or 8 weeks notice? While I understand that this may lead to a delay in paying the pension and lump sum, is the employer, in my case the DES, still legally obliged to date and pay pension from the date of retirement, even if the payment is delayed? Or is there a financial penalty for late notice? Thanks in advance to anyone who can answer this.

Slightly off topic, but does the school year not run from 1 August to 31 July? It used to.

 

[Annieindublin]

Have you asked them to waive the notice period?

 

[acequion]

Hi Marsupial. Yes it's a bit off topic and I'd really like to get an answer to my question about honoring notice, if possible. Thanks.

Whatever about the duration of a school year, the date for retirement at the end of a school year is 31st August, probably to allow for the three month summer period where the teacher is still on payroll.

 

[acequion]

@Annieindublin, to answer your question, no. I just want to know if you are legally entitled to your pension from the date you retire if the notice period is not honoured.

 

[Dr Strangelove]

Or is there a financial penalty for late notice?

I can’t imagine how there would be.

My contract, secondary teacher in a voluntary secondary school, requires three months notice to resign or retire.

This contractual clause is probably there as sudden resignations or retirements make it harder for schools to source staff. They are unenforceable under Irish law to my knowledge.

I’ve known two civil servants who had 40 years service and retired on a whim at a week’s notice. It was bad manners but nothing they could be penalised for.

 

[acequion]

Thanks Dr Strangelove, that is exactly what I wanted to know ie the legal position. Yes, no doubt it's bad manners and I think most professionals would like to end their working lives with dignity and fairness to their organisation. But we don't live in an ideal world and retiring is a massive life change, so understandable that it isn't always done neatly. For that reason I honestly find it hard to understand how anybody would retire on a "whim" but maybe that's my point. Anyway, thanks again.

 

[Dr Strangelove]

Yes, no doubt it's bad manners and I think most professionals would like to end their working lives with dignity and fairness to their organisation.

I know first-hand that schools are scrambling to find staff at the moment so I think it’s best to give as much notice as you can the contract is irrelevant.

IANAL.

 

[Steven Barrett]

What does your contract of employment say?

 

[Marsupial]

You state that the Department is the employer. But surely it's actually the BoM of the teacher's school?

Assuming that it is, then I suppose that the BoM could seek an injunction (from the High Court) to prevent a teacher resigning before they had worked the full notice period. It's hard to see them doing that, however, as it would cost them money and lead to a lot of ill feeling if they won. (Perhaps the Court would award them their costs, but that seems unlikely.) Furthermore, any teacher put in that position would probably be able to get a sick cert from their GP certifying stress, so the BoM would benefit nothing.

The only penalty that I could see the school/BoM applying would be a refusal to sign their part of the teacher's retirement application form until the three months notice period had fully expired. (What would be interesting is whether the DES would continue to pay the retiring teacher their salary for the full notice period!)

I suspect that the DES retirements section would simply process the completed retirement application form when it arrived.

ASTI would probably be able to provide further advice.