Sweden: There are no formal requirements on redeployment investigations made by employers prior to an employment termination due to redundancy

A company with around 20 employees terminated the employment of a person working as a sales representative due to redundancy. Poor sales results in the region where the sales representative worked had led to the business decision to no longer have a sales representative in that specific region. The former sales representative filed a claim with the court stating that there was no actual redundancy and that the employer had not fulfilled the obligation to investigate redeployment options prior to the dismissal. The employer had stated that there were no available positions in the company, but had not presented any written investigation or offered any additional information on how the employer had investigated possible redeployment options.

The employee won in the district court and the employer appealed to the Labour Court. The Labour Court found that it was obvious that there had been an actual redundancy when the position of sales representative was removed. Further, the Labour Court found that it was enough for the employer, which had such a low number of employees that it could be assumed that the employer had a good overview of the workforce, to state that there were no available vacant positions within the organisation. Therefore, the dismissal was considered to be lawful.

For more information on these articles or any other issues involving labour and employment matters in Sweden, please contact Robert Stromberg (Partner) of Cederquist at robert.stromberg@cederquist.se or vist www.cederquist.se.