Retirement Notifications

[Thanks to James Medhurst of Employment Law Advocates for providing this case summary]

The EAT (Underhill P) has handed down its decision in Howard v Campbell's Caravans, which is authority for the proposition that a notification to an employee that he will be retired "after his 65th birthday" does not necessarily constitute a failure to comply with the requirement of the statutory retirement procedure that the employee must be notified of the intended date of his retirement.

It was concluded that a notification letter has to be considered in isolation and further letters cannot remedy a failure to notify an employee of his retirement date. However, nor can they cast doubt on the validity of the original notification if they specify a different date.

On the facts of this case, a natural reading of the letter would cause an employee to conclude that he was to be retired on the date of his 65th birthday, even though he was retired two days later.