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A&O confirms up to 155 London layoffs ahead of Belfast launch

5 May 2011 | By James Swift

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Allen & Overy (A&O) has entered into redundancy talks with 155 London support staff ahead of the launch later this year of the firm’s support services centre in Belfast.

Most, if not all, of the staff in individual consultations are expected to leave the firm.

A&O announced in February that it would be launching in Belfast, predicting at the time that around 180 support roles would be transferred to Ireland (2 February 2011).

A&O has since brought in Qedis as consultants, who have looked more closely at how the move will affect staff, and back-office functions.

“There was a lot of detail that we couldn’t get into before announcing the proposals,” said a spokesperson for the firm. “We are not just moving individual jobs, rather, we are moving whole processes. So we’re looking at which back-office jobs can move and what that means for staff here. And we could only really do that once we started talking to people.”

None of the staff are expected to leave the firm until the autumn, and all those affected remain in individual consultation until they leave.

A&O would not comment on the compensation for individuals but a spokesperson said: “I think the leaving packages we’re putting together will reflect how we’ve treated people in the past, which is pretty fairly.”

It is expected that there will be 250 support roles in A&O’s Belfast office by 2014, on top of 50 fee-earning roles.

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Readers' comments (15)

  • Kim Kardashian | 6-May-2011 10:46 am

    @Welcome to The Free Market | 6-May-2011 9:52 am

    90% of the work A&O lawyers they do is commoditized work – Finance / Corporate etc is just cut and paste and precedent based so the logical step would be, looking down the line in 5 or 6 years, to cut virtually all their associates and have paralegals do the work (in Ireland no doubt) – as most of the work done in finance / corporate a 14 year old could do. UK technical legal work would be done done in London (i.e. real “advice” work) and then they would rent the rest of their London office space out. A&O is a commoditized legal factory if you like – at some point they will structure themselves to reflect that – that is if they really want to give the client a good deal. Why clients pay associates £300 an hour for work that someone barely out of puberty could do is beyond me.

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  • IHateBPP | 6-May-2011 12:16 pm

    I might be mistaken but did A&O not say that no jobs would lost due to the new sausage factory opening up?

    On a related note, does anyone know how the new HS sausage factory's going?

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  • Anon | 6-May-2011 12:45 pm

    GREED.

    Sadly the predominant characteristic at all City firms, not just Allen & Overy.

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  • anon | 6-May-2011 4:21 pm

    Of course it's largely precedent based, Kim. Clients don't want (and won't pay for) you to draft free-hand. What they want (and pay for) is that you don't stuff it up. That's why big clients use expensive firms.

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  • Anonymous | 6-May-2011 6:26 pm

    Clients don't pay for A+O not to stuff it up, they pay A+O so that if it is stuffed up the person hiring a 'brand' won't be fired. That is the scam.
    As to quality, I once heard an A+O partner (and still a partner) from CEE claim (in front ofnhis client) that there was a robust m+a practice in CEE before 1989. Duh.

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