Employment Law – Busi People Partners

Employment Contracts

20202023Admin-HMMLeave a comment

One of the changes coming to employment law from 6 April 2020, is that all employees and workers must have a written statement of terms and conditions from day one of starting work. The law sets out some key information which must be included in this written statement, which are set out below.

Previously only employees were entitled to a written statement within their first two months of work and in reality this often didn’t happen at all.

The MUST haves

The written statement can be made up of more than one document, for example an offer letter and employment contract – regardless of how many documents are used, the ‘principal statement’ must contain the following information:

The business’s name and address
The employee’s name, job title (or description of work) and start date
Continuous service date (if applicable)
Rate and frequency of pay
Hours of work – be sure to include any overtime or weekend work
Holiday entitlement (and if that includes public holidays)
Work location(s) & relocation (if applicable)

The following information must also be included, but might not be covered in the principal statement:

End date or duration of temporary work
Notice periods (from employer and employee)
Collective agreements
Pensions
Grievance process (point of contact and appeal process)

Additional Information

The following information doesn’t need to be described in detail, but you must signpost employees to their location:

Sick pay and procedures
Disciplinary and dismissal procedures
Grievance procedures
Other paid leave (inc. family leave)

Are you prepared?

If you’re unsure if your current documents tick all the right boxes, or if you don’t have any set templates (don’t worry we won’t judge!), contact us for a no obligation chat and we can discuss how we can help you meet the new deadlines in a cost effective and proportional way.

Relevant services include: HR Audit, Your First Hire package and on demand support.

So they’re having a baby!

20192019Admin-HMMLeave a comment

If one of your team is growing their family, there are a number of obligations you have as an employer.

Firstly, it is important to remember the 4 main types of statutory leave employees can be entitled to:

Maternity Leave – expectant mothers
Adoption Leave – primary adopter / carer
Paternity Leave – expectant fathers or secondary carers
Shared Parental Leave – Sharing maternity / adoption leave

You probably already thought about Maternity and Paternity, but families are shaped and created in many different ways, as a business owner you might have to support all of them!

Fortunately the basics are the same – be supportive, understanding, empathetic and follow a process!

As soon as an employee tells you they are expecting a new arrival, you can start planning for their leave and considering the support which you may need to provide, as well as your legal obligations.

Once you have figured out the basics;

Your pay policy (following statutory minimums)
Period of leave
Arrangements for cover

You will also need to consider the impact on the employee, from helping them prepare and accommodating any necessary time off for appointments through to keeping in touch while they’re away from the office and finally their reintegration to the business following their leave.

How much detail you need to cover will, of course, depend on how long the employee plans to be away from the office, anywhere from 1 week to 1 year!

To make the process as positive (and easy to manage) as possible, the best thing you can do is get some basic policies and processes in place so when the time comes, you will know exactly what to do.

Busi People Partners can provide support managing family leave, reviewing or creating policies and procedures and providing training to you & your management team.

Take Note!

20192019Admin-HMMLeave a comment

If there is just one piece of advice all small business owners should follow, it’s this…

Record everything! If its a spreadsheet, an employee notebook or a word file, take note of your conversations, issues and processes! It can save you months in the long-run.

The classic example we experience is an underperforming employee – they’ve been underperforming for a long time but you wanted to give them a chance, and you did. In fact you gave them many chances to improve until the time comes that the rest of the team are frustrated and resentful. You feel you’ve done as much as you can and now you’re ready for a termination conversation.

Maybe at this point, you engage with your HR specialist – the first question we will always ask…

What have you done so far and what evidence do you have to show this?

You may be able to tell us about a lot of conversations you had with your employee, but you’re not sure when they happened or exactly what you said. Unfortunately this often means having to start your performance improvement process all over again and that means the timeline starts over too. Now you’re frustrated, your employee is unhappy and the team might think you’re not managing the situation.

The same issue can happen with disciplinary issues, grievance management, flexible working requests, recruitment and just about any people management process you can think of.

For effective, timely people management taking accurate notes is the foundation you need to hold your business up, not to mention if you ever have to defend your actions in a tribunal setting.

For an easy, integrated solution, speak to us today about our HR system, which not only manages all your employee data but also has the functionality to record meeting minutes and notes in one location.

Importance of Holiday

20182018Admin-HMMLeave a comment

In recognition of my weeks holiday, and that of many workers taking a break for the school half term, it seems like a great time to talk annual leave and holidays. If you run your holiday year from January to December, it’s also a good time to start planning for 2019.

The law

In the UK all employees are entitled to a minimum of 5.6 weeks holiday every year including bank holidays, for most full time workers this means 28 days, pro rata for part time workers. In England and Wales, we usually have 8 bank holidays which for most leaves 20 days to be agreed between you and your team.

Of course, many businesses decide to give their teams more than this and some allow their employees to purchase additional leave or take unpaid leave for time in excess of this. As an employer, you should be seen to encourage your teams to take their annual leave entitlement, and usually this means not offering to pay extra time instead.

Is time off good for business?

In short – yes! Over the past 20 years a lot of research has been conducted around well-being, time off and productivity, some of the benefits of holiday are;

Increased productivity
Increased creativity
Reduced stress levels
Reduction in sickness absence
Reduced employee turnover

Unfortunately, according to the Glassdoor Annual Leave survey, on average employees will take just 77% of their holiday – based on the minimum thats 6.5 days every year, and without holiday all those benefits can turn into big issues.

How do I ensure the team take holiday?

Following these simple tips can be the beginning of a new attitude to annual leave for your team:

Make sure everyone knows their entitlement & how to book
Be a role-model, take your holiday too and make sure to tell the team
Have a switching-off policy – no emails or office contact during holiday
“Use it or lose it” – unless theres an exception, don’t allow carry over leave

Holiday and Other Leave

This is an area which can feel complex and often confusing, if an employee is on long-term sickness absence or family leave – they will continue to accrue and be entitled to holiday during this period. When the leave is planned, in the case of family leave employees can be encouraged to take their holiday before their leave starters. For sickness / unplanned absence, they have the right to carry forward at least 20 days for a minimum 15 months following the end of the leave year.

If this is a situation you are stuck with, give us a call and we can discuss the specifics of the case to come up with a recommended solution.

HR system

I couldn’t finish this guidance without saying all of this is much easier and takes far less involvement if you have a HR system to do it for you! We can provide you with a HR system to calculate entitlements, manage requests and your team calendar with minimal administration and direct access for both employees and managers.