Employment Contracts, Handbooks and HR Policies

Whether you are a start-up or an established business, it is important that you have up to date contracts of employment for all your employees. Employees have a legal right to be given a written statement of their terms and conditions of employment within two months of their start date. An employment tribunal can award a financial penalty if you fail to provide a written statement. This applies irrespective of the size of your business.

Having a set of Company Rules covering key HR policies or a Staff Handbook is also important to ensure employees fully understand your organisation’s rules and the standards of behaviour expected of them as well as making them aware of their rights and entitlements, to avoid any future disputes.

What are the benefits for you?

• To rely on terms and conditions of employment on the basis of verbal discussions and custom and practice could create problems for you which could well be avoidable.
• A written contract can deal with a whole range of issues to protect you, from restricting an employee’s activities during and after employment to ensuring compliance with data protection.
• A staff handbook can be an excellent communication tool in passing on more detailed information about the company’s policies and procedures. Where contracts of employment do not include all the essential legal requirements, certain information (such as pensions, sickness, disciplinary and grievance details) must be available elsewhere.

How can we help?

We can prepare contracts of employment along with a set of Company Rules or a full Staff Handbook tailored to your business and job roles. We can also review and update your existing documentation to ensure this is fit for purpose and appropriate for your organisation’s size and sector.

If you have gone through a merger or acquisition, we can provide advice and support in respect of the harmonization of sets of terms and conditions of employment.

We can support you with the consultation processes you will need to follow if you wish to change the terms and conditions of employment of any of your employees to minimize the risk of any potential tribunal claims.

Even with up to date HR policies and procedures in place, these will only be effective if your managers have the confidence and skills to use them properly. We can provide small group training sessions for managers on key areas of HR practice, examples include:

• Handling disciplinary and grievance issues
• Managing poor performance
• Handling sickness and absence issues
• Recruiting and selecting the right candidate