Important changes to Parental Leave

This is just to remind you that effective from 8 March 2013, parental leave has been extended from 13 weeks to 18 weeks per child up to 5 years (or 18 if the child is disabled). This type of leave is unpaid so does not get taken up very often. There is also a qualifying period of one year's service and an annual limit of 4 weeks per child per year.

The change has been made to comply with the revised EU Parental Leave Directive. It is a relatively minor change; more substantial changes are on the way with the Government planning to extend the right to request flexible working in 2014 and to introduce 'shared parental leave' in 2015. 

If you have a reference to parental leave in your employee handbook, you can either make this simple amendment yourself or contact me.

http://www.hrdept.co.uk/offices/south-east/south-east-london-and-north-kent

February and beyond

Unsurprisingly, there are a lot of changes to employment law and statutory payment increases being enforced throughout the year. Ones to take note of in February include a rise in statutory redundancy pay which from 1st February goes up to £450 a week. This figure is used to calculate a week’s redundancy pay if employees earn more than that amount a week.

 

The statutory guarantee payment for lay-off also increases to £24.20 a day. There is also an interesting and controversial new contract between an employer and an employee coming into force in April 2013. These are called ‘employee-owner contracts’. The Government opened a consultation to these contracts and a mighty 92% of respondents were negative or neutral towards it, so you may be forgiven for wondering why the Government decided to proceed. In an ‘employee-owner contract’, an employee receives company shares in exchange for waiving certain employment rights.

 

These ‘certain employment rights’ that employees will be giving up will include rights surrounding unfair dismissal, redundancy pay and the right to request flexible working. If a mother wants to return to work from maternity leave, she’ll have to provide 16 weeks’ notice instead of the usual eight under the employee-owner contract.

 

Chancellor George Osborne announced that companies of any size will be able to use this kind of contract but it has been principally intended for SMEs. We do question why you would want to give away part of your company to a brand new, unproven employee for very little protection when discrimination claims can still be made. This new contract shouldn’t be viewed as a way for rogue employers to mistreat their employees. We’ll report on this more in due course as we are still waiting to see the draft contracts that are yet to be issued!

 

http://www.hrdept.co.uk/offices/south-east/south-east-london-and-north-kent

 

Return to work interviews

With the Norovirus plaguing workplaces during this infectious season, dealing with sickness absence can be time consuming and costly for smaller businesses. For every member of staff that falls ill, do you conduct return to work interviews, regardless of the length of absence?

If not, we recommend you do.

 

We have seen how straight forward structured RTW interviews can reduce short term absence (sickies) and identify underlying causes for absence to help mitigate further leave. RTW interviews should be held with an employee the day they return to work. The line manager can ascertain information regarding the absence and complete any necessary paperwork such as a self-certification form.

 

Just doing this every time will improve attendance and identify anyone with an underlying complaint that may be classed as a disability. If you need further advice on how to hold a return to work interview, we’d be more than happy to help.

 

http://www.hrdept.co.uk/offices/south-east/south-east-london-and-north-kent