In this newsletter we provide an update on the Employment Rights Bill, the new Statutory Pay Rates, look at recent case law judgements / employment tribunal claims, and look at Probation Periods and how a forthcoming legislation change reinforces the needs for these to be effective.

NEW SERVICE – ‘Document Resource Centre’.  We now offer a stand-alone service where we provide you with web access to around 170 template HR letters and forms covering a wide range of HR aspects (these are constantly reviewed and updated to ensure compliance with legislation).  The cost of this service is £240 (+vat) for a year’s subscription.  If this is something you would be interested in or would like more details, please contact us.

From basic Contracts of Employment to a fully Outsourced HR service we can help.  If you would like to know more about any of our support, consultancy, and training services, and see how we can help you, please visit our website or contact us at info@connectivebusiness.co.uk to arrange a Free no-obligation consultation.

Legislation Updates

Employment Rights Bill

In addition to the changes as detailed in the last (April) newsletter, the following is now also in place

• Holiday pay records: employers are required to keep adequate records to show they have complied with holiday pay and entitlement rules, with these records being retained for 6 years from the date they were made.

Case Law Updates

Sainsbury’s Store Manager awarded over £12,000 for harassment related to disability and unfavourable treatment

Mr C began working at Sainsbury’s in 1993 & in 2010 became a store manager.  He took sick leave as a result of anxiety in July 2022.  In November 2022, his line manager Mr H posted on social media sites & Sainsbury’s internal message board to celebrate International Men’s Day writing “I’d like to take a moment to celebrate the male leaders in my team and say thank you for all that you do to help make our stores across South Wales, Gloucestershire and Worcester places where colleagues love to work and customers love to shop. All of you do this whilst leading busy lives outside of work too, dealing with health, family and personal issues in the same way that everyone else does, yet you all show up for work each day, put on a name badge and provide support, guidance and leadership to the thousands of colleagues that work on our region.” along with a photo of every store manager except Mr C.  After many discussions over when Mr Cooper would return to work, he was dismissed in June 2023.  He subsequently sued for disability discrimination, harassment, unfavourable treatment & unfair dismissal.  At the employment tribunal (ET), Mr C said he felt excluded, humiliated & violated when he saw he was not included, also that he suffered untold further damage to his health because of his omission from the post, along with the angst of having to field questions from friends & colleagues asking him if he had left Sainsbury’s.  Mr H told the ET that as Mr C had deleted WhatsApp, & said he did not wish to be contacted, he thought it best to leave him off the post adding that he did not have a photo of Mr C & thought it inappropriate to ask in the circumstances.  The ET ruled the cause of the treatment was the conscious thought process of Mr H to not include Mr C in the post as Mr C was absent & therefore this amounted to unfavourable treatment because of something arising from disability and that Mr C had been humiliated by the post.  Mr C won his claim for harassment related to disability and unfavourable treatment because of something arising in consequence of disability and was awarded £11,852 in compensation, including £7,500 for injury to feelings.  Mr C’s claims of disability discrimination & unfair dismissal were dismissed.

Key Points: whilst it may seem reasonable for Mr H not to have contacted Mr C given the absence circumstances, the content of the post was not ideal in terms of the wording used and could be seen as specifically ‘highlighting’ Mr C’s absence.  Employers must be careful not to ‘alienate’ any employee and consider appropriate wording for any posts.

Unsuccessful job applicant awarded over £7,500 after complaining her anxiety affected her ability to give concise answers under pressure.

Ms R applied for a Pathology Operations Manager post within the NHS in February 2024.  Another candidate scored higher at the 40-minute interview and was offered the role.  In her rejection email, Ms Rezaei was told although she was 'considered appointable' another candidate had 'answered the questions slightly more directly and succinctly'.  Ms R wrote to the NHS where she complained 'she felt rushed' after the interview started five minutes late & raised further queries including that her mental health disability of anxiety can affect clarity of mind & speech under pressure particularly in interview situations & had therefore affected her ability to give concise answers.  She received no reply, & ten days after her complaint the preferred candidate turned the offer down with the position then offered to a different candidate rather than Ms R.  Ms Rezaei did not receive a reply to her complaint until June that year.  At the Employment Tribunal (ET), Ms R said she had ticked 'I do not wish to disclose my disabilities' on the equal opportunities section of her application form, but that she had selected this in error.  She had also selected 'mental health condition' from a separate drop-down menu on the same form.  The ET noted that Ms R had provided no medical evidence that her anxiety had affected her performance & had not requested any special arrangements when invited to do so during the interview booking process. The ET also found that the recruitment records were incomplete.  Ms R had been ranked second & third by two of the three interviewers, however the director of operations scores & the overall summary sheet were not available, leaving the ET unable to confirm with certainty the final ranking of candidates.  The ET found this was 'clearly a serious failing' & it had affected the NHS's ability to evidence its position that the Ms R’s scores were lower' than another candidate's.  The ET said it 'is not clear to us who came second' &, as there was no evidence the whole application was taken into consideration, the interview 'operated as a tiebreaker', & that 'In our view, the interview process was flawed as it marked question by question, rather than competency by competency’.  The ET found the NHS had taken 'no steps' to remedy a 'potential unfairness' when Ms R told them about her anxiety & could have reinterviewed both candidates.  Ms R was awarded £6,000 compensation for injury to feelings, plus £840 interest & £880 in preparation costs, with her other claims of disability discrimination & unfavourable treatment being dismissed.  In making its ruling the ET stated the NHS had failed in its duty to make reasonable adjustments, finding it should have reviewed whether Ms R disability had impacted her interview scores before filling the vacancy, also acknowledging this was a one-off incident & whilst acknowledge Ms R’s genuine distress they had no medical evidence before them to link the NHS's failure to make reasonable adjustments to any impact on Ms R’s health, particularly as the effects Ms R described are a result of the entire process, parts of which they did not find discriminatory.

Key Points: employers must always give careful consideration to the full circumstances presented to them, and also ensure they have all relevant documentation in place to justify any decision made if challenged.

Training

 

Operational Managers are key to a Company’s success, and how they work with and manage their teams is an essential part of this.  Failing to provide them with the essential training they require will lead to more issues within the workplace.

We run a number of ‘1 to 1 HR Coaching for Managers’ modules, all of which are delivered remotely via Microsoft Teams and takes around 1½ to 2 hours:

• Being an Effective Manager / Responsibilities of a Manager;
• Dealing with Misconduct (Discipline), Poor Performance (Capability) and Grievances;
• Managing Attendance / Sickness Absence;
• Managing Performance / Developing People;
• Dealing With Conflict;
• Managing Recruitment;
• Managing Investigations.

More details on all of the above can be found on our website.

Probation Periods / Employment Rights Bill

The aim of a probation period is for an employer to ensure that a newly recruited employee is capable of performing to the required standards and therefore remain in employment beyond that point.  However, where probation periods are not managed effectively, it can lead to employers wanting to use what they see as a ‘get out of jail free card’ to dismiss an employee before 2 years continuous service is achieved without having specific justification, simply stating reasons such as ‘they have always been a problem since they started’, ‘they have never been able to do the job’, ‘we just need them out’, etc. 

However, from 1^st January 2027, the current legislation requiring an employee to have 2 years continuous service to bring a claim of ordinary unfair dismissal is reducing to 6 months i.e. anyone you employ from 1^st July 2026 will only require 6 months continuous service to bring such a claim.

This change reenforces the requirement for employers to have robust probation period practices in place, setting specific goals / targets for employees to achieve in order to successfully pass the probation period, and for managers to ensure effective reviews are held with the employee during that period providing any necessary support, training, etc. to give the employee the best chance of being successful.

Partner Services

We have long-term partnerships with key providers which enables us to provide other recommended services to our clients.

Our partnerships include:

• Financial Services;
• Legal Services via Howells Solicitors;
• Health Insurance and Staff Healthcare Benefits via Western Provident Association (WPA);
• Health and Safety via Sure Safety;
• Workplace Wellbeing via Wellfinite;
• Cloud based HR Software via WorkSmarter.

 

Visit our website to see full information on our partners and their services.