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Practical employment law information to support your business, from Clover HR

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Establishing a successful recruitment process and clear written employment contracts for new employees can have a major impact on your business.

Every business needs to be aware of its obligations under minimum wage and equal pay laws, as well as recent pensions auto-enrolment changes.

You must comply with legal restrictions on employees' working hours and time off, or risk claims, enforcement action and even prosecution.

The right employment policies are an essential part of effective staff management. Make sure any policy is clear and well communicated to employees.

While sick employees need to be treated fairly, you need to ensure that 'sickness' is not being used as cover for unauthorised absence.

Most pregnant employees are entitled to maternity leave and maternity pay, while new fathers are entitled to paternity leave and paternity pay.

As well as undermining morale, illegal discrimination can lead to workplace grievances. Employee discrimination is covered by the Equality Act 2010.

Home, remote and lone workers are becoming increasingly commonplace. Key issues include communication and how to manage and motivate people remotely.

The right approach to consulting with and providing information to your employees can improve employee motivation and performance.

Disciplinary and grievance issues can be a major burden to employers. Putting in place and following the right procedures is essential.

Following the right dismissal and redundancy procedures helps protect your business and minimise the risk of a legal dispute at tribunal.

Employment tribunal claims are a worrying prospect for any employer. A tribunal case is a no-win situation – even if the claim is unjustified.

Equal pay and job evaluation schemes

Under the Equality Act 2010 women are entitled to be paid the same as men for doing equal work or work of equal value. But how do decide what is equal work or work of equal value?

What is a job evaluation scheme?

In order to avoid the risk of an equal pay claim, you need to be sure that your pay scheme is fair and equal for women and men. A job evaluation scheme is one way of doing this. Acas have produced a guide to employers on how to carry out a job evaluation scheme. It is a good way to:

  • decide on pay and grading
  • make sure you have a fair and equal pay system
  • review all jobs after a major change within the company

The Acas website has more information about job evaluation and you can download a copy of their advisory booklet Job evaluation: considerations and risks (.pdf).

Carrying out an equal pay review

If you run a smaller company (50 employees or fewer), a more manageable alternative to carrying out a job evaluation is to hold an equal pay review. An equal pay review can help you to:

  1. determine whether employees are doing equal work
  2. compare pay between men and women doing equal work
  3. identify any action that needs to be taken

The Equality and Human Rights Commission have produced an equal pay review for smaller organisations which takes you through the steps you need to take in order to conduct an equal pay review, including a sample spreadsheet tool and an equal value estimator tool.

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