Category: "news"
Can smaller offences ever ‘add up’ to gross misconduct?
Usually, most people would tend to associate gross misconduct with situations where an employee has done one particularly serious act (or omission). Staff handbooks and policies tend to list examples of offences that can amount to potential gross misconduct, and these are generally the most serious, such as theft, fraud and... read more »
Can verbal agreements trump written terms?
It is quite common to have a clause in an agreement which states something along the lines that any changes to the agreement have to be in writing. So what happens if the parties agree to vary the terms verbally, and then one party insists that the variation is... read more »
Shared parental leave policies could be discriminatory against men
Last month, we reported on the case of Capita v Ali, one of two cases on shared parental leave being heard by the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT). In Capita v Ali, the EAT held that it was not direct sex discrimination to pay enhanced maternity pay to... read more »
Handy reminder: 8 key employment law changes to be aware of for spring 2018
Spring is always a key time of year for changes in employment law, and 2018 is no exception. Here's my summary of the important updates you need to be aware of: 1. Increases to statutory redundancy payments It can be easy to miss this one – the limit on a week’s... read more »
When does notice take effect?
The Supreme Court recently considered the question of when notice of termination given to an employee takes effect. Is it when the notice was sent, when it was delivered to the employee's address, or when the employee had a reasonable opportunity to read it? This was the question before... read more »
Share and share alike - should fathers taking shared parental leave be paid the same as mothers on maternity leave?
We previously reported on two cases in which the Employment Tribunal reached different conclusions as to whether paying enhanced pay to women on maternity leave, but only paying statutory pay to men taking shared parental leave, was discriminatory on the grounds of sex. (For a recap on... read more »
Employee awarded £47,000 in transgender discrimination case
The recent case of de Souza v Primark (2018) involved one of the highest reported awards for gender reassignment discrimination. We take a look at the Tribunal's findings and the lessons employers can learn from Primark's mistakes. The case involved a shop assistant at a Primark store, Miss... read more »
To bump or not to bump?
Considering it is not particularly common to see it in practice, bumping is something that clients ask us about surprisingly often. It is a term that many employers and HR practitioners have heard of, and know they need to be wary about, but they tend to be unsure about... read more »
Dismissed for knowing a criminal
There are only a very small number of unfair dismissal cases which reach the Supreme Court, usually because the costs of pursuing them this far is completely disproportionate to the remedy if the claimant is to succeed. The recently reported case of Reilly v Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council... read more »
National Minimum Wage headaches for employers
There were plenty of big names on the Government's 'name and shame' list this month for those who had been paying their workers less than National Minimum Wage - and there were a range of reasons why. If even the biggest employers have fallen foul of the rules, it... read more »