First published on Friday, Jun 21, 2024
Last updated on Friday, Jun 21, 2024
Welcome to HR Heartbeat, where we give you a rundown of the week's top employment law stories. Stay on the pulse of current trends impacting your business, plus get up-to-the-minute commentaries on all things HR and legal.
Labour’s workplace reform
On June 13th Labour published their full employment law manifesto ahead of the upcoming General Election on July 4th.
If they win in the polls, their reforms will mean employers will need to do a huge review of their current policies like the right to disconnect. They’ll also have to make major changes to worker contracts.
To avoid any employee disputes, legal fines or costly claims—It’s essential you get the right advice and support to update your contracts accurately.
For more instant advice on this topic ask our AI advice tool, Bright Brainbox: If the Labour Party wins the next general election, what changes will they make to employment law?
Or, sign up for our upcoming webcast General Election 2024: Consequences for business owners and get expert advice on what the election results will mean for your HR policies and procedures.
Euros 2024: Can I make my pub staff work longer to cover extra opening hours?
The UEFA Euros 2024 tournament kicked-off on Friday the 14th of June 2024. Bringing with it excitement, friendly competition, and you guessed it—unplanned absences!
But that’s not the only change, pubs and other licensed premises in England and Wales will be able to extend their opening hours to 1am if England and/or Scotland make it to the semi-final (Tuesday 9th) and the final (Wednesday 10th of July).
These extended opening hours mean you’ll need to be hot on getting cover and managing your match-day rotas. Especially as some employees might choose to book annual leave to watch the match.
If you do need staff to work for longer hours than normal, you must check their employment contract. If no flexibility has been built into their working hours, you can ask for volunteers to support during busy periods or offer your staff an incentive for extra hours, like double or a higher rate of pay.
BrightHR Lite rota software lets you plan, schedule, and notify staff of last-minute shift changes instantly. It’s FREE forever, no strings attached! Plan the perfect game plan: Try it today >
Time-tracking software catches employee out for working a second job
A fully remote employee was recently fired from a recruitment company based in Barcelona.
Business Insider details how the CCO found an employee was working a second job right under the employer’s nose.
The CCO said the employee in question had not only been underperforming, they regularly missed deadlines and were unavailable for long periods of the day. The employer set up reviews to talk about the employee’s performance but saw no major improvements.
The employee was eventually caught out by the company’s time-tracking software, which they introduced as a way to boost productivity and potentially introduce a 4-day working week.
The tracking data showed the employee had been working on tasks for another business in the US that used the same time-tracking software. Following an investigation, the employee was fired from their position.
Some key takeaways for employers:
- Most employers would agree working a second job is fine as long as they aren’t a direct competitor, and the extra work doesn’t interfere with productivity or performance. But if you do want to prevent your employee from carrying out secondary employment, you must lay this out clearly in the terms of their contract.
- It’s important to investigate any suspicions your employee has broken rules thoroughly and hold a disciplinary investigation before taking any action.
For difficult situations like this, you should always seek accurate employment law advice—even better if that advice is available 24/7. Discover BrightHR’s expert employment law advice line.
And that’s a wrap. Tune in next week for more headlines and make sure you stay ahead of major employment law changes!
