Search
Forum - Employing staff
Employing staff
Tue, 04/08/2009 - 14:04 — LISAMILLS
I am thinking of employing a member of staff, but our workload is not consistent. We would need them for approx 5 hours a day but sometimes more. Is there an employment contract that is flexible? I don't want to have to pay somebody for hours when they are not there because they are not needed.
Founding partner
Starting a new business - free advice, tools and resources | Start Up Donut
Published by 
Cant really comment on which would possibly be the most tax efficient or financially beneficial way of doing this but when we started out and needed additional help I would hire people on freelance contracts - which saved us a lot of money early on.
Was better to pay someone £10/hr for 10 hours and then the next week perhaps not need them rather than pay a salary or retainer - although for people we would hire regularly we would pay retainers.
another option, one that gives you total flexibility, would be to use either a self-employed person, trading as a sole-trader or Ltd Co., or use a recruitment consultant that provides temporary staff through their own payroll. Both of these options could be for as little as a few hours per day, although usually it would be a minimum of 1 days work per booking.
Good luck!
It might be easier to employ someone as a temp. There are a lot of people available now that would take flexible hours. You can get someone from one of the better agencies, or if you find someone directly, an agency will do the payment stuff or you - but remember to negotiate a lower rate because they didn't supply the person. As long as you explain to the temp and they can plan a couple of days ahead you should be OK. Have a look at hiremyparents.com. It launches in Autumn but you could be a first customer.
I agree with the comments and advice from employmentlawclinic.com with regard to the contract. On a wider note, the key thing I have found with any sort of flexible working is communication and clarity. You need to ensure that the employee understands your requirements and reasons for the variable hours, and that he has set objectives so he knows what he has to achieve in those extra hours. That way both of you should be happy.
You can easily have a flexible contract for an employee to cover fluctuations in work. If you want to provide more details of what you require:
• expected frequency of extra hours;
• how much notice you would expect to provide the employee with before the extra hours will be worked - will they be told at x-time they need to work beyond the usual y-time finish, or be told a day or week in advance?
• any flexibility available on when the extra hours will need to be worked - will this have to be done at specific times, or within a specific period of time?
• any reciprocal flexibility you will offer to the employee;
employmentlawclinic.com would be happy to discuss your needs & prepare a contract for you - either based on employment contracts you currently use, or something drafted from scratch.
Add a comment
Not registered? We'll create a new account for you when you add your comment