Hours, pay, parental rights and premises

Employment law is designed to safeguard employee rights, but it also removes ambiguity about what’s expected of both parties. So if you get it right it can be good for you as an employer too.

Small business owners can’t be expected to know the details of every employment law. However, knowing a few basic yet important facts could protect you from potentially costly legal action.

Working hours

Unless they opt out (and confirm this in writing), employees don’t have to work more than an average of 48 hours a week over a 17-week period.

They have the right to at least one full day off during every seven, in addition to their daily rest period (20 minutes paid, if the working day is longer than six hours). Employees are entitled to a daily rest period of 11 consecutive hours in every 24 hours.

Full-time employees are entitled to four weeks’ paid annual leave, plus eight bank holidays, while part timers receive pro-rata entitlement.

National Minimum Wage 

The National Minimum Wage for workers aged 22 or more is £5.73 per hour (2009). The development rate (for 18 to 21-year-olds) is £4.77 per hour (2009). The rate for 16 to 17-year-olds is £3.53 per hour (2009).

Fixed-term employees have the right to the same pay as comparable permanent staff.  Part-time workers are entitled to pro-rata pay and holiday. Firms with five or more staff must have a stakeholder pension scheme (unless the business has its own), but they do not have to contribute towards it.

In a working year, employees are entitled to at least statutory sick pay on their fourth day of absence. They don’t have to be paid for the first three days.

Maternity and paternity rights

A woman cannot be sacked or made redundant because she’s pregnant. She must be given time off for antenatal care and can take 52 weeks’ statutory maternity leave. To qualify for statutory maternity pay (SMP) – which can only be paid for 39 weeks - she must have worked for you for 26 weeks by the end of the fifteenth week before the week her baby is due.

She is entitled to 90 per cent of her average weekly earnings (AWE) for the first six weeks, then the standard weekly rate of £117.18 (2009) or 90 per cent of her AWE if this is lower than £117.18 (2009). Employees who don’t qualify for SMP might qualify for maternity allowance. Employers can recover 92 per cent of their SMP payments from HMRC (104.5 per cent if their total NI payments are £45k or less). Women can’t return to work within two weeks of giving birth (four weeks if they work in a factory).

Biological fathers or partners of mothers are entitled to two weeks’ paid paternity leave. When adopting a child, one of the adoptive parents is entitled to six months’ paid and six months’ unpaid leave. If their partner works, he or she can take paternity leave.

Employers must ‘consider seriously’ requests for flexible working conditions from parents or carers of children aged 16 or under or parents of under-18s who have disabilities.

Other employer obligations

You must make ‘reasonable adjustments’ to your premises if this enables suitably qualified people with disabilities to work for you.

As part of your health and safety obligations, you must provide a secure, safe and healthy working environment, which also grants sufficient privacy to employees.

You mustn’t undermine the relationship of trust and confidence that should exist between you and your staff, so don’t engage in gossip or disclose personal information. Employees can belong to a trade union and they’re legally entitled are entitled to alert the relevant authorities if your actions are illegal or dangerous.

There are also responsibilities you need to bear in mind when recruiting and managing staff. You can find those in our overview of recruitment, contracts, discipline and grievance.