Did you know that it is a legal requirement under the Employment Rights Act 1996 that your employees have a written statement of particulars, ie, a written contract of employment, in place within 2 months of them starting to work for you?

Did you also know that if your employee damages any of your Company equipment, you can’t automatically deduct the cost of the repairs from their pay?

A contract of employment will lay out from the onset your working relationship with the employee and will protect your commercial interests in the event that your employee takes any action which is not favourable to you. For instance, if they damage a piece of company equipment, you can deduct the value of the damage from their pay if you have the relevant clause in your contract of employment.

So what safeguards do you have in place if your employee has access to your client information? Or what can you do if they decide to go into direct competition with you?

Employment contracts are an area of business which sometimes gets overlooked but what you have to ask yourself is, if you were going into a business venture, you would have terms of business which outline what is required of you and your relationship with your client so why wouldn’t you do the same with your employees?

Whilst this is the legal standpoint, it’s important to note that if you don’t have a written contract of employment in place, and an employee takes you to an Employment Tribunal then you could be fined for hundreds of pounds. You can safeguard your business by having this in place which supports your business goals and protects your business interests. Don’t get caught out!

HR Pulse can help you with this as we have a suite of contracts of employment which you can use at affordable prices.

We hope that you’ve found this information useful. To find out more, why not check out our fantastic software HR Pulse – ‘At the heart of your business’.

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