Friday, September 27, 2013

Your work contract

By Marge Green


An employment contract contains the terms and conditions, both implicit and explicit, of the nature of the relationship between an employer and an employee.

An agreement must be reached before the employee's requests for contractual changes are agreed. If they wish to alter the agreement, they should, if necessary with the help of their union, explain why they have requested the changes and use the negotiations and arbitration to reach a common consensus.

Unless your request is covered by statutory labour regulations i.e. religious objections to working on a Sunday, you cannot suggest an alteration of an employment contract without first reaching out to your employer and explaining why you have requested the change. Once any changes are accepted by all parties, they should be confirmed in a new written contract.

New contractual situations necessitate two things: a newly updated 'written statement of employment' and, within a month of commencement of the changes, a letter is to be sent explaining the new contract of employment and its implications for both parties.

Contractual changes need to be advertised and made public if these terms and conditions are not in the written statement of employment. If contractual changes take place, then the employer has a duty to inform the employee of how to find out about the changes.

Employers are duty bound to inform their employee's about alterations to collective agreements with trade unions or any other type of staff associations. If any contractual changes affect the terms and conditions of the written statements of any employee, whether they be the wages or working hours, then the employee must be informed.

If the employer refuses to honour a wage settlement, or the employee refuses to honour the working hours of the contract, then a breach has occurred. The situation can also become a negative issue if the employer tries to change a contract without seeking the agreement of the employer.

If an employer is unhappy with his contractual situation, he can utilise any number of options depending on his circumstances: he can use ACAS (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service), a Citizen's Advice Bureau or, if they are a member, they can use the legal resources of their trade union. If they seek mediation services, the issue can be resolved in a timely and polite manner without any lasting damage to a contractual situation.

If an employee has an employment contract with a specific employer and that employment ends upon completion of a task or on a specific date, then they are on what is called a fixed-term contract.

Individuals partaking in education programmes, assigned to work experience schemes or members of the military services are those on non fixed-term employment contracts. Also, if an individual works for a recruitment agency, rather than working for the employer for which the agency recruits, they are on a non fixed-term contract.

Sometimes, fixed-term employees can include those who are employed for the purpose of covering maternity or sick leave, or if they are employed to complete a specialist task on a specific project.




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