Lawrite HR employment law consultancy services

Most Lawrite HR clients subscribe to one of our annually renewable fixed cost services, but we can also carry out bespoke off-cover consultancy work at competitive rates. For example:

Disciplinary, dismissal and grievance meetings and appeals

Statutory procedures and the requirements of fairness, mean that employers must conduct meetings with employees to deal with disciplinary action, dismissal, the hearing of an employee grievance and appeals against such decisions.

We can chair any of these meetings for you or simply attend to give you guidelines and advice on how you run the meeting. We cannot make your decisions for you, but we can guide you through the facts and law that you need to apply to the process. If you ask us to chair a meeting we can ensure that the requirements of a fair hearing are adhered to and deal with difficult or contentious issues for you.

We know that most employers have not been trained as lawyers or HR advisors and don’t always have the skills to conduct one of these meetings. Often the meeting has to run in much the same way as a quasi judicial hearing.

Our HR advisors are experienced in running these hearings for employers.

Compromise agreements

The law gives workers substantial legal rights that can be enforced by making a Tribunal claim against their employer. Most commonly employee’s can claim compensation for unfair dismissal or even ask the Tribunal to make their employer give them their job back.

The law will only allow an employee to sign away their legal rights to make a Tribunal claim in limited circumstances.

However commercial reality means that most employers will from time to time make a decision that is in the best interest of their business but not necessarily in the best interests of one of their employees.

In these circumstances it makes sense for an employer to negotiate a leaving package with an employee who is unfairly dismissed or has grounds to go to a Tribunal.

Usually this will compensate the employee for loss of his job and set out the terms upon which he leaves, often with an agreed reference to be given by the employer. However such an agreement will not prevent the employee from subsequently taking his case to a Tribunal unless both employer and employee sign a binding compromise agreement.

A binding compromise agreement has to comply with the legal requirements and formalities contained in section 203 Employment Rights Act 1996. The most important of these is that the employee has to take independent legal advice. Usually the employer will pay for this.

Negotiation of terms for an employee to leave under a compromise agreement, drawing up the draft agreement and concluding terms with the employee’s advisor can be undertaken for you by Lawrite HR.

If you have already reached a decision that somebody has to leave or a claim has been made by a former or present employee, you will benefit from our experience in handling negotiations and drafting the compromise agreement.

The cost of our doing so, ensures a clean conclusion to the matter and gives you peace of mind, leaving you to get on with running your business.

Our involvement can include attending meetings and corresponding with the employee and their advisors through to drafting the compromise agreement itself. Or having negotiated a deal you can simply engage us to draft the document.