Employer Advice

For Employee advice you will find one of the following pages more helpful:

Employment regulations are constantly changing. So, Curwens' Employment Team are here to guide you through the maze of "best practice".  We can offer you HR advice to help cut through the red tape of regulation and free your time so that you can run your business efficiently. 

We work with you so that we can understand your short and long term plans, including expansion or restructuring. We can help you formalise terms of employment, prepare staff handbooks, implement HR procedures, comply with employment law. By taking over these HR functions for you we can allow you to do what you do best - run  your business.

Curwens’ employer services include:

HR Support

To advise your HR Department on changes in Employment Law and assist in their implementation. In addition, you can use our Employment Team as a sounding board to check that any changes in your staff's employment terms comply with the latest regulations.  We can also offer peace of mind by guiding you through any disciplinary actions or grievance procedures.

Self-Employed or Employee

Whether an individual can be classed as self-employed or an employee has become an increasingly complex area of law and every individual situation needs to be judged on its own circumstances.

Even if an individual does not meet the legal definition of an “Employee” they may still be a worker and afforded protection under anti-discrimination legislation, the Working Time Regulations 1998, the Minimum Wage Act 1998 to name but a few.

We can guide you through the various factors which the Tribunal will take into account when considering whether an individual is in reality an employee or self employed so that you will be aware of the level of protection afforded to that person under employment legislation.

Defending Employment Tribunal claims.

We appreciate that it may be a daunting prospect when you receive an Employment Tribunal claim from an employee or former employee which is required to be responded within a stipulated time period. You may consider the claim to be without merit and we can advise you from an early stage as to the strengths any defence and also the litigation risk of fighting the matter at Tribunal. We can also advise tactically as to how to best defend any claim and also the commercial benefits at settling the case at an early stage to avoid the legal costs of having to prepare the matter to an Employment Tribunal.

 

Redundancy procedures.

We understand in the current climate that you may be forced to make redundancies. However, even if there is a genuine redundancy situation or restructuring, we often find employers fail to follow the correct procedure, which can then result in the employee that is being made redundant, bringing a claim against them at the Tribunal and being awarded significant compensation.

By taking advice at an early stage you can significantly reduce the risk of  an employee making a claim to the Employment Tribunal or in the event that a claim is made present the best possible defence to the action.

We have extensive experience in advising businesses on the correct procedures to be followed when making 20 or more employees redundant where a more complex procedure will be adopted.

Changing terms and conditions of employment.

As an alternative to making redundancies, you may wish to consider altering your staff's terms and conditions of employment and so making necessary savings by reducing their hours, salary, benefits, annual leave entitlement etc. 

Unless the procedure is handled properly, such reductions could amount to a fundamental breach of contract entitling an employee to resign and claim constructive dismissal at the Employment Tribunal. This could involve you not only incurring legal costs in defending the action but may result in significant compensation being awarded to the employee.

We can advise on how you should handle such a procedure so that it is done correctly and in our experience when the correct procedure is followed, staff will often voluntarily agree to the changes being sought so that savings are achieved without any legal action and perhaps, more importantly, staff disaffection.

Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 (TUPE).

The TUPE Regulations 2006 are a legal minefield. We can help navigate you through the Regulations, giving clear and practical advice as to the steps to be followed so that your staff are correctly consulted.  Failure to consult and inform can result in a claim being made by every affected employee, so that the cost implications of mishandling the process can be enormous.

Our Employment Team has a wealth of experience in defending employers against claims brought by employees in the Employment Tribunal, High Court and County Court.

 

 

Meet the Team

We have an experienced team of seven qualified Solicitors specialising in and dedicated to issues involving employment law in addition to three Trainees/Paralegals. We pride ourselves on the quality of advice we give. We are frequently praised by clients for our extensive knowledge of this often complex and developing area of law and also our ability to advise in a clear and concise manner whilst offering pragmatic and tactical solutions. 

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