Policies, Procedures and Staff Handbook

As an employer in the UK today it is no longer enough to simply have a contract of employment as the one and only defining document that details your and your employees’ rights and obligations to each other. You should also consider handbooks and policy/procedure documents to supplement the employment contracts. These can help to cover all those areas and subjects that don’t fit into the employment contract and which affect every employee regardless of their level inside the business. Hewetts are experienced at creating and drafting documents for businesses of all sizes.

Staff Handbook

A Staff Handbook can outline the purpose and goals of your business, so that your employees are aware of them, and are working toward helping you achieve them. It can describe the structure of your business, along with the various departments and their areas of expertise. It can also detail miscellaneous procedures like incoming post, outgoing communications, dress, telephone manner, fire and security etc.

Disciplinary Procedure

Properly defined disciplinary procedures are vitally important to modern businesses. By having a definite procedure in place, and by following it, your business can make a far stronger argument that it is a reasonable employer in the eyes of the court/tribunal.

You might wish to think on the following things. What is the procedure your business adopts when taking disciplinary action against employees? Do you work on a stepped system? Are your employees aware of which offences are graver than others? Are they aware that there is a procedure at all? Does your procedure fall within ACAS guidelines (thereby affording greater protection if the employee were to bring legal action against you)?

Grievance Procedure

As with disciplinary procedures, well-defined grievance procedures are vital for modern businesses. Your employees should be allowed a voice within your business, and they should have definite procedures available to them to facilitate that. A court or tribunal will frown very strongly upon any business without a procedure for raising grievances.

So ask yourself, what is the procedure available to your employees if they wish to raise a grievance about the business or against someone within the business? Are they aware that the procedure exists? Again, does it fall within ACAS guidelines?

Further Policies

You may also wish to consider policies for the following:

• Alcohol and Drugs use
• Email, Fax and Internet use
• The business’ policy on Equal Opportunities for employees
• Harassment and Discrimination
• Maternity, Paternity, Parental Leave
• Sickness and Attendance
• Smoking
• Stress
• Whistle-blowing
• Time off work for Training
• Sunday Work

Some of these polices and procedures might not be relevant for your business, but there are definitely some that will be. At Hewetts we can draft any of the above policies for your business, which can be based on you your business specifically. We can update old policies or introduce whole new ones.

If you are interested in creating any of these documents we would be happy to arrange an interview for you.

Frequently Asked Questions

1.  Are these documents legally enforceable?

Once in place these procedures will become part of the practice of your business. They are not legal documents that bind both parties, but they are heavily influential in court and tribunal proceedings. In order to give them weight you must make sure that, as an employer, you follow these procedures along with your employees.

2.  How should they be incorporated into the business?

You must have these documents available and viewable by your employees. You must also make old and new employees aware of them in the first place. We can advise you once the documents are completed on how best to implement them.