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Date: 05 February 2013

‘You’re too old’ boss tells ill PA

A personal assistant whose boss joked ‘I want to trade you in for a younger model’ has won her unfair dismissal claim. Her boss often teased her about her age and consequently the assistant felt forced to resign after she developed a joints disease. The boss said taking time off work was ‘disruptive’ she told a London employment tribunal. Her payout will be decided later.

Date: 05 February 2013

Changes to minimise tribunal claims

There have been some recent changes to the tribunal claim system which aim to reduce the number of claims being made.
We feel this may be of interest to many of our clients. See below for the latest:

Before lodging a claim at an employment tribunal, employees will be required to contact ACAS with details of their case. Once contact is made, the employee will be offered pre-claim conciliation (PCC) for one month. If it is refused by the employer or the employee, or settlement is not achieved within the month, the employee will be entitled to lodge a claim at an employment tribunal. If however both parties agree to engage PCC, it will “suspend” the time period in which the employee can lodge his or her claim at an employment tribunal.
This meaning, ACAS will work with you to find a solution acceptable to both, so that you can avoid the need for the matter to be heard by a tribunal. If the claimant still wishes to pursue their claim then claims must be made within a specified time of the events they concern. In most cases this is three months.

Date: 11 January 2013

A New Year and its all change

It has been announced that the new maximum compensatory award for unfair dismissal will increase from £72,300 to £74,200. This will apply where the effective date of termination occurs on or after 1 February 2013.

The maximum amount of a week’s pay used, for example, when calculating the basic award for unfair dismissal and statutory redundancy payments, will increase from £430 to £450.

Increases to the rates of statutory sick pay (SSP), statutory maternity pay (SMP), statutory paternity pay (SPP) and statutory adoption pay (SAP) have also been announced and will apply from April 2013. The new rates are:

£136.78 for SMP, SPP and SAP, increased from £135.45 per week; and
£86.70 for SSP, increased from £85.85 per week.

Date: 20 November 2012

Keeping you in the know..

From January 2013 the Government will begin to go ahead and start to reform flexible parental leave and flexible working.

The proposals include:

- Eligible parents being able to end leave early and sharing the untaken maternity leave and pay as flexible parental leave.

- The new system of flexible parental leave will consist of 50 weeks parental leave (37 weeks paid as statutory maternity pay) shared between the mother and her partner.

- Flexible parental leave will be able to be taken by the biological father or the mother’s partner (husband, civil partner or partner, including the same sex). They can take it in turns or at the same time.

- This meaning the mother does not have to return to work before the father can begin flexible parental leave.

- Arrangements for adopters and intended cases of surrogacy will be addressed and changed.

- A new right for fathers to take unpaid leave to attend two antenatal appointments with their pregnant partner.

Flexible working will also be addressed and redesigned but this does not look to take place until 2014.

Date: 23 October 2012

National Minimum Wage

For those of you that didn’t already know the national minimum wage increased from October 1st 2012.

21 and over – £6.19

18-20 – £4.98

Under 18 – £3.68

Apprentice – £2.65

Date: 23 October 2012

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