Notice

Q        Following consultation, I unfortunately need to give notice of redundancy to two members of staff.  Their contracts of employment state that it's a month's notice on either side, but one employee has two years' service and the other has six years' service.  How much notice should I give?

A        The employee who has two years' service should be given one month's notice, in line with the contract of employment.  The employee with six years' service will be entitled to six weeks' notice.  In this situation the statutory notice period, which is one week's notice for each complete year of service up to a maximum of 12 weeks, takes precedence over the written contract.  Whenever there is in any discrepancy between the contract and a statutory entitlement, the higher should always take precedence.

Q        A member of my team has just resigned, giving one month's notice.  However, they are being incredibly disruptive; can I ask them to leave without working their notice?

A        The only way you could terminate the contract of employment without notice would be if they were dismissed for gross misconduct.  However, in order for this to be fair and reasonable, they would have to have been seriously disruptive and you would still need to follow the Company's disciplinary procedures. 

If your contract of employment allows it, you could pay in lieu of notice or place the employee on garden leave for the duration of their notice period.  If you don't reserve the right in your contract to do either of these, you could potentially still do it, but be aware this is technically a breach of contract and could make other clauses, such as restrictive covenants null and void.  However, in respect of being in breach of the notice clause, very few people are going to complain about being paid not to attend work!

Q        I have an employee who is approaching their 65th birthday.  Given that they already know they are going to retire on that date, do I need to give them any further notice?

A        You do not have to give notice to terminate their employment, but you must write to an employee between 12 and six months before they are due to retire notifying them of their impending retirement and of their right to request to work beyond their original retirement date if they wish to do so.

Q        I unfortunately need to terminate the employment of one of my members of staff who has been off on long term sick leave.  They have exhausted their entitlement to company and statutory sick pay, so presumably the notice period will also be unpaid.