Managing Long Term Absence – when enough is enough

The Employment Rights Act clearly states that it is fair to dismiss an employee for reasons related to “capability”. There will come a point when an employee who is absent through long term sickness is incapable of doing the job they’re employed to do but the question is – when is that time? There is […]

Mental Health – conflict of interest

Mental health in the workplace is one of the most significant HR challenges and rarely is there a disciplinary or grievance issue or bullying investigation or a performance management issue where mental health is not referenced. It is an ever present in the workplace and it is important to understand from a legal standpoint that […]

The HR Challenges of a Heatwave

The HR Challenges of a heatwave. So typically British – we are only happy when we’re talking about the weather. The Summer also poses challenges for those that aren’t on holiday – they are stuck inside and may be covering colleagues and having to deal with stuffy offices with poor Air Con, windows that don’t […]

Job Descriptions

What is a job description? A job description – often just called a JD – is a documentation of the scope, duties, tasks, responsibilities and accountabilities of a job and also in many cases sets out through a person specification a summary of the skills, experience, competences, attributes and personal qualities etc that the potential […]

Sexism at Work

It doesn’t matter if it is the BBC, Westminster, the Police – every single day we see a new article in the media about sexism, sexual conduct or misogyny at work. Consequently, the whole subject of sexism in the workplace is back on the agenda like never before and what we see, in some cases, […]

Occupational Health Referrals

This article covers the topic of Occupational Health Referrals. In the last few years, there has been a significant increase in long term work related absence, much of it in connection with mental health, stress and anxiety but also being driven by symptoms of long- Covid. Whatever the cause of the absence, it causes operational […]

Downsides of Remote Working

Remote working – the downsides Everyone is spending so much time extolling the virtues of  remote/home working and let’s be clear – it is great and has massive advantages. But, the debate must be balanced – there are downsides to remote working. What are some of the possible drawbacks of remote/home working? Learning and development challenges […]

Covid-19 Relaxation in the Workplace

“I’ve not had a day off sick in 20 years……!” How many times have you heard employees say that they haven’t had a day off sick for 20 years? There is a perception that it is said in such a way that we are meant to be very impressed and they deserve a medal but […]

Out of Court Settlements

In the world of HR Support, we spend much of our time sorting and settling cases before they get anywhere near an Employment Tribunals saving legal costs and the risk of reputational damage because Tribunal proceedings are open to the public. So, let’s answer a few questions? What are  Settlement agreements and ACAS COT3s? These […]

Personal Relationships at Work Q&A

Given that we spend so much of our time in or around the workplace, there is an inevitability that employees will find themselves embroiled in personal relationships at work. So, what are the issues? And whilst this may seem like a ridiculous question – what is a relationship at work? Personal relationships at work are […]

15 factors to be mindful of when developing a Commission scheme for Sales people

Here are ABHR Solutions’ 15 factors to be mindful of when developing a Commission scheme for Sales people.  Do you base it on sales revenue or profit – no right or wrong answer and it will depend on a multiple number of factors for the business at the time. The “bean counters” will always say […]

11 Top Tips for Bonus Scheme Arrangements

It is very common for a business to have various bonus scheme arrangements and these will vary from very ad hoc, unstructured and informal schemes to highly measurable schemes with clear criteria for payment. So, if you’re thinking about introducing a Bonus scheme, what should you consider – here are our 11 top tips. Decide whether […]

Managing frequent short term absence with the Bradford Factor

Sickness absence is a massive factor in business and it can manifest itself either with as an employee having a period of long term absence which may be directly related to a specific issue – say mental health or an employee may have frequent periods of short term absence – often not requiring a medical […]

The value of quality employment references

We’ve all seen the expression “subject to satisfactory references” in contracts and offer letters but whilst the whole process of obtaining references is quite time consuming, the real question is – does it add any value and are references worth the paper they’re written on? The true test of the value attached to the process […]

Bullying… or Performance Management

More and more businesses are facing internal complaints from employees that they are being bullied and invariably, this gets managed through the grievance procedure and is investigated.  In extreme cases, the employee who is being accused of bullying may be suspended whilst the investigation takes place. However, it is quite conceivable that after investigation, the […]

Relationships at Work

Given that we spend so much of our time in or around the workplace, there is an inevitability that employees will find themselves embroiled in personal relationships at work. So, what are the issues? And whilst this may seem like a ridiculous question – what is a relationship at work? Let’s deal with the latter […]

What is HR Support?

Our message at AB HR Solutions is simple – we provide HR Support to business. But what does this mean? It does NOT mean that we become your out-sourced HR Department. Our value added model provides HR Support to businesses – often SMEs – who are not large enough to need a dedicated HR team […]

Training Clawback Agreements

There has been a significant increase in situations where a Company wants to recover the cost of training from an employee where the employee leaves the Company soon after the training has been completed. This is where introducing a training clawback agreement can be useful.  The idea of recovering of training costs is not new but the high cost […]

Confidentiality Clauses

Confidentiality clauses protect employers and employees. During the course of their employment, an employee is under an implied duty of confidentiality and is therefore under an obligation not to disclose to unauthorised third parties confidential information and trade secrets about their employment obtained during the course of their employment. Why does it matter? This is important […]

The Menopause in the Workplace

The menopause is not the “taboo” subject that it used to be but there is a strong argument to say that employers must do more in the workplace and acknowledge the way in which its symptoms impact women at work. Many large corporate businesses have embraced this subject and put policies and processes in place […]