Answers to your HR headaches
At Employers Direct, we want you to know how to deal with a staff management problem before it even happens.
To help you, here are the answers to some of the most common questions we heard from employers this month topics:
One of my staff emailed me to say he’ll be “out for a few days” and hasn’t told me when he’ll return. Should I pay him sick leave?
You only pay him Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) if he is sick and he qualifies for it. Assuming he’s both sick and qualifies, SSP starts when his absence lasts four days or more and he serves three unpaid ‘waiting days’.
When he returns, hold a return-to-work interview with him to find out why he was off and see what you both can do to help him stay in work.
But because he hasn’t explained why he’s off, he could face disciplinary procedures. Check your company absence policy to see if there’s a section on staff failing to report their absences.
I’ve taken on a part-time employee who I may need to work overtime. What rate should I pay her?
She may work fewer hours than your full-time staff, but you can’t pay her a lower rate just because she’s part time.
To know how much to pay her, check her contract of employment where it should include her rate of pay. You can pay her for the overtime at a rate equal to, greater than, or lower than her basic wage.
If your company pays overtime at a lower rate than her basic wage, then her overtime rate can’t be below the National Minimum Wage or National Living Wage.
Most of my staff work 9am-5.30pm Monday to Friday, but two of them work a four-day week. How do I work out the number of days’ holiday leave I should give to them?
By law, all your workers get 5.6 working weeks’ holiday per leave year, whether they work full-time or part-time.
You calculate it by multiplying the number of days they work per week by 5.6. So, your full-time staff get 28-days’ paid holiday leave whilst your part-time staff get 22.4-days’ paid holiday leave.