Obliged to sign a new employment contract?
Discussion
A friend of mine (no really, it is a friend!) has been in her job for 5 years, it's a specialist consultative sales role in a niche industry for a small company of 20 employees. The business is doing reasonably well, but the management/directors/owners are bit "wing it" when it comes to things like compliance and GDPR etc.
Today, completely out of the blue, she has been presented with a new employment contract to sign which is significantly different to the one she has been employed under from the start. There are a lot of new clauses around working hours (such as their ability to cut her hours, or temporary lay-offs at will), notice periods have been altered, and a non-competition clause that last for 12 months but across the whole industry, rather than just in a similar employer. It also states that she has to take 3 days off at Christmas when the business is closed, previously these were discretionary days.
There are no obvious incentives in the contract for her, and everything seems geared towards the employer.
There has been no consultation on this with her, or any of her co-workers. There are two other people who do the same role as her who have also been given the new contract.
She is off work next week and is going to check the legal cover on her home insurance to see if employment matters are covered, but in the meantime, are employers allowed to insist on a new contract like this without any notice?
If she refuses to sign it, what are the possible implications?
What is the correct process that a business should follow if they wanted to change the contracts in this way?
Thanks!
Today, completely out of the blue, she has been presented with a new employment contract to sign which is significantly different to the one she has been employed under from the start. There are a lot of new clauses around working hours (such as their ability to cut her hours, or temporary lay-offs at will), notice periods have been altered, and a non-competition clause that last for 12 months but across the whole industry, rather than just in a similar employer. It also states that she has to take 3 days off at Christmas when the business is closed, previously these were discretionary days.
There are no obvious incentives in the contract for her, and everything seems geared towards the employer.
There has been no consultation on this with her, or any of her co-workers. There are two other people who do the same role as her who have also been given the new contract.
She is off work next week and is going to check the legal cover on her home insurance to see if employment matters are covered, but in the meantime, are employers allowed to insist on a new contract like this without any notice?
If she refuses to sign it, what are the possible implications?
What is the correct process that a business should follow if they wanted to change the contracts in this way?
Thanks!
Just as update to this, my friend has spoken to a few of her colleagues over the weekend, and they too are not happy. A few other issues have been pointed out within the wording of the new contract, and employment lawyers are being contacted tomorrow by a couple of people.
I'll update as and when appropriate for those that are interested.
Thank you for the input so far, it's certainly given some food for thought.
I'll update as and when appropriate for those that are interested.
Thank you for the input so far, it's certainly given some food for thought.
My friend finishes her job on Friday - she refused to sign the new contract, got her CV updated and hit all of the local recruiters hard. 5 interviews in 8 days, resulting in 2 job offers with significant increases.
Her notice was handed in, and the reason she gave in writing was that the new contract terms made her position untenable.
It's not all rosy though....
In the 3 weeks that she handed her notice in, she has not been told who to handover to, and she has an active client base that are asking questions and still need ongoing support. The directors have blanked her, her line manager has asked her to ensure all her client notes and billing are up to date which she has done, but then said he wants them in a different format - whcih she has done, and now has said she has to create a manual folder with hard copies of all the documentation which is already duplicated across 2 CRM systems....
Two other people have left since the contracts were presented to them all, both have been stitched up on their last pay packet by a few hundred quid, and are having fun trying to get it rectified.
A few other people have been keeping diaries of various events and issues that have arisen in the last few months, notably bullying and harassment, 2 are currently engaging with ACAS, and my friend has an employment solicitor on stand by for a constructive dismissal claim.
It has been a salient lesson in how not to manage a team.
Her notice was handed in, and the reason she gave in writing was that the new contract terms made her position untenable.
It's not all rosy though....
In the 3 weeks that she handed her notice in, she has not been told who to handover to, and she has an active client base that are asking questions and still need ongoing support. The directors have blanked her, her line manager has asked her to ensure all her client notes and billing are up to date which she has done, but then said he wants them in a different format - whcih she has done, and now has said she has to create a manual folder with hard copies of all the documentation which is already duplicated across 2 CRM systems....
Two other people have left since the contracts were presented to them all, both have been stitched up on their last pay packet by a few hundred quid, and are having fun trying to get it rectified.
A few other people have been keeping diaries of various events and issues that have arisen in the last few months, notably bullying and harassment, 2 are currently engaging with ACAS, and my friend has an employment solicitor on stand by for a constructive dismissal claim.
It has been a salient lesson in how not to manage a team.
Jasandjules said:
If she has a new role which pays more her "constructive dismissal" losses will be slim to nothing, it will cost her more in fees to even draft the claim....
I'm looking into that now - I wasn't aware that could have implications and her solicitors didn't mention it either - she does have cover through her house insurance legal cover and I've been helping with some of the correspondence.Although she is out of the place, and better for it, she is fully expecting to be messed around on her final wage that is due next month, so we'll cross that hurdle when we come to it.
Her employers aren't the most clued up - they are quite maverick on a lot of issues so I'm not convinced that they are trying to bluff her or just being wilfully awkward.
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