HR FAQ's

As a minimum, businesses who employ either employees or workers need to be able to cover their workers Statutory employment rights. These Statutory rights range from day one rights to what is known as enhanced employment rights. In addition to the legal side, commercially, you have an operation to run which your people are integral to. Resulting you need to have HR processes in place to ensure your operation can effectively Attract – Engage – Develop – Retain staff. Complete our HR health check form to benchmark the effectiveness of your people management tools and processes.

A Statutory employment right is a basic right that either an employee or worker is legally entitled to. These are typically automatic rights i.e. from day one and form the basis of fair treatment within the workplace. Some Statutory rights are acquired by length of service which are known as ‘enhanced employment rights’.

Examples of day one employment rights for either employee or workers include: Written Particulars of Employment (Contract of employment) Itemised wage slip National minimum wage Unlawful deduction from wages Equal pay Paid annual leave (Statutory paid holiday) Protection under TUPE Weekly and daily rest periods Protection from detriment for Trade Union membership Protection against discrimination Protection for ‘whistleblowers’ Protection from automatic unfair dismissal Statutory sick pay (workers maybe) Breach of contract (not workers) Statutory maternity leave & adoption leave (not workers) Statutory bereavement leave (not workers) Paid time off for various activities (not workers) Flexible working requests (not workers) Time off for dependants (not workers)

Yes, employees and workers are two different employment statuses with which, employees receive further rights as they accumulate length or service (and workers do not). These are known as enhanced statutory employment rights. Examples of enhanced employment rights include: Minimum statutory notice periods Unfair dismissal Redundancy pay Medical suspension pay Shared parental & paternity leave Adoption, shared parental, Maternity, and Parental Bereavement pay.

At the very least, you require Contracts of Employment and, depending on your business’s complexity, several HR Policies to establish a framework for your operational tasks. For effective people management, we usually recommend the following policies as a foundation: Disciplinary Grievance Absence & time off Holiday Data Protection

The main purpose of the HR Health check is to benchmark your current people management protocols. How you attract–engage–develop–retain staff as without these practises your operation is blind in forecasting either growth or managing current / potential future obstacles. Health checks are not only relevant at the beginning of your HR journey but should be used periodically by way of best practise in continually reviewing your capabilities and efficiencies.

The obvious is when you are suffering with people matters whether getting the right people through the door. Engaging and motivating them. Or facing potential legal disputes. The other is keeping on top of the ever changing landscape of Employment law and rights to both employees and workers. All of these are indicators that you are ‘doing it’ wrong. The other side to ‘people issues’ or expert employment knowledge, is using staff as assets and leveraging your investment (wage bill) in them, something which Micro & SME sized businesses often overlook. At Bearman HR we have the experience and expertise to achieve this.

Yes! Our retained packages are typically cheaper than permanent salaries whilst benefiting from more senior HR experience. Furthermore, engaging in a Consultancy is more flexible and does not give employment rights like Holiday, Pension, Unfair dismissal, Redundancy etc.

The drawback of relying solely on retained HR arises when a continuous onsite HR presence becomes necessary. At this point, it is wise to recruit full-time HR staff for your business. However, before reaching this crucial stage, utilising a retained HR service offers significant benefits in establishing foundational processes and smoothly transferring responsibilities to the permanent HR team.

Like retained, but for specific HR departments that will already look after the ‘people function’ of the business but may look to outsource specific elements. Reasons could include: Looking for specialist expertise or escalation support Being stretched and snowed under Constantly firefighting and being unable to work on dedicated projects Needing confidential or additional impartial entity to run a process for you Looking to save on costs i.e. not a full-time requirement for certain aspect of HR

Actual outsource services could include (but not limited to): Recruitment, Selection & Onboarding Employee relation cases: Disciplinary, Absence management or Performance improvement Employee surveys Management / Leadership training Appraisals Staff forums / committees The Companies overall HR / People strategy

Yes! As with our retained packages, outsourcing is typically cheaper and more flexible than permanent employment. Established HR departments can look after the core day-day duties of the operation and outsource other HR aspects to benefit from industry specific expertise and flexibility.

There are four main formats available to best suit your needs: Ad hoc – Charged by the hour firstly, as a minimum 1hr charge, then any additional time at 30min intervals thereafter. HR Projects – Charged as a day rate. Retained – Either on a monthly Direct Debit or a discounted (typically 5%) annual fee. Outsourced – Upfront annual retainers.

One of our values is service excellence and we understand the complicating nature of employment law as well as the daily challenges of managing people. Therefore, as people management experts, the least we can do is make our services as simple and flexible as humanly possible for clients. As people management experts, we understand what makes company’s grow and achieve those additional revenues and increased profit returns. As a result, our services are specifically designed to facilitate achieving this. As we support our clients to prosper and grow, we are resultingly amplifying as well as securing our own sales pipeline; the pure essence of true business partnering!

The different levels of retained packages have been specifically designed to help you sustainably scale your business without the need of hiring permanent staff. We have supported and scaled 100-200 headcount multi-site organisations harmoniously due to the people strategies implemented. Once all the appropriate people management processes are fully embedded with staff and management, your business becomes self-sustaining. That is until your next growth phase which is reflected in the three levels of retained packages. This journey and our expertise are reflected in the different levels of packages.

For transparency, payment terms will always be provided within the quotation. Typically for documentation it will be based on an upfront charge (as per quote). For general consultancy works on 14 day invoicing terms and retained / outsourcing on either monthly Direct Debit or annual fee. However, the quotation will always be the principal precedent.

Retained HR is when firms have an ongoing need for HR, and they ‘retain’ the services of an expert HR Consultancy who become your external HR department for all your people matters. Micro and SMEs typically have this set up when they do not have enough of an ongoing need for a permanent HR department. Retained packages typically come in various sizes and offerings to lay the appropriate people management foundations at the relevant time so your firm scales sustainably.

These are more larger items that tend to be weekly or monthly tasks which is cleaner to be charged by the day as opposed to the hour. Examples of HR Projects can include: Reviewing current People Documentations i.e. Contracts & Policies holistically Disciplinary or Grievance processes Redundancy processes Absence & Wellbeing processes Staff appraisal processes Pay gradings and pay increase processes Performance processes i.e. 121s, S.M.A.R.T. goals, KPIs Design and implement staff forum / committees

Ad hoc – no strings attached, is essentially ‘pay as you go’. These are typically standalone, singular items that need to be dealt with in a timely manner with no contract or ongoing commitment required.

No! We know that growth is driven by quality and flexibility so why would we inhibit growth and tie people into long term contracts? For our retained services, we do implement a mutual notice period, typically 3 months (90 days). This is to ensure a smooth transition of service to non-service to eliminate any operational hiccups for either party.

In short, yes you can. However, as with all things at Bearman HR, each molecule of what we do and why we do it has been meticulously considered. Resultingly, we would normally advise against mixing and matching to benefit from the different elements of the package because they are designed to complement each other in such a way to facilitate growth. However, your operation will always be our guiding principle, therefore if for example, your operation was much more process driven as opposed to administrative, we could of course look to eradicate one service to fit an another to make a bespoke offering to suit your needs.