Written statement of employment particulars

Under sections 1 and 2 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 (ERA 96), employees have the right to a written statement of particulars of their employment. This must be given to the employee no later than eight weeks after the employment begins, and must include:

• the names of the employer and the employee;

• the date the employment began and the period of continuous employment;

• the scale and rate of remuneration, pay intervals and the method of calculating pay;

• terms relating to hours of work and any terms as to normal working hours;

• holiday entitlement and holiday pay, including public holidays, and any entitlement to accrued holiday pay on termination of the employment;

• rules about sickness or injury absence and sick pay;

• pensions and pension schemes;

• length of notice the employee is obliged to give and entitled to receive;

• job title or a brief description of duties;

• whether the employment is permanent or if it is fixed term, the date when it is expected to end;

• place of work, or if the employee required or permitted to work at various places, confirmation of this and the employer’s address;

• details of the employer’s disciplinary and grievance procedures (or information about where to find them) (See Chapter 10);

• any collective agreements affecting the employment contract;

• certain further particulars where the employment is outside the UK for more than a month each year.

Information about sickness absence procedures, sick pay and pensions can be included in another document (such as a handbook) that the employee has reasonable opportunity to read in the course of employment.

Overtime is not specifically mentioned in the above list. However, in Lange v Georg Schunemann GmbH ([2001] IRLR 244), the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruled that if overtime is an essential element of the contractual relationship so that employees should normally do it if requested, it must be referred to in the written statement.

According to the ECJ in Kampelmann and others v Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe ([1998] IRLR 333), simply providing details of the job title without any further description is not sufficient.

As regards notice requirements, it is sufficient for the statement to refer the employee to the law on the matter (see Chapter 10: Termination with/without notice) or to a collective agreement, as long as there are opportunities to see it at work.

If there are no terms relating to any of the above items, this also must be stated.

The right to a written statement does not apply only to new employees. Existing employees can ask for a statement of their particulars if they do not have one.

If the employer does not provide a written statement, the employee can refer the matter to a tribunal at any time while they are working for the employer, or within three months of the ending of the employment (or later, if a tribunal decides it was not reasonably practicable for them to do so within the three months).

Once tribunal fees are introduced in Summer 2013, this claim will attract an issue fee of £160, followed by a hearing fee of £230 (see Chapter 1).

A tribunal can decide what terms and conditions have been agreed, based on whatever evidence is available, but it cannot change the terms that have been agreed (Eagland v BT [1992] IRLR 323).

If the particulars of employment change, the employer must give the employee a written statement of the change within one month of the change (section 4, ERA 96).