The purpose of outsourcing is to enable small business owners to focus on their business, take control over the overhead costs, gain accessibility to the best in human resource information system technology, gain compliance expertise and help to improve employee service.
Examples of HR functions that are generally outsourced include:
- Payroll
- Benefits administration
- Recruitment and tasks linked to risk management
- Employment law, contract and handbook preparation, and reacting to issues as they arise.
What are HR services?
HR services refer to the human resources department which offers services and answers any of the employees’ queries, as well as supporting the company’s interests in its employees.
Why is HR important?
HR is important for a business to run successfully because it involves so much more than just hiring, firing, and pay reviews. It includes all elements of people management; communication and is key in creating a positive culture within a firm. If a company didn’t have HR, employees wouldn’t know what to do, what their role involves, what is expected of them, and would have no recourse for any issues they may have.
Why is HR outsourcing important?
HR outsourcing is important because firstly it helps businesses minimise the chances of risk. Employment laws are continuously changing which makes it hard for employers to be kept updated with regulations that could impact the workplace. As a result, HR outsourcing enables businesses to stay on top of employment laws and to ensure organisations act under these laws so that claims in the Tribunal can be avoided at all costs.
In addition to this, HR outsourcing has the added benefit that it is cost-effective, whereby it helps to decrease the cost of maintaining non-revenue-generating back-office expenses. This is particularly beneficial for smaller businesses.
Finally, ensuring that the workplace is both productive and efficient is of paramount importance and this can be achieved with HR outsourcing. Outsourcing enables both employers and managers to do less paperwork heavy tasks and to dedicate this energy to the workforce instead.
An added benefit of Thrive’s Outsourced HR Package is that getting your HR services from a solicitor means, should a case ever proceed to Tribunal everything we have ever discussed is protected by legal privilege, meaning all conversations are protected. Whereas if you were to use an HR consultant, all conversations and documentation regarding that employee would be disclosable in tribunal; this makes it much more difficult to have full and frank conversations when the going gets tough.
What are the 7 major HR activities?
So, what are the common HR duties? What do we do here at Thrive as part of our outsourced HR services?
Contracts
We stay constantly up-to-date with the latest laws to ensure that policies introduced into the company are following the law. Staying on top of employment regulations helps to reduce the chances of companies experiencing employment-related risks. It’s also important to ensure that contracts actually reflect what happens in your business; if your employees are all working from home due to Covid-19, your contracts should reflect that.
Furlough
On Thursday 24 September 2020, Chancellor Rishi Sunak put the Job Retention Scheme in place which was planned to end on 31 October and then was replaced by the Job Support Scheme from the 1 November. We have been inundated with queries about furlough on our coronavirus helpline, and this allowed us to support our HR clients further and pre-empt any issues they may not have spotted from the legislation and guidance alone.
Restructure
The process of restructuring can be a complex and demanding process for HR representatives because they ultimately have to manage an entire workforce during a restructure. HR may be involved in guiding employees on the methodology of a restructure, get involved in the management of the entire restructure program including expected costs, the timeframe for each restructured stage as well the potential claim assessments. There are a few consideration points when discussing restructuring. This includes: maintaining constant communication with stakeholders, managing employee productivity, retaining critical employees, and even managing payrolls and records.
Thrive can help with this, we can guide managers through the entire process, and prepare all the documents you need.
Redundancy
The redundancy process is a legal requirement that ensures that businesses have followed all steps and procedures to avoid making staff redundant. It tells the employees that as an employer, you have taken all the appropriate channels and followed the correct protocol to ensure that when people are made redundant, it is done so for the right reasons. It also prevents the risk of a successful tribunal claim. The process of redundancy can take up to 1 month if multiple employees are at risk of redundancy.
There are usually five steps that can lead to redundancy, this includes:
1) Establishing a clear business reason for redundancy
2) Clearly identifying roles that could be at risk of redundancy
3) Keeping staff aware of who is in the “at-risk category” when it comes to redundancies
4) Ensuring that HR is involved in redundancy consultation meetings.
5) Whether there are any alternatives to redundancy
Here at Thrive, we have prepared a redundancy guide which we can sell at a fixed fee; please enquire for more information. Our HR clients get it for free!
Long term sickness absence
Employees who are off sick for more than 4 weeks consecutively usually count as long-term sickness
employees. This is a difficult time for an employer to deal with, considering how to support that employee to return to work and
balancing that
with whether they are capable of any such return. There may also be the added factor that the employee may be disabled. We guide our HR clients through issues such as these all the time.
Reasonable adjustments
Where an employee is disabled, they are entitled to reasonable adjustments to lessen the impact of any practice, criteria or provision which is detrimental to them because of their disability. This can include altering equipment, changing working hours, etc. We assist our clients to identify when people qualify for such adjustments, and also identifying what those adjustments should be.
Discrimination
All companies have a clear obligation not to discriminate against employees, and very few would do so deliberately. Often, HR points out where an employer may be accidentally discriminatory.
Why Thrive?
As an owner-run company, we know the pains of having to wear many hats and how time is precious. As qualified employment and HR lawyers, we know the consequences of getting HR decisions wrong. We work with you to let you focus on what you really need to be doing in the business with the peace of mind that all letters and decisions are run past a qualified lawyer before you implement them.
When you partner with Thrive for outsourced HR support, we can reduce your stress and free you up to work on the business and to make HR decisions with confidence.
With people at the core of every successful business, keeping on top of the ever-changing legislation and making the most out of your people can be challenging, but we are here to help.
We can also support your business in the event an employee approaches ACAS or the employment tribunal
Get in touch today to invest in your business and make your HR stress free. Email Jodie.hill@thrivelaw.co.uk
Disclaimer
Please note this blog is for reference purposes only. It does not constitute legal advice and should not be relied upon as such. Specific legal advice about your specific circumstances should always be sought separately before taking or deciding not to take any action. Please contact us if you have any questions on enquires@thrivelaw.co.uk
