May Day Changes

Two significant changes affected the employment law landscape this May.

1.     TUPE

Further to the TUPE changes which were seen earlier this year, on 1 May 2014, the TUPE Regulations were amended so that the deadline for providing Employee Liability Information (“ELI”) to the Transferee, increased from at least 14 days prior to the transfer, to at least 28 days prior to the transfer. The change only affects transfers taking place on or after 1 May 2014.

The purpose of providing ELI on a TUPE transfer, allows the Transferee to assess what employee liabilities it will inherit from the Transferor, in order to plan its business accordingly post-transfer.

The thinking behind the change is to give the Transferee further time to plan in advance of the transfer taking place, though with criticism often directed at the narrow scope of what ELI comprises in the first place, it remains to be seen whether businesses will welcome this change with enthusiasm.

2.     Early Conciliation

From 6 May 2014, ACAS Early Conciliation (“EC”) became mandatory.

Following the introduction of mandatory EC, ACAS published some interesting figures:

• Since its original launch, around 1,000 people have contacted ACAS about EC;
• 98% of those who contacted ACAS went on to try the service; and
• 100 Employers had contacted ACAS to try EC.

ACAS Chair, Sir Brendan Barber, said:

"Early Conciliation has got off to a very good start and has given us the chance to help more people resolve their disputes early as well as save taxpayers some of the cost of running the tribunal system.

The public have repeatedly told us how much they value the skills and experience of our conciliation staff. It is thanks to their professionalism and hard work that so many people have decided to try EC since its launch on 6 April."

It may take some time (and further figures) to determine the extent to which EC is considered a success. Whilst initial indications are positive in this respect, we have spoken to a number of ACAS Conciliators who have come across what they consider to be vexatious claims.

In their view, EC has provided a mechanism for those not prepared to pay the issue fee and bring a claim, to try and negotiate a settlement when they may otherwise not have attempted to. In this sense, employers may view EC with scepticism as a result.