Key Policies for our Staff Handbook

The importance of having strong policies that cover your legal obligations and looked at Maternity Leave, Paternity Leave and Shared Parental Leave.

In this article, we are going to look at two other important policies for your handbook and that’s Disability and Equal Opportunities:

In order to comply with the Disability Discrimination Act of 1995, it is essential that you have a Disability Policy and Procedure that details exactly how your business deals with and manages issues connected with employing staff who suffer from a disability or who have had a previous disability.

The Disability Policy and Procedure applies not only to your permanent staff but also to any potential staff member and even people in the job application process.

Having and following a solid equal opportunities policy has been the lifeline of many businesses as, unfortunately, discrimination has become one of the most frequent reasons cited by employees at Employment tribunals. 

Average discrimination claims are around £100,000 over the past few years so it’s a cost not many small business can easily absorb.

Protected characteristics are words that come up very often in these instances and it’s critical that you have a strong policy and philosophy to Equal Opportunities. Some of the main characteristics include age, disability, gender, nationality, sexual orientation and religion to name a few.

Both Disability and Equal Opportunities are critical policies to have within your Staff Handbook, not just to protect your business but to demonstrate to your staff and future staff how seriously your company takes its employment obligations.