New rules would allow trade unions to formally request access to your workplace once they come into force. If you repeatedly breach an access agreement, you could be looking at fines of up to £500,000. That's not a typo. And this isn't something you can quietly sit out. The Employment Rights Act 2025 introduces two separate trade union obligations, with workplace access planned for 30 October 2026, subject to parliamentary approval, and the written statement duty planned for

Guidance from an HR consultant in Ipswich on how to handle menopause at work, protect your business from tribunal claims, and keep your best people. The Equality and Human Rights Commission published new employer guidance on menopause in 2024. Tribunals are already using it as a benchmark for how businesses should be responding. Menopause-related claims have jumped from 64 in 2022 to over 200 in 2024. That's more than three times the number in just two years. If you haven't l

If you've never had to deal with a trade union, October might change that. From 1 October 2026, every employer in England, Wales and Scotland must give workers a written statement telling them that they have the right to join a trade union. That applies regardless of size or sector. And, if you have 21 or more workers, there's a second obligation. Trade unions will have a new statutory right to request access to your workplace, physically or digitally, to meet, recruit and or

A single tribunal claim can wipe out tens of thousands of pounds and consume months of your time. From January 2027, with the compensation cap being removed, those figures are only going to go up. The vast majority of claims don't start with a dramatic incident. They start with small things that turn into bigger issues. Maybe a concern that got brushed off or a grievance that dragged on. By the time someone contacts ACAS, the window to fix things cheaply closed long before. T

Insight from an HR consultant in Ipswich on the new third-party harassment duty arriving in October 2026 and what you need to do before it lands. From October 2026, you'll be legally responsible for protecting your team from harassment by customers, clients and members of the public. That's new. Right now, most harassment policies only deal with behaviour between colleagues. The incoming rules change that completely, and if you can't show what steps you took to prevent it, a

Guidance from an HR consultant in Ipswich on what recent tribunal cases tell us about covert surveillance of employees on sick leave, and what you should do instead. Three employers have recently been hit with tribunal findings of unfair dismissal and disability discrimination after secretly monitoring staff who were off sick. One of those employers is now facing a bill of more than £329,000. All three made the same fundamental mistake. They jumped from surveillance footage t

Support from an HR consultant in Ipswich to understand SOSR dismissals, avoid common pitfalls, and build an evidence trail that actually holds up. The rules around dismissal haven't changed recently, but the way tribunals scrutinise them has tightened. If you've ever considered letting someone go for a reason that doesn't neatly fit into misconduct, poor performance, or redundancy, you've probably come across the term SOSR. It stands for "some other substantial reason" and it

From October 2026, two separate legal duties around workplace harassment are changing under the Employment Rights Act 2025. The first: the duty to prevent sexual harassment is being upgraded. The current standard, taking "reasonable steps", is being replaced with "all reasonable steps". This means that a policy alone won't cut it anymore. You need to show that you've done everything you reasonably could to prevent harassment and that evidence has to be there before anything g

Guidance from an HR consultant in Ipswich on the casual interview questions that put your business at legal risk. The rules around what you can ask in a job interview have shifted over recent years. If you're running interviews the same way you did five or ten years ago, there's a good chance you're asking something you shouldn't be. The difficult part is that the most dangerous questions often feel completely harmless. They sound like small talk. But discrimination law doesn

Advice from an HR consultant in Ipswich on how to measure whether your employee benefits are delivering real results or just draining your budget. The cost of living has shifted what your people expect from you as an employer. Perks and benefits that felt generous two years ago might now be completely irrelevant to your team. If you're spending money on employee benefits but have no idea whether they're making a difference, that's a problem worth fixing. As an HR consultant,

Advice from an HR consultant in Ipswich on how recent law changes have made dismissing employees far riskier for small businesses. The rules around dismissing employees in the UK have shifted. If you're running a small business and you've been handling exits informally, the ground beneath you has moved. From January 2027, there'll be no cap on what a tribunal can award for unfair dismissal. And employees will qualify for protection much sooner than you're used to. Here's what

Guidance from an HR consultant in Ipswich on keeping your business running smoothly when summer holidays leave you short-staffed. Summer's coming, and so are the holiday requests. If you run a small team, even one or two people being away at the same time can take a real chunk out of your capacity. That's 20% of your workforce gone if you've got ten people. And if you haven't thought about how to handle it, you'll feel it. The good news is that a bit of planning now saves a l

Guidance from an HR consultant in Ipswich on what went wrong in a recent whistleblowing tribunal and why the financial stakes for employers are about to rise. The rules around unfair dismissal compensation are changing from January 2027. The statutory cap on what a tribunal can award is being removed entirely. If you're running a small business and making people decisions without proper advice, the cost of getting it wrong is about to increase sharply. A recent tribunal case

Support from an HR consultant in Ipswich can make the difference between defending a tribunal claim successfully and facing a costly judgment against your business. The rules around employment tribunals have shifted recently, and the financial stakes have gone up. From January 2027, the cap on unfair dismissal payouts disappears entirely. If you're running a small business without dedicated HR support, that change alone should give you pause. As an HR consultant, I'm already

Support from an HR consultant in Ipswich to help you handle flexible working requests the right way, before the rules get even stricter. The law around flexible working shifted in April 2024. If you missed it, you're not alone. But the changes affect every employer, regardless of size. What catches most business owners out is that another set of changes is arriving in October 2026, and those will make things tighter still. As an HR consultant, I'm already helping clients prep

Insight from an HR consultant in Ipswich on the legal duties you have when an employee returns from maternity leave and is still breastfeeding or expressing milk. The law around supporting breastfeeding employees has been tightening for a while now. If you've got someone coming back from maternity leave who's still nursing, you've got specific legal obligations to meet. Most small business owners I speak to have no idea those obligations exist. Get it wrong and you could face

If you think HR support means hiring someone full-time or managing without because that's too expensive, think again. There's a middle option that a lot of businesses overlook. Interim HR support has been growing as a solution for businesses that need real expertise for a specific period. Maybe for a restructure, a complex people issue or for getting ahead of Employment Rights Act changes. The appeal is straightforward. You get senior HR expertise when you actually need it, w

Support from an HR consultant in Ipswich to make sure your business meets the new "all reasonable steps" standard before October 2026. The law around sexual harassment prevention in the workplace has shifted twice in recent years. Another change lands in October 2026, and it raises the bar again. If you've been relying on a policy document tucked away in a shared drive, that won't be enough anymore. As an HR consultant, I'm already working with business owners who had no idea

Loneliness at work rarely looks the way you'd expect. You might think an employee who feels lonely might not speak up in meetings as much. Or they start taking more days off. But actually, loneliness can show up in all sorts of subtle ways. And, ultimately, it usually ends up affecting performance, which impacts your bottom line as a small business owner. How loneliness costs you When people feel like they belong, they engage more and stay longer. The people around them benef

Practical advice from an HR consultant in Ipswich on handling summer holiday clashes fairly, staying legal, and keeping your team onside. Summer leave season has shifted forward this year. More of my clients are already fielding requests for July and August. If you don't have a clear process for deciding who gets time off and who doesn't, you're setting yourself up for resentment. One poorly handled decision can damage trust across your whole team. The good news is that a few