Facing a Workplace Challenge? We're Here to Help.
Nectar HR provides practical, expert HR advice to UK employers. Protect your business, follow fair ACAS procedures, and resolve workplace situations with confidence.
Browse Practical Guidance for Employers
Select your workplace situation below for step-by-step guidance, procedural checklists, and practical HR advice.
1. Employee Not Performing? What Employers Should Do
Identify the root cause of underperformance, distinguish capability from conduct, and implement fair support without triggering grievances.
2. Can I Dismiss an Employee for Poor Performance?
The legal test for fair capability dismissals, qualifying service changes, navigating disability discrimination risks, and protected conversations.
3. How to Manage a Difficult Employee
Separate challenging behaviour from personality traits, deal with counter-grievances, sudden sickness absence, and de-escalate team disruption constructively.
4. Employee Misconduct: What Should an Employer Do?
Defining general vs. gross misconduct, managing fair suspensions, carrying out balanced investigations, and keeping an open mind before hearings.
5. How to Run a Fair Disciplinary Process
A complete step-by-step roadmap from allegations and statutory companion rights through to formal warnings, appeals, and ACAS adherence.
6. Employee Has Raised a Grievance: What Should I Do?
Understand allegations, follow the ACAS Code, maintain investigator impartiality, and handle overlapping disciplinaries cleanly.
7. Employee Off Sick: What Can an Employer Do?
Navigate fit notes, agree on sensible welfare contact, manage occupational health referrals, and handle absence review meetings lawfully.
8. Long Term Sickness and Capability: Employer Guide
Manage months of absence, evaluate medical prognosis, assess reasonable adjustments, and navigate fair capability dismissals.
9. Employee Not Performing During Probation
Set clear standards early, extend probationary terms properly, and handle short-service terminations without triggering discrimination claims.
10. Protected Conversations: A Guide for Employers
How Section 111A pre-termination negotiations work, when 'without prejudice' applies, and avoiding improper behaviour pitfalls.
11. Settlement Agreements for Employers
Mutually agreed exit packages, drafting binding claim waivers, structuring payments tax-efficiently, and ACAS 10-day review rules.
12. Workplace Investigations: Employer Guide
Define scoping remit, conduct compliant witness interviews, assess conflicting testimony, and produce objective case reports.
13. Employee Has Made a Whistleblowing Complaint
Differentiate personal grievances from public interest disclosures, protect against detriment, and avoid automatic unfair dismissal.
14. Employee Subject Access Request (SAR) Guide
Managing one-month response deadlines, searching email servers, redacting third-party personal data, and applying statutory exemptions.
15. Managing an Employee With a Disability
Equality Act 2010 duties, implementing reasonable adjustments, adapting absence trigger points, and avoiding uncapped tribunal risk.
16. Flexible Working Requests: Employer Guide
Handling Day-1 statutory rights, complying with the 2-month decision window, and relying on legitimate business refusal grounds.
17. Redundancy: What Employers Need to Do
Establishing a genuine business case, objective selection scoring, individual consultation, and collective consultation rules.
18. Short Service Dismissal (Under 2 Years)
Dismissals under current two-year qualifying rules, preparing for the upcoming 6-month threshold, and checking automatic claims.
19. HR Support for Care Homes & Adult Social Care
Balancing safe staffing ratios, managing safeguarding referrals alongside disciplinary steps, and reducing absence rota stress.
20. HR Support for Children's Residential Care Homes
Coordinating with LADOs, maintaining 24/7 care ratios, conducting sensitive investigations, and meeting Ofsted compliance.
Dealing with an urgent workplace challenge right now?
One procedural error or rushed decision can trigger costly Employment Tribunal claims. Talk through your situation confidentially with an experienced UK HR specialist before taking action.
- ✓ Practical assessment of conduct, sickness, and capability situations
- ✓ Hands-on drafting of investigation letters, PIPs & meeting invites
- ✓ Step-by-step guidance tailored to your organisation
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