Employment Law for Pest Control Owners - Redundancy vs Layoff Explained (Ep.63) - Pest Perspectives

Hello and welcome to Pest Perspectives episode #63 Crazy

I'm at #63 but people are still loving the show where there was

a good one last week with Trudy Martin.

Thanks for coming on. That was well received online,

LinkedIn and everywhere that was so far.

It's doing well this week. I'm getting more and more

out-of-the-box. Even though this is a pest

control show, I like to kind of off the new technicians or you

business owners who's listening, different skills or different

knowledge you can use in your own business.

Even though I don't really employ anyone, just me and my

dad, it could be loads of people out there that own firms and

employees that have lost their jobs or are getting jobs.

There's loads of new laws. So I'm going to read it here

before, before I bring you in, right.

When I, Allison originally reached out to me because I, I

was asking about layoffs on LinkedIn and about redundancies.

And to be honest, I was probably thinking about those terms

interchangeably, which I suspect a lot of business owners do.

But it turns out that there's actually quite a different, it's

quite different. And that led me into a wider

conversation about employment law changes because there are

actually over 20 updates either already in place or coming soon.

So today we're going to break that, break that down, starting

with the basics and then looking at what pest control business

owners need to know. And I have on Alison Matisse HR

Limited. How are you doing?

I'm. Doing very well, thanks for

having me on the show. That's fine and everyone could

probably tell I was reading that because I kept making mistakes,

but I don't care, you know, there we go.

Yeah, I was putting them out. I've actually got a few other

people coming on. Not, not people of your stature,

you know, like some people that have had to soon there's a

couple of people had to lay off a family member.

Now they're back and how they felt, etcetera.

So I've I've tackled it from some different angles.

I've got like 3 of I've made three podcasts out of that warm

post. People, people wanting to come

on. Yeah.

Thanks for reaching out. That's good to hear.

It's no problem. It's, it's been this year

particularly our redundancy season seems to have extended

well into April. Normally in January when people

are maybe approaching year end and the accountant saying to the

new year old grades are a bit high, we we get a flurry of

redundancies. But this year it's just simply

not stopped. And whether that's to do with

national minimum wage going up, employers in National Insurance

going up cost of living or these new employment rights, enhanced

employment rights that are coming in, I don't know.

But some really sad stories because to me making people

redundant, the hardest job, they've not done anything wrong,

these people and you most employers realise that they're

taking away that person's living and they're affecting the

families and the home. So it it is tough, it's not an

easy thing to do. It would be because a lot of

people take pride in having a team and thinking I'm feeding

their family or paying their mortgage and then to think I'm

going to cause some serious issues here.

But it's nothing they can do. They've got to try and protect

the business or they might be shutting the business down.

That's it. You've got to protect the the

wider team for the sake of those the few casualties, and the more

often you do it, the smaller your team gets, the thinner your

team gets, and the harder the decisions become.

Yeah, most definitely. Coming from the expert, you'd

know you would. Unfortunately, that's how I I

invented Metis. I got made redundant 15 years

ago and and decided it was never a life ambition for me to work

for myself. But I couldn't find the kind of

job I wanted. So I decided that I was going to

go for it, and it probably took me 3 years to actually think

that was the best decision that ever happened or the best thing

that ever happened to me. But it's tough.

Anybody running a business knows it's not easy.

Right, it's it's good because obviously you, you've found what

you want and as you said to me before in the pre chat, I don't

think I could ever work for someone again.

They, they, they say that and you have your own business that

you, you probably couldn't do it again.

It's just a couple of shout outs to people watching live.

Thanks, Jason for watching live on Facebook and thank you for

the praise. Darren.

I have to give it to you, Sean. You do get the right people on

you look at a wide catchment area.

Well, I try to try to be a bit out-of-the-box.

You can't always have pest controllers on, but anything,

anything on this podcast that that a business owner in pest

control or the wider sector can learn from, it's just as good.

That's how I feel anyway. That's what I try and do with

the podcast. But thanks Darren for popping

in. So have you got any like, say,

people within the pest control industry, technicians?

Have you got any advice for people that have been laid off

for such where say or bosses that I'm probably not saying it

right but some people are about to be laid off or have been laid

off or. So we look at the so we look at

the difference between redundancy and layoff because

because they're they're different things.

So redundancies are very specific scenario.

It means that a job is is disappearing.

So what shouldn't happen? We shouldn't be picking people

to be made redundant. We should be looking at maybe

we've got 6 pest control technicians and we need to

reduce to four and we have to go through some kind of selection

process to keep the best qualified, most skilled people

in the business. But it's always redundancy is

always about we've got to reduce need for that number of people

and it's a very legalistic step by step consultations letters.

It's very well defined what you should do and anybody with over

2 years service is entitled to receive redundancy pay in

addition to the notice pay when this happens.

So, so redundancy is we're going smaller or we're getting rid of

a line of management what however we're doing it.

But we have to be very objective.

So it can't be I don't like you or you know, if we have to have

you, your ability to do X is less good than somebody else's

ability to do X. So redundancies are often quite

big things for companies to engage in and most business

owners will do all sorts of things and look at cutting costs

from all other places because as you said before, we've trained

the team up, we've invested in them.

We don't really want to have them to lose them.

So most of the time when people pick the phone up to me, they've

already thought about the other things that they could do.

Often I'll just point out often when companies can't cut the

costs but if or not they cut pest control.

I know. I.

Do and. It's one of them things.

They'll regret it soon. It is.

It's not because it's not something that's obvious.

They look for the things that they think are hidden.

But having bought this building and done it up and had the

biggest rat problem in the cellar that I've ever seen, it

was an old bakery. Don't ever cut you.

Don't ever cut your pest control.

So redundancy is a serious programme for businesses to take

on layoffs. Slightly different in that

usually it's a temporary thing. Maybe we had a contract to

deliver a large piece of work and that's either disappeared or

it's been delayed and we, we have to, we've got these people,

but we've got nothing to no work to give them.

But you, you can't lay off people in the legal term unless

you've got a clause in your contract.

If you don't have a layoff clause, it means that even

though you've got no work, no money coming in, you're going to

have to pay those people their normal salary.

To not pay them is an automatic unlawful deduction from wadies

and you're heading straight to tribunal and you're going to get

a claim that you can't defend. So the I until we had COVID,

very few employers wanted layoff clauses in the contract because

they thought it makes it look like I'm maybe the business

isn't secure. But we all learned furlough was

never around. We learnt that there were

businesses going out of business because in all of these staff,

they had to pay them money and they'd no money coming in.

So layoff can be used for all sorts of reasons, but it's

usually temporary in in some respects.

And if, if you are thinking as an employer, if you're thinking

of making people, if you're thinking of laying them off, you

have to have some kind of reason, some rationale for doing

it. So if we're talking pest

control, maybe we've got this big contract that was going to

use 8 technicians and they were going to be fully deployed, but

we've got 12 in total. Is it right to a fair that it's

those eight that get laid off or do we share the layoff among the

whole 12 of them so that if we share it out that maybe you're

laid off for two weeks and the next person's laid off for two

weeks and there's some kind of of rota?

OK. So, so there's, there are

different ways of doing it and if you've got a layoff clause in

your contract, instead of paying people when they're on layoff,

you, you pay them statutory guarantee pay, which is it is

not a King's ransom, it's £39 for up to five days and if you

so go on. Like is there also this thing

where they companies, they're not going to lay people off as

such, but they they offer people say they're really busy

throughout a year and people can bank hours and then they could

use them hours when they've got no work.

Is that a route? Because my wife's company does

this. It's.

Yes, it's as long as you're contracted to do it, that's

useful. But what it's not doing is it's

not cutting the costs because we've still got to cover those.

So there's lots of different ways, but and I, I would imagine

there's an element of seasonality in pest control

because more pester around in the warmer weather.

I don't know, is it seasonal industry?

It is seasonal but obviously you can have sometimes have a

massive wasp season and some years it can be dead.

So yeah technically, but rodents are generally around since

COVID. I'll be honest, I believe

rodents around all year now. Used to be not as much in the

summer but now they seem to be here all the time.

There's too many of them, yes, but sorry, Jason was saying that

earlier. You know how you were saying you

were made redundant? He was saying he was made

redundant. The best thing he ever did is he

set up his own business as a pest.

Control. Congratulations.

It's, I think once you've done it and you're in it's, I've

worked. I work harder now than I've ever

worked. And I've always been a grafter.

But I think you finish your day job as Jason, as a pest control

operator, but then you're running the business in the

evenings and the weekends, doing all your bills and your admin

and your ordering. And so it's.

Yeah, But I enjoy it. Every day is different.

And nobody tells me what to do anymore, Sean.

I choose. Myself.

There you go. Sorry I derailed you there a

bit. Sorry, no, no, no.

So there are some because different industries have got

different requirements. If you think of golf courses and

you've got ground staff, the ground staff are going to be

more busy in the summer than they are in the winter.

So you, there's all sorts of inventive ways we can contract

with our staff to try and minimise the, the amount of time

they're in work and we've got no work for them.

And that's to the benefit of the the employer.

Interestingly, if you put the people on layoff for four weeks

solid or six weeks in a 13 week period, they can ask to be made

redundant. So it's not something that you

you have to be quite disciplined in, in recording your time that

they're off and otherwise you're going to get people asking you

to make them redundant. And that maybe was not the

intention all the way along are. You never redundancy when, say,

someone's worked at a company a long time.

Yeah. How much we've done, Is it like

a week for every year of work there?

Is that how it works or? It's it sometimes it's changes

when you get to 41. So you get a week's pay for

every year of service up to the age of 40 and over 41 it's a

week and a half. OK.

But you have to remember there's also notice pay.

So if you've worked for a company for 12 years, you should

get at least 12 weeks pay notice pay and 12 weeks redundancy.

Now if you're over 41 that might actually turn out to be 18 weeks

redundancy. So making people redundants

quite an expensive business when you've got long serving

employees. Yeah, it does sound.

It so that often means that employers are, when they're

looking at making objectively making people redundant,

choosing who should go or not. You would think that they might

look at the cheaper end, those that have not been employed very

long or young ones. But many people listening I

imagine will remember things called last in, first out.

So the last person you employed is the first one to go.

We can't do that anymore because that's potentially

discriminatory. So we have to be careful about

how we choose. I remember.

Yeah, yeah, it very much was that way, to be honest.

It was especially. It's changed now though, because

it used to be if you're not worked there two years, you're

going to definitely be. You can't do that now.

Can your laws have changed? It you can do it, you still need

to go through a fair process because there are discrimination

laws that can catch you out. So you still need to follow a

fair process. It is a fact, a financial fact

though that somebody under 2 years service at the moment

doesn't claim, can't claim redundancy pay so they only get

notice pay. You asked earlier about people

that go through this process and then the employer doesn't pay

them. Yes.

Yes. So if a company is going out of

business and they're insolvent and they can't afford to pay the

people that are making redundant, there is an

Insolvency Service that the government run that you, you get

a number from the insolvency practitioner like a certificate

number and you make your claim to the government and then they

will pay the the wages that you were due and the redundancy pay.

So there is an Ave for companies what that have gone out of

business. It's.

Interesting to know that is. I, I don't know how it's funded,

presumably via National Insurance, but it's, it's there

as a safety net. Those that don't go out of

business and don't choose to pay, that's employees are able

to take a claim to employment tribunal, foreign lawful

deduction for wages and they don't need any length of service

to do that. But it's them finding them and

getting them to pay that's the the issue.

And often we're getting there used to be a television

programme didn't there about the sheriffs.

So you can put your debt in the sheriffs and the bailiffs and

they'll go and try and get your money.

But that's that's awful when you've worked for a long time

and you're just being left with nothing that's not right.

Oh yeah, exactly. It's like I use that but only

not. Obviously not.

I've used it not for an employer, but it's like you can

pay £50 for the courts and if you've got all the proof I'm

obviously talking about. I've had to take a couple of

commercial clients and I've got one because CCJ doesn't look

good. We're not talking big amounts of

money, but there was more principle.

They still owed it. I have one but talking up to

£400, nothing massive. I've used, I've used small

claims court for the same reason.

If I've contracted with a company and they've not paid, I

take the view. That's my money.

I did the work. If it was a restaurant, you

wouldn't. I want me to just eat the food

and walk out. So the problem is what I sell is

in my head. So I can't, once I've given it

you, I can't really claim it back.

But I'm with you. That's my money, so I'll see you

in small claims court. Oh, definitely.

I mean it. It very rarely ever gets to

where you actually have to go to a court.

It's all done on the computer. If you have to go, there's

something wrong. Yeah, to be honest.

There is, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

There is, but now I'm sure that will help some people that have

had some difficulties or been laid off.

Anyone has been, you know? There's no cost to take it as an

employee, there's no cost to taking a tribunal claim out.

So Acas as an organisation is there to, you have to go through

something called early conciliation.

So you, you make an approach, you want to make a claim and

Acas will try and get that. They'll work with you and the

employer to try and achieve a settlement.

But ultimately if that doesn't work, you get another number,

not an insolvency number, but you get an early conciliation

number and then you can go to tribunal.

But do. You have to be a member of Acas.

No, no. No, it's a free service to

employers and employees. Their their sole aim in my

opinion is to settle claims so that they don't go to court.

At the moment the tribunal services are so oversubscribed.

The listing cases for 2029 and 2030.

Wow. I don't even want to think about

20-30 yet, that's crazy. And that's the London, London

tribunals are flagging that that already in 20-30.

Can you imagine having to go to court for something that

happened like 4 years ago and remember everything And yeah.

Because it, oh, yeah, you have to remember everything and you

have to keep jogging your memory all the time.

You would because it's, you'd have to write everything down.

But welcome, Pete. Thanks for popping in, mate, and

also who we've got here, Levi. Cheers for watching, Scott.

Cheers for watching we go. We'll crack on again.

A few more people, some LinkedIn people too.

Yeah, there's some great information there for people

that are employees. Now you mentioned there's some

updates, some updates on on employers, a few.

So the Employment Rights Act came in, it was passed at the

end of last year and it's coming through in in phases.

So as of the 6th of April this year, the one of the major

changes was around statutory sick pay.

So previously if you had employees who were off sick,

they had three waiting days so they didn't get paid for the

first 3 days. But now from day one they are

entitled to either statutory sick pay or if they're, they

earn less than that, 80% of what they would have they would have

earned. So for some of my clients that

are minimum wage employers, it actually was quite a good

saving. If somebody went off sick, they

were saving three days pay. But that doesn't hang fire.

Now it's you're paying them from day one.

So one of the things I would be saying to anybody that's

listening, who's got staff, is now make sure that that person

is themselves sick and unfit to work.

It's not they're taking time off because a child is ill or a

partner is ill because that's a different kind of leave and

that's emergency leave and that is unpaid.

So categorise your absence correctly to try and make sure

you're not paying statutory sick pay when you don't need to.

So that's one of the the big issues that that have come in.

We've got changes to paternity leave you that's now a day one,

right? Although you still have to work

for I think it's 26 weeks before you can get the paternity pay.

So that came in, it won't surprise you.

I had to write these down, Sean, because.

I can't, don't worry. There's a lot that I know You're

an expert, but these are all new and you've got to get it, you

know? Right, You have.

And the reason they're not new rights, they're just changing

the, the entitlement that that exists.

So unpaid parental, unpaid parental leaves a day one right.

We now have some leave for parents of, of children that are

born very prematurely or sadly for where parents have had

children die, there is now bereavement leave for them.

We've got collective redundancy protections coming in.

Trade union recognition of this is, I find this an interesting

one, but this is one that's going to develop over the coming

months. And the consultant, the

government's consulting on them at the moment, a piece of a code

of practise, if you will, that's going to, if it goes through, it

will allow on the face of it, unions to come knocking on your

door and say, we want to come in and talk to your staff.

And, and your ability to, to resist that on the face of it

would look quite limited. So it's quite interesting.

And it's, I'm being a sad person.

I actually enjoyed reading it. But the thought that people can

just not just walk in, they've got to give you notice.

But if you're busy doing something, then disrupting your

work, is it paid time? Do you have to pay while they

listen to a union person or so? That one's going to get quite

interesting, I think. It will, because I know for a

fact that most, most companies write in their contracts.

We do not recognise unions where I used to work, used to, and a

lot of American companies say it too.

They do. But.

That won't be an option now. Well, you can.

Recognition is slightly different than allowing people

to become a member. So now if you recognise trade

unions, it means you're into collective bargaining and it's

usually only very large companies in the UK that are

involved in collective bargaining now.

But it's it's an interesting difference.

So now if, if I'm going to pull you into a disciplinary, Sean,

because you have been doing something you shouldn't do, you

are entitled to be accompanied by a trade union Rep or a work

colleague. I don't have to recognise that

trade union. You've got a statutory right to

be accompanied and that's been around for a long time.

So where there's a disciplinary issue and you're going to be in

a hearing, you are allowed to bring somebody with you.

So slightly different rules. We have some protection that

came in for women returning off maternity leave that does impact

redundancy. So it's giving them protection

for six months after they have returned and if there is a

vacant post then they can actually say I want that post.

So providing the qualified and there is no selection process,

they're able. This protection gives them first

dibs on that job and other people in a way are prevented

from being considered for that role because we've got a

category of employee that's got enhanced protection.

So that's a bit of a hard pill to swallow for in some

workplaces. Imagine it will be it's.

It doesn't feel very fair. Yeah, you're supposed to have,

you know, a level playing field for everyone, don't you?

As much as you can. It's about fairness, isn't it?

And if there were two of you for one one job and the other one

just got it, that doesn't it's what it leaves you feeling that

I think that's the the key. You wouldn't feel very valued,

would you? No.

You. Wouldn't and we've got some

changes to it's not a change because it was always an issue.

So sexual harassment, you could already, you could bring that

forward as a whistle blowing complaint.

Now it's explicitly said that it can be listed as a complaint.

You have to now keep holiday pay and annual leave records for six

years. I think we've never had anything

written down that was so concrete.

So start putting putting them away and labelling them because

if the tax man comes a a knocking, you want to be able to

produce your records. Oh, OK.

Well, that's interesting that I didn't know that.

So that everyone, everyone is a bit of sauna here.

Listen to that. Yeah.

Yeah, put put them away and file them and on.

So all of that came in on the 6th of April and the day after

there was a Fair Work agency established.

And it's not a new agency that the government have established,

but what they're doing is they're pulling resources from

lots of different existing agencies.

And so national minimum wage claims will be looked at by them

and the it's not operational. So it exists, but it's not

actually flexing its muscles now.

But we do think that this might be one of the ways of reducing

the pressure on the tribunal system because this agency will

come in and check things and deal with things and prosecute

if we're not doing things. And I do wonder whether the

holiday pay annual leave records might be one of the things that

will fall under their their remit.

Interesting that is is some more bits of paperwork for people.

Yes, and keeping hold of it and remembering it.

The most important piece of paperwork is, is not something

that's come in now. It's been around for a couple of

years and that's doing right to work cheques in the UK.

I was highly offended. I I worked at my old factory.

Are you on the back where they asked to see your passport?

Yes, yes. I I I got quite offended by

that, but I knew it was a lot. Everyone had to bring the

passport in. But yeah.

If if you're if you're found to have employed somebody that

doesn't have the right to work in the UK, the maximum fine is

60,000 lbs. Yeah, that's worth doing.

That's a big chunk of change. Yeah.

So there's lots of different, it's quite technical, but

there's an easy on that gov.uk. There's a, an easy thing to

follow depending on where you come from in the world, there's

different, you want different kinds of of proof, but it's also

keeping on top of you do have any employees that have got

limited time. So a visa of some sort or a work

permit, just making sure that you're on top of them being

renewed because it's quite easy to inadvertently get yourself

into trouble. And we don't.

Not many of us have got 60 grand stuff down the back of our

setting. Is that is that like 60 grand

per person? Yeah, yeah.

So that's the worst, the worst case.

And I think there's some naming and shaming of companies as well

when that happens. So, but essentially if you take

if, if one took a personal opinion whether we as employers

we're doing the work of the Border Agency, we're the ones

that are policing the right of of the working population to

actually work in the UK, then it's us that's in bother if we

don't check it. Yeah, because we like, I've

never ever had it before. I can't remember what year it

was, but it was only ever done once.

It wasn't. It wasn't actually at the point

where I've started there at 7/19/19 and I was never asked

for it until like 10 years, 10 years later.

I was, can't remember when we came in or more.

It was. So you once you, if, if you're

Auk resident with Auk passport, we don't need to recheck those

once you've done it, just keep it in the photocopy and put it

in a file. Then you can prove that you've

done them. But it's people with different

levels of right to work. They're the ones that you just

need to stay on the top of making sure that things are

being renewed. And if somebody loses the right

to work, you need in your contract, you need to have the

ability to to take their job away from them.

Because if you allow them to continue to work without that

right to work, you're going to again fall foul of the Border

Agency. How would the problem is?

How would you know? That's the thing, I'd say

someone was allowed to work and they were OK, but then if it

gets removed the government doesn't just ring you and say

they can't work there more, do they?

So you get, usually you get a visa for a particular period of

time. So it might be for two years.

So they, yeah, they give you a share code.

So the employee coming for the job gives you a share code and

you can check online and you can check that the picture is the

same as the person that's come for the the job.

And you need to make a note of that visa is due up in July and

you need to be asking them three or four months before that.

What are they doing? Are they, is their visa going to

get renewed? And we have had not many, but we

have had occasions where we have got very close to dismissing

because again there's a backlog and the right to work hadn't

come through, their visa wasn't renewed.

So when you're offering somebody a job, it's very helpful to make

it condition of that offer that they have got the right to work

in the UK and that they retain that, they maintain that.

Yeah, that's, that's fair because on I see on a lot of job

postings on LinkedIn, especially in pest control, people from

other countries are always asking a lot of them ban put UK

residents only the sponsorship rules.

It's it's a bit difficult for UK firms to pay for it really.

Yeah. So I have a client in the care

industry and they're 63% of their workforce are sponsored

workers. So and that's not unusual in the

care industry. But what is interesting there is

if, if they do lose their job, if it's they're dismissed, they

only have a very limited time to find other work in the UK.

And, and if that doesn't happen, then I think action is taken to

deport them or that's, that's the impression I get.

So we've had a couple of people recently where they've

unsuccessfully complete, they've not been successful in

completing the probation and we've been moved on.

But it's very, it is very expensive.

Oh yeah. Yeah, I have heard.

I used to have people messaging me.

You can have a job. I don't employ people.

I think, I think that's a very good ploy, but.

Yeah. Now the the stuff that's coming

in in October, we're still waiting for details around this.

We haven't got the the nitty gritty of what's going to happen

here, but one of the things that we do think is going to come in.

So I think it was two years ago the laws around sexual

harassment changed and there is an obligation now on employers

to risk assess the likelihood of sexual harassment by third

parties. So I have a window cleaning

client and because they're going on to people's premises, then

they are having to risk assess what's the likelihood of them,

their staff getting harassed by the the people in those houses.

And I assume similar in pest control because you're going

into people's people's houses. So what you're at the moment,

you're being asked to take reasonable steps as an employer

to reduce the chances of sexual harassment taking place in

October of this year. We think that duties going, the

bars going to be raised and you have to take all reasonable

steps to control that that harassment.

And that's that's a really tough ask for a lot of employers.

You think of a shop worker, for example, or somebody that works

in a pub. It's you're not in control of

the behaviour of the public, but you're liable if your employee

is harassed by one of those members of the public.

Yeah, on that would like say companies that were like you say

you had a contract window cleaner, would measures like I

don't know, would DBS cover it or not?

You would put in place a number of different things, so training

your staff is one of the things, having the risk the the most.

A barrister that I was speaking to, you said one of the most

important things is to have a risk assessment.

You've written it down and you've worked out what are the

risks. So it's exactly the same

process. If you're doing risks of using a

chemical or risks of working in confined space, what's the risk

of my employee going into that scenario and getting sexually

harassed? And we look then at reducing the

likelihood of that. So we train them, we have the

risk assessment. And then you start to think

about, well, what else can can we do?

Do we work in pairs or so Every organisation, every team will be

different. And that's what makes it so, so

difficult. So how on earth an employer can

confidently reach the I have done all reasonable steps.

I think that's going to be a really tough bar for all four

employers. It's difficult because what do

you get to the point where you're making your staff wear

body cameras like police do? Possibly.

Possibly it's it's hard to know and and the for employers, the

danger is that an employee who is harassed by somebody.

So let's use sexual harassment as a an example.

Then if you've not put in place any of these controls, then are

they going to take? So it's you've got vicarious

liabilities employer. So you are responsible for this

situation and again, you're going to find yourself

potentially in a tribunal and that's big, big money, that kind

of claim. So does it then become a way of

people causing trouble generating money?

I'm very cynical. My job makes me very cynical,

so. I'm trying to think because I

think I. See the word?

No, because you are right, years ago used for them people would

crash into you on purpose. Yes.

Things like that. So I can't see what you're

saying. Always, there's always someone

willing to exploit a whole, yes, sorry, a loophole in the law or

something. I say a loophole.

We've got tipping policies. I don't know that people I've,

I've never tipped a pest control operative, but I don't know

whether you're in the industry tips are anything that you, you

do find people giving you for doing that and carrying out the

work. But there's legislation around

that. Now the the biggie that

everybody is unhappy. Well, I say everybody employers

are unhappy about is in on the 1st of January 2027 the unfair

dismissal. Time limit is coming down.

So at the moment you have to have been employed for two years

before you can you have unfair dismissal rights.

If everything sticks to what it's we're seeing that will come

down to six months. So you employ somebody, you

maybe they have a six month probation, you're still testing

them out. And we were everybody's waiting

to see how the law is written to actually understand if I need to

remove them at six months because they've not passed the

probation, how do I do it safely in a way to avoid unfair

dismissal claims coming at me? So we think it is, we think it's

going to be paying more attention to your recruitment,

making sure that your inductions people know the rules, that

they're trained well. But we're actually having

probation reviews with individuals.

So we can we can start to catch some of those behaviours a

little bit earlier and explain to people how those behaviours

are not welcome and maybe look to end probations earlier than

in six months. So it's too early to tell

because we haven't got the detail.

But that's the one that is causing a lot of issues for

employers because you can't always tell whether somebody's

good or got potential within six months.

If I have a six month probation and I extend it to nine months

and then I think it's not working out.

Have I unfairly dismissed you? I don't know.

I'll tell you, it seems just to to keep making employees jobs

harder and harder and harder. Yeah, it it when different

governments come in, the legislation always changes.

And so traditionally Conservative government passes

legislation that's in employer's favour.

The Labour government passes legislation that's in employees.

It's this is the biggest change we've seen in employment

legislation for many, many years.

We really have does. The government even understand

it when they're writing it, that's the thing.

Do they? Understand it well, it's the bit

that fascinates me. So they pass the legislation and

it was going backwards and forwards from the House of Lords

to the Houses of Commons. But then it has to be written up

in a way that we can actually enact.

And then you've got Acas will develop a code of practise.

But it's funny when you read these things, sometimes it's

that that thing wasn't in the law, but it's now in this code

of practise. How did that happen if our

elected representative didn't include it?

So I don't know. That's not an area that I

inhabit, but it's, the wording is so very, very important in

these things to check what it is you're expected to do.

So for my clients, it's our job to keep our eyes on this and to

brief them on what they need to be doing.

We've if people are running their businesses, it's very

difficult to keep. How on earth do you keep if

there's 22 pieces of legislation changing, how do you run your

own business, make a success of it and spend every hour

available to you reading bits of legislation and codes of

practise and case studies and case law.

So that's. Like a new SO sounds like a new

person's job. Yes it does.

Yeah, or or outsource it to a firm.

Like you absolutely, of course, of course.

And then we've got some possible changes around 0 hour contracts

and guaranteed hours. So it's a bit too far in the

future to know for definite. But the suggestion seems to be

that if I, if I regularly I'm working a particular pattern of

0 hours, then I, I don't know whether it would be a right to

ask to maintain that or a right to be given that.

And the same with the 0 hour contracts are meant for

flexibility. So I don't have any obligation

to offer you work and you don't have any obligation to take work

from me. But which seems at odds with

more legislation around 0 hours, I think.

I think zero hours contracts are really helpful for employees

where you're, you know, your demand goes up and down and

really those zero hour employees should get proportionately what

the full time people get. And I think some employers don't

do that. So the government have decided

that they will legislate to make sure that people are treated

fairly. The zero hours person should get

sick pay and they should get a proportion of holiday pay.

To be fair, it is about time. I mean, governments have been

promising, they've sought it out for a long time, previous

governments too, but they've never done no about it.

Yeah, but it's, if you imagine the hospital, the hospitality

sector, they, they're the probably the biggest user of 0

hours contracts and the impact is thought to be going to be

massive when it comes in. So I don't know.

It's I have a crystal ball on my desk, but it's not telling me

what's doing it that far ahead. Oh, miss, it's like some of

these things. It's like, sounds good, but is

it? Careful what you wish for,

because it won't be exactly how you think it's going to be.

Yeah, and it won't go back. It'll legislation doesn't often

go backwards. So it's almost like we're stuck

with this. We have to make it work and then

we use case law from tribunals to hone it.

And I don't want any of my clients to be case law.

Thank you very much. It's interesting.

I was looking at what kind of cases go to tribunal from pest

control companies and a lot of them, there weren't very many

juicy ones. A lot of them were around

failing to pay notice, pay deductions from wages that

weren't correct, but they're actually a couple around

disability discrimination, the failure to make reasonable

adjustments to jobs, quite a big company in the Northwest and

this this chap developed type 2 diabetes and his long days were

not helping him control his symptoms.

And it was found that the company actually didn't.

They were breaching working time regulations and they weren't

allowing him to manage his symptoms in a way that reduced

the impact. He was very tired.

And so we don't now get, years ago you used to get a green card

if you were disabled. That's not the case now.

A disability is any long term health condition, usually 1212

months that significantly impacts your daily life.

So and type 2 diabetes didn't used to be disability, but it

obviously is no no. I didn't know it was either.

My mum's got that so I didn't. I didn't know.

Yeah, the tablet. Version.

Yeah. So I think the thinking was that

type 1 diabetes, it's it's not reversible, whereas type 2 is,

but it's still classed as a long term condition.

So that was quite an interesting 1.

So what else did I have? I had, as I say, lots of people

not paying what they should have been doing.

Oh, poor handling of grievances, process is not followed

properly. So if you as an employer, if an

employee raises a concern with you, you need to listen to that

and you need to investigate what's gone on and see if

there's any, anything that you need to to put right.

And failure to do that can create a situation where

somebody decides I can't work here and walk out.

Was it like a grievance in such of how they've been tracked or

was it like particular jobs that they couldn't do something right

and they were being told to do it?

Things like. That so this, this one, so this

was in the Midlands, this one. And the employee raised concerns

about the way things were being managed at work and it was it

was impacting him and the company were found to have not

handled that grievance correctly.

They hadn't followed a proper process.

The employer in that case, they did actually win some of the

cases, but they still had to pay out.

So there's some quite big, big amounts.

We've got one in the London, London and Southeast that was to

do with dismissal and pay issues.

So there was unfair dismissal. This one cost £10,000.

The wages were not handled correctly and there's quite a

few in your industry around whistle blowing where health and

safety breaches have been identified.

And if I raise with you a concern about maybe the way the

chemicals are being used or I'm not getting PPE or anything like

that, and I and you take action against me for raising that,

I've made a protected disclosure to you.

And to dismiss me for that is usually automatically unfair.

Would be you're only trying to be, you know, these chemicals

are dangerous. You like, you don't want to

breathe them in. So yeah, I agree with that.

Yeah, it's quite, it's right. We we know in health and safety

at workout, you know, Section 7 says I've got responsibility for

my own health and safety as well as yours as as an employee.

And surely it's therefore right, if I'm not being given the

correct PPE that I raise, that you should listen to that and do

something about it, not dismiss me for raising that that

concern. Yeah, I mean, it seems, yeah, a

bit mind blown by that because like we have health and safety

training, it's a lot of these courses are online and you

should provide the relevant, each product tells you what PPE

you're supposed to use. It does.

Yeah. And you can't, you shouldn't be

charging employees for that PPE either.

That should be being provided by the the company.

You might want to ensure it's returned when they leave so

you're not in for fancy safety boots and goodness knows what

else. But but then again I do have one

client that says I don't want all these sweaty shoes, they can

keep them. I'm going to buy some new ones.

Some, I'd imagine some people would do that.

I would. But I am very impressed how

you've done some research on pest control companies.

I like this. Someone's done some homework.

I tried to make it relevant years ago.

My very first job was managing cleaners in the NHS.

So at the age of 24 I was managing 105 cleaning staff over

in a kind of Victorian hospital. And one of my jobs was pest

control officer. So I was trapping, I was

trapping feral cats, learning about Hoy Hoy cockroach traps.

And I, I enjoyed it, but I had people that went and did the

doing. Like I said to you before, I'm

not good with rodents. So I didn't want to do that.

It's a, it's a, to me, it's a vital service that you offer.

And I, I was interested the infographic that I put out on

LinkedIn today to see how quickly the industry has

developed. And you were saying how little

regulation? So, so here it's right, the way

I my business set up, we be, you know, we're with a trade body,

we've got accreditations we show no, we do things correctly and

anyone could be with a trade body.

However, within the industry, how it operates is you could do

a one day course on rodenticide use and tomorrow you could go

out and say you're the rat man, you're the rat catcher and you

could do work there. And then.

I'm not saying that is how it works, but I think there's

different levels to how you run your business.

But yeah, a one day course in my, I'm going to say this, this

is my personal opinion, not open pest controls, not the NPTA's.

My personal opinion, you should have a few.

You should really strive to get accreditation or be part of a

trade body and do learning via CPD because people will get CPD

for tonight that are on the British pass register.

I believe you should have the more learning and education you

can get, the better because every day is every day is a

school day. It is.

But unfortunately, yes, you can just get a day course and you

can be classed as a pest controller after that.

You can, but yeah, it surprises a lot of people.

It does. The, the pest, the pest

perspectives I listened to a couple of weeks ago where you

were talking about confined working and there was a lot of

discussion on that podcast about how much training you is

available to the industry. And you think one of the

downsides for employers is what you're doing by training people

is increasing their market value.

So you're making it more likely, more able for them to just set

up on their own or go work for somebody else.

It's. What happens?

Yeah. So what?

So it is possible, it's quite possible to contract in a way

with your staff so that if they were to leave, you can recover

that money that you've invested in their training.

So you, you set out in the contract that you, you will, if

you leave within a year, you're going to repay 100% of that, the

cost of that course, 2 years, 75% to try and at least recoup

the money that you've you've spent.

Yeah. See, I didn't know that was an

option because obviously these courses, I mean the one, the

main one that is the RSPH level 2 awarding pest management,

that's not a day course, that's a three day course.

You're talking anywhere from 7 to a grand for that course.

So someone disappears a bit quickly.

That's a lot of money gone. So you are right, that could

help people protect their investments.

But I didn't know. I didn't know that was a thing

you could do. I didn't.

Yes, absolutely. As long as you do it before

they've gone on the the course and they've, so we have you

either do it in the contract by having a like a global statement

that this is what the deductions will be and by signing the

contract they've agreed that or you put in place a training

agreement that says very similar.

But with something like that course that's more expensive,

you, you might want the ability to put them on some kind of

payment plan when they they leave because there's not enough

money in their last ways to recoup all the, the cost.

So again, by signing upfront, they've already agreed to the

the conditions of of that that training.

So it's one of the ways you can manage your money and try and

keep that investment inside the business.

Yeah, no, I mean that's obviously for that particular

course that's usually companies that hire trainees and train

them in house and then set them on that way.

But a lot of people just get jobs and they've already got

that. But that would help people in

protect because there's obviously there's a lot of

different courses you can be put on as well.

You know, there's all sorts like you say, but evening, Darren,

thanks for popping in. But yeah, that'd be interesting

for people to know that Will. It's an easy, an easy cost

protection if you will. You, you have to already have in

your contract what you're going to deduct from people's wages

when they go. If you deducted something that's

and you've no clause to do that again, you get into hot water.

So it's making sure your contract is written in a way

that allows you to do that. I thought, I, I thought that it

was also useful to, to, to think about the other ways that we can

protect our investment. So we talked about, so

protecting the training investment, but going back to

what we said at the beginning, getting your absence categories

right. If I, if I ring you up and say

I'm need a day off sick because my child is ill and you give me

a day sick, then you're paying me statutory sick pay.

But I am not sick. It's my child that's sick.

So the leave that I'm actually asking for is emergency leave

and that's unpaid. So paying attention to how you

classify people's leave is another way of of reducing

unnecessary payments to to people.

And I get that I'm going to say something obviously, because I'm

not a professional in the industry.

Once staff know that, they'll just say they're, I'll, they,

they get. Paid, but then but then you that

allows you then to monitor their their sickness absence.

And we we look for patterns and trends.

Is it every Monday, every Friday?

Are they regularly off at such times?

The average number of absences per year in this country per

person is 6.5 days in the whole of the year.

So if you've got somebody whose absence level is above that or

even I would start below that. But you're able to have

conversations with people ultimately, if an employee has

signed a contract to do to do 40 hours work, but they're never in

work to do the 40 hours, we're perfectly within our rights as

employers to have conversations about what's going on with you,

what what's wrong? Is there anything we can do to

help? What's what are the reasons?

So if somebody's always off with the same thing backed back

issues, for example, maybe we need to be sending them to

occupational health to get a medical opinion on what it is

and whether we can do adjustments.

But if it's it's food poisoning, I had somebody the other week

who she'd have 4 bouts of food poisoning.

I think she needs to go to a different takeaway.

If we've got somebody that was off, had a cold, had a sore

knee, hurt themselves at football, everything's

different. There's no underlying trend

there. So that makes you start to

question and you can put people on monitoring.

So we expect you to reduce. Your absentees and more approve

your attendance whichever way around you want to do it.

Yeah, OK, I'll be honest with you.

Before I got into pest control and my old job that I hated, I

was one of these people. Monday morning was a Monday

morning was the the theme with me.

I never got sacked. I never got put on mornings, but

they would just get me, told me off and then, you know, I kept

doing it. But I stayed there for 16 years,

so they kept me. Yeah, you can't be that bad.

Yeah, so I used to hate my job. That was pretty much.

I don't. I didn't tell them that, but

yeah, I used to just not want to go on Mondays.

But yeah. But I understand obviously as a

business you can't, you can't operate like that.

I mean no. It makes it very difficult.

I'm very rarely off ill to be honest.

I think self self-employment is the best cure for the common

cold. Yes, and what we call man flu.

Well, I didn't. I didn't.

Want to say that of course. I don't know, but I'd say that

anymore. It might be a thing.

I don't know who knows, but no, no, some some good information.

Have we got any? Have we got any more information

that might might be helpful to I, I?

Think just the thinking about the main things, the things if I

had a hit list of things I would do so it'd be right to work

cheques out. That's dead easy tomorrow get

everybody to bring the passports in and the the visas and then

you've done that and you're not going to get caught out.

Get your absence categories right.

If you you have to have employment contracts.

People are entitled to an employment contract on day one

of their employment. They can't take it to structure

ibupro for not having one on day one, but they can add it as a

supplementary claim. So and that's quite expensive.

So get contracts and make sure those contracts are, yes,

they're respecting the rights of the workers, but they're giving

you the wriggle room as an employer to be able to work in a

way that your business needs to to work and gives you the rights

to deduct what's what's yours. If they're leaving.

And there's an an underused part of a contract that looks at how

you restrict what people do after they've left.

Do you want them going working for competitors just down the

road? Probably not.

Do you want them poaching your staff?

You might want some of them to be poached, but the good ones,

you might want to not have that. So that post termination section

of your contract is really important.

I do know, I'm obviously mentioning no names, but I do

know bigger, bigger pest control companies, they do do that, yes.

So you can't approach the client, the client stepping

services straight away, but you know ultimately they're going to

try and do it eventually when they can.

And it's, it is very expensive to enforce, but it's a signal

that I'm taking it seriously. And you sign that contract, You

knew at the start what your restrictions were.

It's got to be in place. You can't just do it after the

fact, and you can't if it if it wasn't in writing.

Yeah, yeah. So if you've not got contracts,

get them. I would say Google's free for a

reason. So make sure if you get anything

off the Internet that you get some advice because you want it

to work for you as to make sure it's giving you the right

protection. And as these laws come in, you

need to refresh and review your contracts and the policies that

support them. That's.

Great advice that is, I've learnt loads but I feel like I'm

going to have to re listen to the podcast as well, probably

because because there's there's a lot in there.

There is everyone else. I'd suggest that you get a

notepad and write these particular bits down because

most people will listen after the fact.

But there's a lot of juicy information in here.

Whereas as to your graphic as well, I would, I would say

there's probably over what now? They're probably, there's

probably over 1000 pest control companies.

The problem is when you search Google etcetera, because it's

not, there's not a, a, a list where you have to go.

I've got a business. So a lot of them aren't

incorporated, but they just want people that just do a bit of

some people just do it part time.

And I would say you've probably got, I'm only guessing here, so

don't, don't shoot me people. There's probably 1 to 2000

companies in the UK probably, but some of them people just one

person by themselves doing it and that's it.

So it is hard, it's a hard number to gauge, but they there

is a claim out there. I don't know where the

technicians wise and people actually in the rolls.

There's about 10,000 pest technicians in the UK right now

that that is that I don't know how they gathered that data, but

that's a rough estimate and we're we're tightly compared to

other other industries we. Are when I was looking at trying

to find that they group you with other it's so it doesn't have

one just on its own for pest control and you're grouped in

with other. It was something weird like

construction or something so very I couldn't get anything

reliable. The only thing I.

Did find out. It was, it's an like everywhere

else, it's an ageing population and how do we encourage young

people to come into the pest control sector and see it as a

career? That is a fact and that is

something it's true that did it tell you in the next five years?

No, go on. Well.

This is the case. It's five years.

Half the industry is going to retire.

Well, that 5 to 10 years is what they say.

And obviously I'm a member of the MPTA great body.

And they are trying to find ways to encourage young people to see

it as a career because I don't imagine the teachers at the

school recommending why don't you buy be a pest technician.

They were trying to find ways into we've all we've all we've

the MPTA itself is the National Pest Pest Technician Association

trade body. I've got a partnership with the

Royal Society, Royal Society Public Health and they've got a

careers hub and it shows you like they've had various

companies sponsor the the project and it's like stories of

how so and so got into pest control.

What you need to be a pest control that all the different

avenues. So there is websites out there.

They're trying to, I think they're trying to get schools to

plug into so they can see the options out there because

primary schools are easy to get into, aren't they?

You know, they'll let anyone come and talk for you know what

you do. But it's a bit different in

secondary schools, isn't it? It is, but it's I can see the

attraction of linking it with this is health or environmental

rather than pest. I can see that that that's got

potential there. Yeah, because they're, they're

literally the, the three day course was talking about RSPH.

That's it is their course. It's the Royal Society of Public

Health. So and I believe the, I think

the BPCA have got a careers hub as well.

They have as well to try and attract young people.

Everyone's trying to attract young people into industry.

And the NPTA has a deal with partnership with Syngenta, which

you do with a chemical company where if you're an MPTA member

company and you want to frame one of your, you have to be

under 25 though when discrimination, I know I'm

joking, I'm joking, but you've got to be under 25.

Your member company can apply you, but you've got or actually

the young person has got to have like it's like a interview

candidate style just so you're passionate about the industry.

And I'm not involved in any of them conversations, but I've had

a lot come through and or even if you're, you want to take a

young person on and then you can have that person apply.

We've had companies where they're going to get a

guaranteed job with the NPTA member company come through the

system. So that's a good way of getting

them a job. But yeah, it's it's fun to 24 to

try and track people in, but we're always looking for new

ways to try and get people in. But you're right, public health

does sound. I try and work a lot of my stuff

as often public health, it sounds better.

Yes, Yeah, but. Ultimately, that's what it is,

isn't it? It's it is making the

environment that we live and work in a healthier place.

It is, definitely. It is, yeah.

It's been a nice conversation. It's and it's all work.

It's not gone wrong. No, this is true.

This is true. Oh, good.

Yeah. Streaming arts, quite good.

It's been working. Yeah, it has.

But yeah, it's been a it's been a fun conversation.

And I hope this helps any employees in the industry that

are having difficulties with employers or they've been laid

off or there's no at the minute, the pest control industry, the

multitude of companies are laying people off, but there's

also multitude of companies that are hiring too.

There is, there is. So it's it's like most

industries go into it. It's a tough time at the minute

and I hope this helps people on all different sides.

Yeah, if anybody's got any questions they want to ask, I'm

on LinkedIn. If they want to drop me a

message, I'm happy to help. Do you want to promote your

business? Because there might be some

firms like I think we need some help.

Would you like to promote your business?

If, if you don't mind, that's very careful.

So we a small HR consultancy in Lancashire, but we've got

clients across the UK and we work with small, medium sized

businesses with no HR. But every one of us in the team

has either run our own businesses or managed businesses

for for people. You're not dealing with a call

centre. And our strap line is we protect

employers from their own employees.

So our job is to make sure that we help our clients not fall

foul of the law by making sure that they follow employment

legislation. But they do it in a way that

helps them run the business in in the way that they need to, to

thrive. So we're very down to earth

northerners. We call a spade a spade and you

can find us. We have a website, so it's

www.metishr.co.uk. I have, I'm on LinkedIn.

We do have a Facebook page, but I'm not very good at keeping

that up to date and I gave up on XA long time ago.

But anybody, if you've got any questions, just drop me a

message on LinkedIn and I'm happy to help.

I will put Alison's details in the Spotify links as well, so if

you want to contact or or do business, you can because sounds

like some people may need some help, yeah.

don't overload people with mails.

But when there is something coming out, we have like a

mailing list where we can this kind of thing that's coming out,

new pieces of legislation, just top tips of things you can do.

I know that's that's helpful for people.

That is lovely. Yeah, No.

Thanks for coming on, Allison. Thank you very much for having

me, I'm enjoying. It very nice.

Ian, was this your first ever podcast?

Yes, I've been on the radio quite a few times, but I've

never done a podcast and but this platform you used was dead

easy, so. Yes, it's the idea is, is you've

got to make it easy because we popped on a you're on your

phone, man. It was on my phone.

You're both there or you're on your tablet.

We tested it yesterday. That was quick.

That that's easy. That was the thing that I was

most bothered about because I I can talk till the cows come

home, but it's the technology that often gets in the way.

So no, I'm very grateful to you having me on.

I've enjoyed it. Nice.

I mean, I mean, here we go, right?

Last week we had Trudy on This was Hurdle of First Life

podcast. This is your first live podcast.

I have. I have done radio as well, by

the way. But it wasn't live.

It was a recorded interview that played on the radio about Wasps

last year. Yeah.

Have you been on live live radio?

I said it's live. Is it?

You're speaking and it's live on the air.

Yeah. I've not done that yet.

I've not. I've sponsor a business

programme on our local radio and I go once a month and we we do

it's, it's not a live phoning, but they're actually answering

live questions that are coming through on social media.

So yeah, very nice. Very.

Nice. Well, I'll end the stream now.

Thanks everyone and I will see you next week.

Thanks. If stay on the line for a minute

Alison, not just end the stream. Yeah.

Thanks everyone and I'll see you next week.

Thank you.

Tonight's Episode