What Should an Employment Contract Cover?

When you set up a new business and start hiring employees, you need to make sure that you are asking them to sign contracts of employment. These contracts will be what you both refer to when certain matters to be addressed, such as holiday entitlement or resignation procedure.

If you haven’t written an employment contract before, you will need to seek legal advice to make sure everything is covered. Below, we’ll discuss some of the things that need to be in there.

Salary

The salary is something which is usually discussed in the interview stage or in the official job offer but it should also be included in the employment contract. You should detail how much the employee will be paid annually or per hour. You should also include how often they will be paid and what date this will be on if monthly.

Job Description

Did you know that you should also include the job description for the role in the employment contract? Many people don’t realise this, but it can be very important. The employee needs to understand exactly what is expected of them and they need to agree to this from the beginning. If you start asking them to do tasks that aren’t within their job description, they could refer back to this so make sure to be as accurate as possible.

Holiday Entitlement

In the UK, employees that work full time are required by law to have a holiday entitlement. If you don’t know how much you need to offer your employees, then you should consider getting advice from some employment solicitors. They will help you to figure out exactly how much you should offer your new employees so that you are in line with the law on this.

Pension Entitlement

If you are just starting out a new business, you might not be thinking about your employees retiring anytime soon but this is something that you need to consider. They need to know what their pension entitlement is and how much you are going to be contributing to it. This should be carefully detailed in the contract so that they can plan for their future.

Notice Period

You should also carefully detail the notice period that you expect from your employees when they decide to move on to another role. You should also include the notice period that you will give them should you decide that they are not a good fit within the company. You might want to include a probationary period, especially if you are a new business. Be clear with this and discuss it before they sign the contract.

Get Started

Your contract of employment should be very clear and should include all of the important things that you’ll face as a business owner. It is always recommended that you seek legal advice from those who have experience in writing contracts like this. If you are unclear in your contract, you could face legal issues further down the line.