Up to £60,000 fine for employing an illegal immigrant
There have long been penalties for employing illegal immigrants, but they are about to get much tougher.
Currently, a first offence of employing an illegal immigrant can land an employer with a fine of £15,000; with repeat offences earning fines of £20,000. Under the proposed changes, those figures would triple, rising to £45,000 and £60,000 respectively.
For unscrupulous employers, hiring illegal immigrants gives them a commercial advantage by allowing them to bypass the minimum wage and other employment rights. This is exploitative towards vulnerable people, whilst unfairly allowing such businesses to undercut legitimate employers who play by the rules.
So it is understandable that the government is trying to stamp out the practice. Since 2018 they have issued 4,000 civil penalties totalling £74 million.
It is possible you could employ an illegal immigrant inadvertently, and the key to avoiding this is following the government’s “right to work” checks. You should do this as standard every time you hire, and doing so properly will provide you with a statutory defence against the fines. There are different ways in which you can perform the checks.
You can conduct a digital right to work check. This may be the most common way of conducting your checks and there are a number of methods. The simplest may be asking your recruit to generate a “share code” from the Home Office’s online service which when passed to you allows you to log in and view their right to work status.
Alternatively, there is an option to outsource the task using Identity Document Validation Technology (IDVT) through a certified digital identity service provider (IDSP) who will carry out the checks on your behalf.
If, for some reason, neither of the above are possible (and the employee cannot provide manual documentation, see below) you may be able to go directly to the Home Office and use their online Employer Checking Service.
You can complete a manual check. To do this compliantly, you must meet your prospective employee in person with them bringing documentation from prescribed Home Office lists. You need to check the documents give them a right to work (for instance a UK citizen holding a UK passport), and that they are not obvious forgeries. Inconsistencies, like name changes after marriage, should be explained.
You’ll need to take copies of the documentation and retain them for the duration of the employment plus two years. For help ensuring you are compliant, just ask us.
Job titles gone crazy
Everyone has noticed the monetary inflation that has set in over the past couple of years. Apparently it has spread to job titles, too; with younger generations in particular demanding ever more lofty job titles, regardless of their experience.
We do have a bit of fun looking out for weird and wonderful job titles.
There is the classic “media publications administrator” for which you can read “paperboy”.
One well-known hospitality chain (whom we won’t name) advertised for “sandwich technicians” – which most would agree was a bit over the top if you knew what they served.
Still, at least with that one it was clear what they did, or aspired to do.
One police force once advertised for an “anti-social behaviour coordinator”. Seeing this from the outside you could be mistaken for thinking the role involved the organising of kicking in bus stops and drinking strong cider in the park!
This raises a more serious point, though. Simple and clear with job titles is far better – not only will people outside your company understand what it is your team members actually do, but no one needs to stay up until the wee hours thinking of ever more inflated titles.
It does go both ways though, and sometimes a bit more thought to the semantics could go a long way. One poor graphic designer privately bemoaned the fact that his official job title was “back-end manager”. Now that’s unfortunate!
Employees behaving badly (outside of work!)
You know that you must instigate your disciplinary process for bad behaviour within the workplace.
But what about employee behaviour outside of work? When do you decide to step in if they transgress in their personal life? Often, it will be none of your business, but if it develops and imposes on you, then you could be within your rights to act.
There are many ways it could become your business, including: they attract negative publicity which is linked to your company and causes reputational damage; they denigrate your brand, colleagues or customers on social media or some other public forum; it is a criminal case which is so bad their position is untenable or they are no longer able to perform their role – say they are remanded in custody or lose their driving licence.
When one of these scenarios plays out, you really do need to get professional advice to ensure a fair and reasonable disciplinary outcome is achieved.
Is Elon Musk going to sue you?
Elon Musk recently tweeted a call to arms for any employees who felt they had been unfairly treated by their employers for posting or liking something on Twitter (now called X). He said he would fund their legal bills. No Limit.
To what extent he would ever do this, who knows? There are several tribunal claims currently in progress where people claim they have been unfairly dismissed for expressing what they think is their right to a religious or philosophical belief.
This can be a highly contentious area and as we have already stated do take professional advice before reacting. If you find yourself in this position, please don’t hesitate to call your local HR Dept office to get your expert opinion.
Best of enemies?
It’s great when your team bonds so well they are productive in the workplace and friendly outside of it. It is not uncommon that some employees may have been buddies before they ever started working for you.
Such friendships do, though, run the risk of blurred lines and personal dramas brought into the workplace – as one care home has found out to its cost.
Two childhood friends were employed at the care home, with one managing the other. A work-related row erupted, which resulted in the manager using strong expletives, threatening language and remarking “No wonder you have no friends”.
The employee quit and successfully brought a constructive unfair dismissal charge against the company. With so much upset, distraction and cost caused by personal remarks, it is a reminder how important it is to have well written and clearly communicated behavioural policies in the workplace.
Pay blunder
If you have ever had anything to do with payroll, you’ll know that mistakes do happen. But for one Hungarian company, it was rather a large one. Meant to pay a short-term employee €260, they accidentally transferred €92,549.
The mistake was a currency error and transpired because the worker gave a foreign bank account. His €226 was meant to be paid in Hungarian Forints, of which the correct number was, you’ve guessed it: 92,549. The police are now involved because the company has only been able to recover about €70,000.
Do you have the payroll processes in place to avoid such a fiasco? If you are unsure, talk to us about our outsourced payroll service.
