Statutory Notice Pay:

Our employment solicitors in Brighton and Hove would typically advise on 2 types of notice. The first is statutory notice pay. Under the statutory notice pay legislation, your employer is required to give you a certain minimum notice period by law. This could be:

• One week’s notice: this applies if you have been employed continuously for a period of one month or more, but your employment is still less than 2 years.
• Two weeks’ notice: if you have been employed continuously with the same employer for more than 2 years then you are entitled to an additional week notice for each extra year you complete in employment. This is capped at a maximum of 12 weeks’ notice under employment law.

In contrast, under your employment contract there may be a clause that deals with your notice period. It may be, and often is, more advantageous so it is important that your employment solicitor considers your employment contract when advising on statutory notice.

Statutory Notice Pay Situations:

Our employment solicitors in London and Brighton would advise that where notice has been given, the law states that even if your employer gives you no work to do you are still entitled to be paid in full during the notice period. The only situation where this would be different is if your contract expressly states something different.

There are four situations where your employer must still pay you during your statutory notice period. These are:

• if you are sick or injured and incapable of working
• if there is no work provided by the employer you are still, “ready and willing” to work
• if you are on holiday, in accordance with your holiday entitlement
• if you are pregnant, had a child, on adoption leave, in a period of parental leave or shared parental leave or paternity leave which causes you to be absent from work altogether or only partly.

Meaning of a Career Break:

An agreement can be made with your employer that allows you to have time away from work. This can sometimes be for a personal reason, for example, someone in your family is ill and you need to care for them, or a professional reason such as career development.

A career break can be referred to as a ‘sabbatical’ or an ‘adult gap year’. Either way it simply means that you wish to take time away from work without terminating your employment. Career breaks are often unpaid unless otherwise agreed with your employer or in your original employment contract.

Career breaks are normally for a period of one year however, in some cases they can be extended for several years.