What you must do
From their first day on the job, any employee can request a flexible work arrangement. There's no limit to how many times they can ask.
You must:
- give their request fair consideration
- respond to their request no later than one month after receiving it.
You can refuse if either:
- the request conflicts with the employee’s collective agreement
- there are one or more recognised business grounds for refusal.
Recognised business grounds for refusal are these:
- You wouldn’t be able to reorganise work among other staff.
- You can’t recruit more staff.
- It would have a negative impact on quality.
- It would have a negative impact on performance.
- There’s not enough work during the periods the employee wants to work.
- There are planned structural changes.
- It would cause too much additional cost.
- It would impact on your ability to meet customer demand.
Types of flexible work arrangements
There are many different flexible work arrangements. These are some of the most common.
Reduced or increased hours
It’s up to you and your employee to agree on the number of hours they need to work to complete the job. They might ask to reduce their hours, and you might agree that they could still get their job done in less time. Because you don’t have to pay them for the hours they don’t work, their reduced hours might have a positive impact on the business.
If an employee requests extra hours for extra pay, you could increase their hours if:
- you know there’s enough extra work for them to do safely
- you don’t think it will negatively impact their performance.
Flexible hours
You can give your employees a range of hours to work within, and they can choose the actual hours they work.
For example, you could say work hours are anytime between 7am and 7pm, and your employees just need to complete eight hours of work between those hours.
Job sharing
In a job share, two people share the tasks and responsibilities of a full-time position. They are both employees, and need separate employment agreements. Each person works part time and is paid and entitled to leave according to their work pattern.
Working remotely
If technology and job type allow, you could allow employees to work from home or another location. This could be for an agreed number of days each week or month, or whenever they want to.
Paid study leave
If an employee is studying towards a qualification that relates to their job, you can agree to let them spend some of their work time each week studying, instead of carrying out their usual tasks.
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