Do you need a grievance procedure, and what should it contain?

The grievance procedure is the formal process by which an employee may raise any complaints about the behaviour of the employer towards them. Employees have a statutory right to access a grievance procedure and there is an implied duty for employers to reasonably and promptly afford a reasonable opportunity to their employees to obtain redress of any grievance they may have. Employees therefore are entitled to have their grievances dealt with, and any failure on the employer's part to deal with a genuine grievance would potentially give the employee the right to resign and claim constructive dismissal.

Since the statutory discipline and grievance procedures were repealed in April 2009, guidance should now be sought from the new Acas code and guidelines which apply to discipline and grievance situations. The new Acas code is used as a benchmark by employment tribunals when considering the fairness or otherwise of an employer's procedure and actions.

It is in the interest of all concerned to try and resolve any problems informally in the first instance and managers should be trained in how to deal with problems at an early stage to stop them escalating.

If any problem is unable to be resolved informally then employees should be given the opportunity to submit a formal grievance in writing and the employer must respond by arranging a meeting with the employee at which the employee has a right to be accompanied by a work colleague or trade union official. The employee’s complaint should be fully investigated by the employer before a response is given in writing to the employee along with the right to appeal against the decision.

If an employee appeals against the decision then the same process should take place but with a more senior manager hearing the appeal. Any decision made as a result of the appeal is the final stage of the grievance procedure.

Some practical tips to help manage absenteeism during the World Cup

There is no legal requirement for you to grant time off to your staff to watch the World Cup matches; it is up to you whether or not you want to consider it, taking into account the needs of your business.

There are a number of options open to you to ensure that your business is not adversely affected during the 4 weeks of the competition.

• Operate a "business as usual" approach whereby staff who want to take time off must request annual leave in the usual way. However, you may want to consider late requests for annual leave particularly if the employee’s national team does well during the later stages of the competition.

• Explore the possibility of screening matches in the workplace. This could lead to the business benefiting from increased motivation and improved morale. However, you would need to ensure that non-English staff are given the same flexibility to watch their national teams and be aware of the need to keep football-free areas for those not interested in the World Cup.

• Be flexible - allowing staff to work around the matches that they want to watch. An ideal opportunity for staff to use any time off in lieu owed by allowing flexible start or finish times or offering extended lunch breaks.

• Ensure staff are aware of any specific rules or procedures which you may want to put in place to deal with any unauthorised absence. For example, staff that are off sick could be required to notify their absence to a specific person. This would raise awareness that you are monitoring unauthorised absence closely during the World Cup period and would assist with identifying absence patterns on match days. Without fail, return to work interviews should be conducted as soon as the employee returns to work to record the reason for their absence.

These approaches, together with advance warning to staff that unauthorised absences without a good reason and sickness absences that are not genuine will be dealt with under your controlling unauthorised absence procedures, should help to discourage absenteeism during the World Cup period.