There is a lot to consider when taking on new members of staff: firstly, there is the initial recruitment process, where you advertise the job, sort through CVs and conduct interviews. Then, once you find the right employee, there are the employment contracts to consider, the induction meeting to conduct and all the health and safety issues involved, among other things.

Complicating matters is the fact that all these steps need to be taken in accordance with employment law. "Obvious", you say; but how do you really know whether your procedures fully comply with the ever-changing list of rules and regulations? The fact is that employers are brought before employment tribunals all the time on account of flaws in their employment procedures. They can be fined thousands of pounds, often when they did not know that they were doing anything wrong.

This shouldn’t deter you from taking on members of staff, or ignoring your responsibilities. You need to be prepared ahead of time, before the worst happens and you get called up to an employment tribunal. Our service will help you do this, so that you can concentrate on running your business, rather than worrying about policies and procedures.

Use our service to keep up to date with legislation by reading our monthly bulletins and looking at our online law guide. Use our documents to easily draft all the documentation you need to stay on the right side of the law. In this month’s issue, we tackle two topics related to taking on staff:

• Preventing discrimination claims when hiring
• Fines for paying below the National Minimum Wage