Should employers provide their employees with any information about age discrimination?
Are long-service awards incompatible with the Equality Act 2010?
Where it is a company's policy to give a small gift to employees who have completed periods of service of multiples of 10 years could this be discriminatory under the Equality Act 2010?
Can an employee bring a pay discrimination claim on grounds other than sex?
Is "last in, first out" still a valid redundancy selection criterion?
Will an employer be liable to an age discrimination claim if it makes enhanced redundancy payments?
Can employers stipulate in job adverts that applications from individuals who have reached, or are within six months of reaching, retirement age will not be accepted?
Can an employer use a mandatory retirement age for workers who are not employees?
Is it permissible to increase the frequency of health screenings for employees in line with age?
Can an employer ask an employee whether or not he or she has any plans to retire?
Can an employer suggest to an employee that he or she consider reducing his or her hours in preparation for retirement?
Depending on the circumstances, there could be a risk of age discrimination if an employer suggests that an employee reduce his or her hours in preparation for retirement.
Much depends on whether or not the employee has informed the employer of his or her intention to retire. In the absence of such an indication, the employer should not assume that the employee will retire simply because he or she is approaching a certain age. If the employee does inform the employer of his or her intention to retire, the employer may wish to discuss with the employee the possibility of reducing his or her hours in preparation for retirement, for example if this might facilitate a handover of the employee’s work, or help the employee to adjust to not working. The employer should not impose a reduction in hours on the employee without his or her agreement as this is likely to constitute unlawful age discrimination, unless it can objectively justify it.
If the employer’s reason for wishing to reduce the employee’s hours of work is unrelated to retirement, for example there has been a downturn in work or the employer has concerns about the employee’s performance, it should address this using the appropriate procedure, ie the redundancy or capability procedure.
XpertHR provides answers to more than 1,000 FAQs. But that's not all...
Request a demo today to find out how XpertHR can benefit your organisation
Should an employer notify its employees that they can choose to retire?
Should an employer take into account an employee’s age when setting targets or assessing performance?
If an employer does not retain an employer justified retirement age, can it retire employees if this is justified on a case-by-case basis?
How should an employer that is no longer using a compulsory retirement age amend its policies as a result of the abolition of the default retirement age?
What procedure should an employer follow if it wants to retire an employee after the removal of the default retirement age?
How can an employer know whether or not its retirement age can be objectively justified?
What should an employer do if an older employee requests to change his or her working pattern in preparation for retirement?
Can an employer offer a pre-retirement course to employees when they reach a certain age?
Can an employer stop providing group risk insured benefits such as life assurance or private medical cover to employees when they reach a certain age?