Employment Tribunals: An Investigation into Common Claims

We recently analysed Ministry of Justice (MOJ) data looking at employment tribunals across the UK going back over the last 5 years. In the name of business compliance, we wanted to find out what workers are most likely to take their employer to tribunal over – and the answers may surprise you!

The number one claim was in relation to The Working Time Directive, with frazzled and disgruntled employees claiming they are forced to work excessive long hours at detriment to their health and wellbeing and in breach of the law.

Under The Working Time Directive, a UK employee may not work more than 48 hours per week (on average; usually taken over a 17-week period) unless there are mitigating circumstances.

Unfortunately, in just one year (2019/2020), 26,498 employees felt they were overworked without due cause.

Looking at the data as a whole across a 5-year period the top five claims were:

  1. Working Time Directive (160,299 cases)
  2. Equal pay (115,359 cases)
  3. Unauthorised deductions (formerly wages act) (114,520 cases)
  4. Unfair dismissal (86,009 cases)
  5. Breach of contract (58,415 cases)

What does this mean?

Sadly, there has been a 25% increase in the total number of claims brought against employers. A statistic that seems to imply organisations still aren’t doing enough to comply with the law and protect their employees (not to mention themselves).

If we analyse the top claims over the last 5 years in terms of percentage increase (rather than how many cases filed), the jurisdictions most in hot water were largely discrimination-based:

  1. Sexual orientation discrimination (up 165%)
  2. Disability discrimination (up 133%)
  3. Religion or belief discrimination (up 130%)
  4. Written pay statement (up 109%)
  5. Public interest disclosure (up 98%)

Although, there is some good news: the number of age discrimination cases has fallen by 80% over the same 5 year period and dropped by 3% in 2019/2020 compared to the previous year – a great trend to see across Britain!

Successful hearings

Naturally, not all claims filed are successful at tribunal. However, if we look closely at the number of disposed cases (completed cases) by outcome, the claim with the highest success rate was redundancy cases – where employers have failed to properly inform and consult redundant employees.

Almost half of all cases in this category are successful (48%) and affected employees are often awarded compensation in the thousands of pounds.

Further Analysis

Over the last 5 years, equal pay claims have increased by 181% and sex discrimination claims by 15%. Unauthorised deductions cases (where an employee has been unpaid or underpaid wages) increased by 114%.

It’s not all bad news though. It’s good to see that last year a third of discrimination cases related to age, disability, or pregnancy were resolved through an ACAS conciliated settlement – a process usually involving mediation and eventual agreement between employer/employee.

As ever, prioritising your employees’ wellbeing and treating them with fairness, dignity, and respect – in line with The Equality Act 2010 – is the best way to avoid employment tribunals as a business, as is following clear and transparent processes designed to treat everyone consistently.

It’s important, as business owners, to train managers and team-leaders in your organisation to handle these processes fairly and to deal with grievances in a reasonable and respectful manner, always in line with basic employment law.

Don’t neglect to regularly update employees in positions of trust with information about your statutory and contractual requirements as a business – this empowers them to speak up in everyone’s best interest.

Below you’ll find full data on the number and type of jurisdictional complaint, as well as data arranged by outcome:

Number and type of jurisdictional complaint

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 729,627

Age Discrimination

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 31,935

Year on year change: -3.41%

5 year change: -80.94%

Breach of contract

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 58,415

Year on year change: +3.78%

5 year change: +59.25%

Disability discrimination

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 27,754

Year on year change: +16.98%

5 year change: +133.26%

Equal pay

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 115,359

Year on year change: -11.50%

5 year change: +43.83%

National minimum wage

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 1,476

Year on year change: -14%

5 year change: +25.94%

Part-time workers regulations

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 1,543

Year on year change: +3.65%

5 year change: +45.12%

Public interest disclosure

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 10,465

Year on year change: +6.89%

5 year change: +98.43%

Race discrimination

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 14,719

Year on year change: +8.58%

5 year change: +94.66%

Redundancy – failure to inform and consult

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 23,329

Year on year change: +25.15%

5 year change: +73.32%

Redundancy pay

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 22,479

Year on year change: +18.39%

5 year change: +66.51%

Religion or belief discrimination

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 2,931

Year on year change: +4.12%

5 year change: +130.59%

Sex discrimination

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 35,363

Year on year change: -34.31%

5 year change: +15.11%

Sexual orientation discrimination

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 1,661

Year on year change: 8.24%

5 year change: 165.43%

Suffer a detriment / unfair dismissal – pregnancy

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 6,522

Year on year change: -10.61%

5 year change: +87.05%

Transfer of an undertaking – failure to inform and consult

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 3,624

Year on year change: -29.91%

5 year change: -11.81%

Unauthorised deductions (formerly Wages Act)

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 114,520

Year on year change: -0.26%

5 year change: -38.22%

Unfair dismissal

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 86,009

Year on year change: -1.06%

5 year change: +60.60%

Working Time Directive

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 160,299

Year on year change: -46.71%

5 year change: -28.02%

Written pay statement

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 4,145

Year on year change: -64.86%

5 year change: +109.60%

Written statement of reasons for dismissal

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 1,200

Year on year change: +57.40%

5 year change: 67.14%

Written statement of terms and conditions

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 5,879

Year on year change: -10.87%

5 year change: +23.46%

Type of jurisdiction by outcome

(ACAS Conciliated Settlements, success at hearing and unsuccessful at hearing)

Please note these are disposed (completed) cases and are not the only potential outcomes

Total (2015/2016-2019/2020): 482,741

Age discrimination

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: +83.86%

Success at hearing: +59.74%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +29.39%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: +10.07%

Success at hearing: -6.30%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -53.82%

Breach of contract

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -14.29%

Success at hearing: -10.21%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -15.40%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -17.52%

Success at hearing: +8.28%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -6.50%

Disability discrimination

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -9.30%

Success at hearing: +22.06%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -3.43%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -22.62%

Success at hearing: -31.24%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -30.90%

Equal pay

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -52.87%

Success at hearing: +440.95%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -88.17%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -90.93%

Success at hearing: +181.47%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +204.23%

National minimum wage

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: +5.59%

Success at hearing: -18.66%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +16.68%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -28.01%

Success at hearing: +1.47%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +101.25%

Part-time workers regulations

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -33.80%

Success at hearing: -50.63%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +54.74%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -45.05%

Success at hearing: -50.51%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -63.36%

Public interest disclosure

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -12.07%

Success at hearing: +14.12%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -11.07%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -19.68%

Success at hearing: -31.95%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -34.09%

Race discrimination

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -8.40%

Success at hearing: -16.42%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -4.48%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -15.93%

Success at hearing: -43.43%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -32.07%

Redundancy – failure to inform and consult

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: +32.46%

Success at hearing: +24.03%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +58.26%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -64.57%

Success at hearing: -20.09%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -18.64%

Redundancy pay

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -26.78%

Success at hearing: -25.44%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -37.11%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -29.39%

Success at hearing: +10.28%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -11.56%

Religion/belief discrimination

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: +18.85%

Success at hearing: +12.19%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +32.22%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: +88.36%

Success at hearing: -29.22%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -24.65%

Sex discrimination

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -9.74%

Success at hearing: +39.51%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -16.72%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -8.91%

Success at hearing: -150.28%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +116.25%

Sexual orientation discrimination

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -8.33%

Success at hearing: +29.98%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +14.47%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -24.07%

Success at hearing: -52.03%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -18.67%

Suffer a Detriment/Unfair Dismissal – Pregnancy

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -5.26%

Success at hearing: +3.26%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +21.02%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -20.36%

Success at hearing: -20.47%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -24.85%

Transfer of an undertaking – failure to inform and consult

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -4.71%

Success at hearing: +166.28%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -58.16%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -46.50%

Success at hearing: +41.54%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -38.35%

Unauthorised deductions

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -21.62%

Success at hearing: -7.75%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -3.16%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -25.12%

Success at hearing: +114.89%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -28.35%

Unfair dismissal

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -5.68%

Success at hearing: +1.69%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -11.85%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -38.49%

Success at hearing: +2.61%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -21.62%

Working time directive

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -19.30%

Success at hearing: -13.50%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -23.43%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -10.16%

Success at hearing: +52.94%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -1.91%

Written pay statement

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -18.62%

Success at hearing: -7.06%

Unsuccessful at hearing: +31.48%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -47.81%

Success at hearing: +26.22%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -8.15%

Written statement of reasons for dismissal

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -54.60%

Success at hearing: +18.03%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -45.26%

5 year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -59.10%

Success at hearing: -34.74%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -39.76%

Written statement of terms and conditions

Year on year change:

ACAS Conciliated Settlements: -13.94%

Success at hearing: +45.30%

Unsuccessful at hearing: -17.17%

With thanks to Richard Nelson LLP for their expert guidance on this project.

Introducing Our New Information Security Collection

We are excited to launch the second of our Compliance Collections for Information Security – a unique approach to keeping awareness training programmes fresh, year on year. Keep your workforce cognizant no matter where they work.

Keeping Business Information Secure

Cyberattacks continue to be a concern for many organisations. A study by Accenture indicates that the most expensive component of a cyber-attack is information loss at $5.9M. Information breaches from cyberattacks can have devastating consequences on businesses – from significant financial losses to damage to reputation and job losses.

With remote working becoming the norm, in light of the COVID19 pandemic, information security is more important than ever. Employees are now spread across different locations – be it in the office or at home. It is therefore paramount to keep your workforce aware and informed on how to keep business information secure. Awareness training is vital for educating employees on the threats facing businesses, spotting the signs of cyberattacks and mitigating the risks of breaches.

One Size Does Not Fit All

When it comes to online training programs, one size does not fit all. With this in mind, we designed our Collections to help organisations create a cost-effective bespoke training solution using our off-the-shelf products. With Collections, organisations can roll out effective learning interventions over a number of years – promoting learner engagement and knowledge retention.

New Information Security Collection

Our Information Security Collection is packed with courses in a variety of learning styles – combining immersive learning, microlearning and toolbox talks to keep learners engaged. Also included are free communications resources which can be printed out or displayed in the workplace digitally to reinforce key messaging.

With novel learning experiences and targeted messaging, our Collection can help boost engagement and retention while embedding a culture of compliance.

What’s New?

Apart from a complete refresh of our existing courses, our Information Security Collection includes the following new courses.

Immersive Learning

Our immersive learning courses are scenario-based and highly interactive – placing the learner at the heart of the experience and testing them on their ability to make the right decisions.

With the new immersive-learning course on Introduction to Information Security, educate members of your staff on their responsibilities in ensuring that your organisation is protected against cyberattacks and breaches. It is a highly gamified course, using multiple gamification elements and the latest techniques in high-quality 3D styling.

Diagnostic Assessment

The new Diagnostic Assessment is a short quiz to measure the learner’s understanding of information security and automatically create enrolments onto relevant microlearning courses. The assessment is useful for assessing individual training needs, offering valuable insight into common training gaps with targeted interventions tailored for each employee.

The Diagnostic Assessment requires all the microlearning courses in the collection. It is exclusively available for xAPI courses, utilising the auto-enrol functionality powered by our Astute LXP’s AI engine.

Microlearning

In addition to our existing microlearning courses, following are the new additions to the Collection:

Toolbox Talks

Three new Toolbox Talks designed as blended training courses for small groups. Each Toolbox Talk includes downloadable facilitation notes.

Get a sneak peek at all the new courses on our Information Security topic page. Or download the brochure below for Information Security Collection.

Protecting Homeworkers’ Health and Safety

The recent HSE update to their guidance on protecting homeworkers has become even more pertinent following the new Government directive to work from home where possible.

Just as many workers were returning to their offices, albeit in a very different capacity to which they left them, the trend is now set to reverse with numbers working from home likely to rise again.

The updated guidance reiterates the need for employers to demonstrate the same duty of care towards employees who work from home as they do for on-site staff.

HSE guidance and how training can help

The importance of adhering to the guidelines is twofold:

  • To look after your employees and ensure their wellbeing, both physical and mental
  • To ensure that your business is compliant and operating within the guidelines, negating the possibility of any future accusations of not following the correct procedures which could leave the company open to financial penalties.

In order to help keep your employees safe and your business compliant, eLearning can help employers ensure that they are providing the best possible level of care to the health and safety needs of their employees.

Employees can take the training at home and as they are likely to be in their current working environment they can make any changes necessary to improve their safety quickly and easily.

eLearning can cover the key areas contained within the HSE guidelines and is ideally suited to ensuring that you and your employees are working in a safe environment.

The guidelines refer specifically to DSE (Display Screen Equipment), Mental Health and Stress and state that:

As an employer when someone is working from home, permanently or temporarily, you should consider:

  • How will you keep in touch with them?
  • What work activity will they be doing (and for how long)?
  • Can it be done safely?
  • Do you need to put control measures in place to protect them?

This is as important now as it was when employees first started to work from home on a widespread scale, following restrictions imposed in March.

It could be argued that it is actually even more important as time has progressed, with feelings of isolation likely to have grown the longer home working has gone on.

To say that everybody who has switched to working from home has suffered mentally isn’t true; studies have shown that a high number of people have flourished, citing increased flexibility, lack of commute and reduced distractions as just some of the reasons for a reduction in stress and improvement in overall mental health.

DSE and working from home

One of the key things to consider about the home office space is DSE. We all know that incorrectly set up screens can cause musculoskeletal issues and other health problems and that this has to be a core area of concern for employers moving towards homeworking; but how do employers and employees alike mitigate this risk?

The answer is with targeted training that can be delivered at home, namely eLearning. Getting your employees to undergo training specifically focused on DSE will help to achieve the goals of ensuring their safety and demonstrating you taking responsibility as an employer.

Training should include points such as:

  • How to set up DSE correctly to maximise safety
  • Exercises to minimise the risks of injury
  • Importance of regular breaks
  • Relevant legislation

To discover more about successfully training your employees to set up their DSE safely, we have a number of options available.

Stress

The HSE guidance explicitly mentions the greater need for employers to ensure the mental health of their homeworking staff is protected.

Studies have shown that a number of people have seen improvements to their mental health since working from home, citing increased flexibility, lack of commute and reduced distractions as just some of the reasons for a reduction in stress.

However, for a great many others, feelings of isolation, loneliness and detachment from the workplace has led to a rise in stress and a deterioration in mental health.

This is where managers have had to step up and will continue to need to do so. Increased communication from managers is vital to help with feelings of isolation, as is the need to be able to recognise early warning signs and symptoms of stress in employees.

We have a set of resources specifically designed to help employees recognise their own signs of stress and to help manage it, along with resources for managers to learn how to manage stress in their team.

Home Working Risk Assessments

Many of the risks inherent to homeworking are the same as working in the office: setting up display screen equipment correctly, minimising slips and trips and taking extra precautions if lone working for example.

Home working environments should have had a thorough risk assessment carried out at the outset. Even if this was the case, now is a good time to be re-visiting it to ensure that the working environment remains safe.

We created a Home Working Risk Assessment for precisely this purpose and provides a comprehensive tool for ensuring the safety if your employees.

It focuses on three core areas: your home workspace, working design and taking care of yourself. From looking after your mental health all the way to electrical safety, no homeworking topic is neglected. There is also an extra section for people with line management responsibilities.

Summary

The recent updates to the HSE guidelines about protecting home workers are a timely reminder that we cannot be complacent about the health and safety of homeworkers.

Coupled with the new advice from the government regarding working from home where possible, now is the perfect opportunity to refresh your employees training to maximise their safety.

Our solutions provide a high quality, cost effective solution to your training needs in order to mitigate risk and keep your employees safe.

CPD Certified: All DeltaNet International Courses

Our teams work tirelessly to produce eLearning courses that add value for our customers. Every year, we launch and update dozens of courses to make sure our offering is comprehensive, relevant and valuable. We conduct thousands of conversations with our clients, new and long-standing alike, to make sure we are exceeding their expectations wherever we can.

Our commitment to creating training materials of the highest quality had previously been recognised as our Compliance courses have been CPD Certified for several years but we have recently added our Health and Safety, Performance Management and Take5 courses to our certification. Our eLearning suites were independently reviewed by the CPD Certification Service and were found to meet the exacting standards required.

CPD certification is recognised and respected across industries. It provides an independent measure of quality, giving organisations and learners alike the peace of mind that they are using tried and tested courses of the highest standards.

What Does a CPD Certification Mean for Us?

Ultimately, the CPD certification of our eLearning courses is your assurance of the quality of our courses.

We stand by the excellence of our courses – but you don’t have to just take our word for it! Our eLearning materials have reached all of the demanding benchmarks set out by the CPD Certification Service. This means our courses are consistently high quality and provide significant value to the organisations who invest in them.

Please get in touch if you would like to know more about our CPD certified courses.

Building Ethical Organisations With Anti-Bribery and Corruption Training

For many organisations, mandatory anti-bribery and corruption training can become a tedious box-ticking exercise. We believe that with the right training program, businesses can deliver compliance training that is flexible, engaging and focused on knowledge retention.

We are excited to launch the first of our Compliance Collections for Anti-Bribery and Corruption – an innovative new approach for keeping your training programmes fresh, year on year.

Our new Anti-Bribery and Corruption collection offers an engaging learning experience to employees, helping you build an ethical organisation with a culture of compliance.

The Collections Approach

For many organisations, some of the pain points of compliance training are engagement and retention. We have designed our Collections keeping this in mind. A collection offers a selection of learning interventions that enable organisations to roll out training over several years to keep training content fresh and engaging. This approach supports a multi-year training strategy, offering a flexible training program. It can also be adapted to roll out plans in response to evolving training needs and risks identified.

Our collections also deliver training in different learning styles – combining detailed study, adaptive learning, immersive learning and microlearning, along with some communications resources. The variety of learning formats is linked to higher rates of learner engagement and more effective reinforcing of key messaging.

What’s New?

Adaptive Learning

Adaptive learning courses are a new innovative approach to our longer, detailed study courses. Adaptive learning courses begin with a quiz to check the learner’s current knowledge and understanding of bribery and corruption and demonstrate their areas of competence and weakness. Based on the results of the quiz, the course is tailored to fit individual learning needs and close any gaps in knowledge.

Learners don’t need to repeat any topics which they are already familiar with, saving up to 45 minutes per employee in unnecessary study time!

Our existing Anti-Bribery and Corruption (Working Globally) course is now available in an adaptive learning format.

Core Take 5s

In addition to our existing courses, we have also added the following new microlearning courses as part of the Anti-Bribery and Corruption collection:

To learn more about our collections, visit the Anti-Bribery and Corruption topic page on our website.

Contact Tracing: Complying with Data Protection Regulation

As businesses prepare to open up on 4 July, following the easing of lockdown restrictions, they are expected to have robust measures in place to curb the spread of COVID19, including contact tracing. Collecting personal data as part of contact tracing is expected to create a data privacy minefield for some. So how can businesses navigate this minefield?

What is Contact Tracing?

Contact tracing, supported by the NHS Test and Trace service, is a vital strategy in the fight against COVID19. It can help curb the spread of COVID19 by tracing those who are showing symptoms of COVID19 as well as those who may have come into contact with the infected and risk of becoming carriers. Contact tracing requires the collection and sharing of personal data, affecting most businesses with face-to-face customers or visitors, including hospitality, leisure and retail sectors.

Some businesses may already have systems and processes in place to collect personal data. However, for some small businesses, it will be an entirely new experience. Both will need to comply with data protection regulations while employing contact tracing.

Key Data Protection Requirements

Here is a refresher on the data protection requirements for businesses in the UK.

Data protection regulation in the UK

The UK data protection regime is set out in the DPA 2018, along with the GDPR (which also forms part of UK law). The DPA 2018 sets out the framework for data protection law in the UK. It updated and replaced the Data Protection Act 1998 and came into effect on 25 May 2018. It sits alongside the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and tailors how the GDPR applies in the UK.

The Regulator

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) maintains and enforces data protection regulation across the UK, including the GDPR. Awareness and understanding of data protection requirements are essential for businesses looking to prevent data breaches.

Lawful basis for the processing of personal data

Under the GDPR, acceptable reasons for the lawful basis for the processing of personal data are consent, contract, legal obligation, vital interests, public task and legitimate interests. Data collection for contact tracing is expected to be classed as a public task – a specific task in the public interest that is set out in the law.

Six Tips on Collecting Data for Contact Tracing

So how can businesses ensure that they are fulfilling the requirements for contact tracing but also complying with data protection regulations? Here are six helpful tips on collecting data for contact tracing.

1. Keep the process transparent: Assure your customers on why you are collecting data and how the data helps with contact tracing.

2. Only collect the data you need: For contact tracing purposes, customers only need to provide details such as name, phone number and email address.

3. Keep the data secure: Invest in a secure data collection method or system to make sure the data you have collected is stored away safely.

4. Be clear on retention policy: Government guidance requires businesses to keep a temporary record of customers and visitors for 21 days only.

5. Use the data only for the purpose collected: Personal data collected as part of contact tracing cannot be used for any other purposes such as marketing unless stated explicitly and consent has been given for it.

6. Don’t forget to delete the data: Any personal data must be securely discarded after 21 days.

Contact tracing or not, compliance with the data protection regulation is a vital requirement for most businesses. To mitigate the risks of compliance breaches, always follow best practice around data collection, perform regular audits of policies and processes, and continually review staff readiness.

Helpful resources:

COVID-19 secure guidance for employers, employees and the self-employed

NHS Test and Trace

NEW RELEASE: Global Anti-Money Laundering eLearning Course

A record number of anti-money laundering (AML) fines were issued worldwide in 2019. US regulators and authorities took the lead, handing out fines totalling over £6.2bn – twice as many fines as UK regulators.

This shows that the global impact of money laundering is showing no signs of abating. Regulators are continuing to crack down against illegally obtained wealth, including businesses that fail to prevent money laundering. For global businesses, preventing money laundering makes good sense and is vital for securing the future of a business. Non-compliance with anti-money laundering (AML) laws can result in heavy financial penalties and loss of reputation – two factors which can threaten the stability of global businesses.

While enhanced customer due diligence and internal procedures and monitoring are important, it is equally important to raise awareness on the pitfalls of money laundering within your workforce. Providing relevant AML training to employees is your first line of defence and ensures your staff are well prepared to spot and deal with any money laundering threats that come their way.

Our new eLearning course focuses on raising awareness on anti-money laundering (AML) legislation and its impact on organisations and their employees. The course is designed keeping global businesses in mind, covering general legal requirements for anti-money laundering on a global level, with a focus on the key roles and responsibilities that help organisations to comply.

Delivered in an immersive and engaging format, this online training course is divided into five modules covering legislation, responsibility, and policy, the definition of money laundering, signs of unusual activity and how to report unusual activity. The course can be taken all at once for a holistic, detailed introduction to AML, or learners can take and revisit separate modules to suit their schedule and preferred learning style.

Find out more about our new course HERE.

The Global Anti-Money Laundering eLearning course joins our suite of Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Training.

Enabling Workplace Learning In The Time Of A Pandemic

The coronavirus pandemic has hit businesses very hard. Many organisations have successfully transitioned to remote working to continue with business as usual. But for some, it has also meant putting part of their workforce on furlough. While furloughed employees can no longer work or generate revenue for their employers, government guidance suggests they can certainly continue with learning and development. There is an opportunity here for furloughed employees and their employers to use the current situation as a means to gain skills and retain talent. In this blog post, we analyse the importance and the means of enabling workplace learning in the time of a global health pandemic.

Importance of Continued Professional Development

Continued Professional Development (CPD) enables learning and development in the workplace and helps create a skilled, knowledgeable workforce while boosting the working relationship between employers and employees. A skilled workforce is also instrumental in building a business’s reputation among customers and clients as well as future employees. While many employers may be tempted to put a pause on professional development under the current circumstances, it is certainly worth considering the impact of CPD during a pandemic. During this sobering period, CPD can help with both upskilling and maintaining knowledge as businesses and industries adapt to new ways of working. So while CPD may not be on top of the list of priorities for many businesses and employees right now, it is important to not overlook it completely and enable some form of learning and development.

Keeping Engaged with Learning and Development

For employers, promoting a culture of learning and development is often linked to business growth – it helps employees develop skills, retain knowledge and boosts productivity. In the current situation, learning and development can also offer a means to keep employers and employees engaged. With the move to remote working, learning and development programs can be delivered in digital formats. Learning and developent can keep employees motivated and engaged with work. It can help them gain skills to better support their colleagues. This also holds true for employees on furlough. Even if they’re no longer working, they can stay connected to their workplace and can keep engaged with their professions through learning and development while gaining new skills.

Adapting to eLearning

Technology is already playing a key part in supporting businesses as they navigate through the global coronavirus crisis. From remote working to Zoom calls for meetings and socialising with work colleagues using the House Party app. For learning and development, it means adapting to eLearning to continue offering opportunities for training and development. eLearning offers a flexible and cost-effective alternative to traditional training and development programs. With the advent of learning experience platforms (LXP), modern eLearning is designed to be easily accessible, so employees can access their training remotely on whichever device that is most convenient or comfortable for them.

Despite the adversities facing us currently, it is important to continue to learn and develop our skills while in lockdown. With advances in technology and the use of eLearning, training and development opportunities are more accessible than ever. While the lockdown may have put a temporary lull on business plans and targets, the skills and knowledge gained during this time will continue to hold value once past the pandemic and holds the potential to refuel business growth in the future.

Could Mandatory Remote Working Build Trust Between Employers and Employees?

Ready or not, many coronavirus contingency plans have resulted in remote working for the foreseeable. Seize the opportunity to build trust with your employees.

Due to the spread of COVID-19 coronavirus, the UK has entered one of the biggest remote working experiments ever seen.

However, many businesses were unprepared for the shift. Some were (perhaps unfairly) concerned about trusting their staff to be engaged and work productively whilst away from the office, surrounded by the distractions of home life.

A snap poll indicated that 76% of HR leaders reported concerns from managers about the productivity of teams mandated to work from home during the outbreak. This is the same concern that – prior to the outbreak – led only 56% of managers to agree to flexible and remote working, even though work policies permitted it.

COVID-19 could change all this.

Government advised social distancing has left organisations with no choice; they have been forced to revisit and reassess remote working policies – redesigning them to include everyone possible, not just MDs and senior members of staff (these are the occupations of those most likely to work from home according to the Office of National Statistics).

Once the dust settles it’s possible that the face of business will be changed forever. Staff that proved their trustworthiness by stepping up to the plate and continuing to be productive at home may question previous decisions not to be given the chance – and rightly so.

Trust is an essential building block of any successful team and, if there is a way to find positivity in the midst of the infectious outbreak, perhaps building trust between employers and their employees is one of them.

For managers looking to use this time to encourage transparency and cultivate strong workplace relationships with their team, here are some effective and simple strategies to try:

Set the right tone

Think about it, why employ someone to work for you that you don’t trust?

Micromanaging and being overly controlling encourages cultures of fear and distrust. It’s demoralizing and demotivating for staff, and will erode your teams’ sense of unity and purpose.

As a manager, it’s your job to set the right tone from the top. Lay down your expectations for productivity clearly, during onboarding, and let every member of staff know the part they play in reaching your common goals.

Clarifying how each employees’ contributions complement each other and play a part in the success of the business as a whole is a surefire way to keep everyone motivated and on track – wherever they happen to be working from.

Open communication

Maintaining continuous and transparent communication is the most effective way to keep your team collaborating effectively.

For remote workers, this will often mean using communication software rather than face-to-face chat to stay in touch – although this can actually be a blessing!

Without the distraction of unnecessary meetings and unexpected interruptions and office noise, it’s easier to keep communications purposeful.

Whether it’s daily or weekly check-ins, shared status updates, or collaborating using task management platforms, regular communication with your team drives motivation and feelings of accountability; it also demonstrates your investment in the team.

Keep the personal touch

When we spend 8 hours a day working side by side with people, we tend to get to know them quite well!

For remote workers, however, this isn’t necessarily the case, and managers will need to be more intentional about connecting in order build healthy working relationships.

Incorporating time for personal connection into team interactions will help build empathy, trust, and commitment. Try scheduling a virtual meeting just for personal updates, or creating a separate chat space that’s ‘just for fun’.

Giving staff an outlet like this shows you value their wellbeing and happiness – and that you trust them not to abuse the outlet in lieu of getting the job done.

Be Flexible

Having a flexible approach can build trust during periods of remote working (not to mention it’s proven to help retain experienced and skilled employees).

Small things, such as allowing variable arrival and departure times will mean employees can leverage the time of day they feel most productive, helping to balance work with home and family responsibilities.

Within reason of course, having a flexible approach to home working, will increase commitment and loyalty from staff members. Meaning it’s far more likely they will be willing to go the extra mile when the team needs it.

Working remotely for the first time or due for a quick refresher course? Try our Remote Working awareness course to stay safe and healthy away from the office.

Four Tips For Keeping Safe Online When Remote Working

With the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus globally, a majority of businesses are following up on the official advice of social distancing, encouraging employees to work remotely and ensuring business continuity. While remote working has its benefits, it could also lead to potential cybersecurity risks for employers and employees.

Here are some helpful tips for ensuring cyber safety and information security when working remotely.

Work on Secure Network

The first and most important step to working remotely is making sure you are connected to the Internet, ready to connect with your workplace, communicate with colleagues and access business information online. Failing to work on a secure network can make you vulnerable to a cyber-attack, compromising your systems and business information in such a critical time.

Top Tip:

Make sure you are using a virtual private network (VPN) or a secure home network with strong end-to-end encryption, for example, Office 365 SSL session. Using an unsecured network such as public WiFi could inadvertently create an access point for hackers and cybercriminals to exploit and make your systems susceptible to cyberattacks.

Secure Your Personal Devices

With so many employees working remotely, many organisations have authorised the use of personal devices when working from home. Using your personal device for work is fine as long as you are keeping it secure and have the most up-to-date software and settings running on it.

Top Tip:

It is very important to make sure that you are running the most up-to-date anti-virus software on your device. Anti-virus software carries out regular scans of your computer and removes any malware detected. Make sure you are combining the anti-virus software with a robust firewall – software that monitors incoming and outgoing network traffic on your machine. This will ensure that you are significantly reducing the risks of cybercriminals successfully infiltrating your machine.

Beware of Phishing Attacks

Beware of cybercriminals looking to exploit the current situation on the coronavirus pandemic. Phishing attacks are designed to gain unauthorised access to confidential information through email.

Security experts are reporting a substantial rise in phishing email scams related to the coronavirus – the worst they have seen in years. The BBC has followed up on reports of individuals and businesses being targeted with phishing emails. The campaigns include tax refunds from the HMRC, email attachments from the World Health Organisation (WHO), bitcoin donations to help fight the coronavirus and scare tactics aimed at giving up work or personal email details.

Top Tips:

  • Never click on links in emails that you receive from people you don’t know.
  • If you’re not expecting an email, always examine the content of the email thoroughly and look out for grammar or spelling of the email – these are the tell-tale signs of a phishing scam.
  • If the email is claiming to be from public bodies such as the HMRC or the WHO, don’t open these emails as these are well-known phishing scams circulating currently.
  • If in doubt, always forward the email to your IT team first and get help in verifying if the email is legitimate.

Keep Business Information Secure

Any business information you access from home will be protected by secure login and password. Be it your work email, online business applications and communications tools. Weak credentials are easily exploited by cybercriminals and setting secure passwords is your first line of defence against hackers trying to gain unauthorised access to businesses’ systems.

Top Tip:

Use strong and unique passwords each time and make sure they are a combination of letters, numbers and characters. Apart from setting up secure passwords, try using multi-factor authentication for your organisation’s systems. Multi-factor authentications work by verifying user identity by multiple credentials, normally a password and a code sent to the user’s phone by text or an additional security question.

Effective information security is key to optimising business information while remote working. Keeping information security risks under control will not only protect your own interests, but also those of your organisation, your customers and all other individuals or organisations that you hold information about.

Helpful Resources

Here are some more helpful tips and resources to help you while remote working:

Remote Working awareness course

Try our Remote Working awareness course to stay safe and healthy away from the office.

Information Security awareness training

With the flexibility to work from home in the current climate, it’s a great time to refresh your knowledge of keeping business information secure and working safely online. Try our awareness training courses on key information security topics to working safely and securely away from the office.

Business Contingency Plan (BCP) for Infection Outbreaks

A blog post with helpful tips for businesses on drawing up a business contingency plan and ensuring business continuity.

Mental Health While Working Remotely

A blog post with helpful tips on how to care for your mental health while working from home for longer periods.