Thank you for taking the time to visit myHRdept.co.uk. This site is wholly owned by HRR Solutions Ltd, Company No 4081891, Vat Reg No: 727 5322 35, Registered Office: Bray Business Centre, Weir Bank, Monkey Island Lane, Bray, Berkshire, SL6 2ED.

PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO READ THIS ENTIRE NOTICE AND IN PARTICULAR THE GENERAL CONDITIONS SECTION AND THE SECTIONS DETAILING YOUR CHOSEN SERVICES. BY CHOOSING TO PURCHASE ITEMS OR SERVICES FROM OR TO SUBSCRIBE TO MYHRDEPT.CO.UK, OR TO USE ANY OF THE FREELY AVAILABLE INFORMATION ON MYHRDEPT.CO.UK YOU ARE ACKNOWLEDGING THE TERMS OF THIS NOTICE AND ACCEPT THEM.

Contents

1. General terms and conditions & liability statements

2. Premium Plus specific terms and conditions

3. Fair usage policy – Premium and Premium Plus subscriptions

4. Fixed price HR services specific terms and conditions

5. Single document purchases specific terms and conditions

6. Employment Tribunal Guarantee Scheme (ETGS) (discontinued July 2012 and applying only to Clients with a subscription including ETGS cover)

7. Limits of liability – general statement

8. Payments via WorldPay

Definitions

‘Services’: include but may not be limited to information freely download from myHRdept or in the case of pay as you go documents in return for a fee paid, or supplied to you by us in any other form (with or without charge), advice and/or consultancy support provided by us to you or on-going subscriptions purchased by you for HR services and whether those services remain within contracted dates or continue without substantial alteration beyond contracted dates.

‘Supplier’ of Services: Services available from and services provided through myHRdept.co.uk have been prepared by HRR Solutions Ltd, and when we refer to ‘we’ or ‘us’ or ‘myHRdept.co.uk’ or ‘myHRdept’ in this Notice, we mean that Company.

‘Client’ for Services: Where we refer to ‘you’ or our ‘Clients’ we mean the person or persons or organisations using our information or services and where in the event of a dispute it is that person who has reasonable cause to be in dispute with us.

‘Notice’: Refers to the terms outlined here and applies to all Services and Contracts except where expressly stipulated in Contracts (which will deem to take precedence in the event of any conflict).

‘Contract’: Refers to Contracts for Services drawn up and agreed between the Client and the Supplier normally for Premium Plus contracts, full outsourcing agreements and fixed price HR services.

‘Direct Debit’: Widely accepted direct to account payment terms provided by most UK banks and building societies and underwritten by the national Direct Debit Guarantee. Payments made by Direct Debit for myHRdept on-going Services (Premium and Premium Plus subscriptions) will normally be rolling i.e. monthly or annual payments will continue to be taken unless cancelled by the Client under the terms of the Direct Debit Guarantee and/or in accordance with agreed terms.

‘Premium’: A subscription of service of at least 1 year, payable in one instalment and offering unlimited access to myHRdept (excluding H&S docs) and use of the myHRdept database and document builder facilities. Also available with an ‘occasional support module’.

‘Premium Plus’: A subscription service of 1 year or more, payable monthly. Precise services and prices vary by client and covered by the applicable terms of this Notice and also by a separate Contract for Services.

‘Fixed Price HR Support’: Covered by a specific (separate) Contract describing Services to be supplied at a guaranteed fixed price normally to deal with a specific employment issue or project.

SOLE JURISDICTION AND SEVERABILITY

The Notices of Terms & Conditions described here (including those below) are subject to the sole jurisdiction of the English Courts. If a court or any other body having the power to rule on disputes decides that any part of these Notices is not reasonable or cannot be enforced for any reason, this will not affect the validity of the other parts of these Notices which will continue to be in full force and effect.

1. General terms and conditions & liability statements

1.1. If you use any document or Services which you have accessed through myHRdept.co.uk, it will be under the terms stated here, in this Notice, or in the applicable parts of it depending on the Services you have chosen.

1.2. Geographical limits on Services. Where Services concern the supply of documents please note that the documents have been prepared for use in England, Wales &, in most cases, Scotland. They will not necessarily be suitable for other parts of the UK, or elsewhere. It is your responsibility to ensure that documents are used for their intended purpose and within appropriate geographies and that the correct documents are selected for the intended purpose.

1.3. Liability 1. We try to ensure that our Services comply with the relevant aspects of employment law and are in line with best practice standards recommended by the Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS). However, the law is constantly changing and evolving and new cases in court can dictate a change of practice for employers. We cannot accept any liability for any loss or damages howsoever caused through the use or misuse of any Services supplied to you by us, whether or not that loss or damage is caused by our error, omission or negligence.

1.4. Liability 2. In any case and should clause 1.3. be deemed unreasonable by an English court (who have sole jurisdiction over any disputes arising in relation to these terms) our liability to you will not extend beyond a maximum of the lower of the actual price of any individual Service purchased by you or in the case of Premium subscriptions of an amount equivalent to a maximum of 1/12^th annual subscription or in the case of Premium Plus service contracts of an amount equivalent to the maximum of the last months payment. For Premium or Premium Plus subscriptions where loss or damages is accepted by us as being caused by our serious error, omission or negligence you will also be given the option to cancel your subscription without penalty. For the avoidance of doubt there will be no liability whatsoever to you in circumstances where loss or damage stemmed from freely available information or advice obtained from us.

1.5. Unsupported services. For Premium subscriptions offered without support and for pay as you go document sales these Services are provided to subscribers and users on the understanding that the publisher is not in business as a lawyer and that the service is not attempting to a emulate the services of a lawyer or consultant, from whom further support may from time to time be necessary.

1.6. Your sole use for your employees. Services are for your use solely in connection with your employees working at a single location or, in the case of mobile roles, operating from a single company base. Multi-site businesses will normally require a subscription for each location. Services do not cover the employees of any third party, contractors, the self-employed, agency or other non-employee workers, partners, equity partners or share-holding Directors. Where we offer information and services in connection with categories of worker other than directly employed employees we do so in an effort to be helpful to the needs of our Clients but, and for the avoidance of all doubt, we will not accept any liability whatsoever for any losses or damages that arise in connection with any other category of worker irrespective of whether or not we are deemed to be at fault.

1.7. Liability with respect to Health and Safety. Services are offered to subscribers and users on the understanding that the publisher is not in business as a health and safety specialist and that the service is not attempting to emulate the services of a health and safety specialist or consultant, from whom further support may from time to time be necessary. The health and safety documents available on this site, in common with all other documents and information, are for general guidance only. Whilst we have considerable experience in advising clients on employment law issues (and will continue to do so subject to the provisos given above) we are not health and safety specialists and cannot currently provide advice on anything other than very basic aspects of health and safety issues in a practical context.

1.8. Intellectual Property. We reserve intellectual property rights for all of the content contained (including documents and web page content) on myHRdept.co.uk. It is a strict condition of our supplying Services to you that you will use our Services (including written material (hardcopy or in electronic form) including (but not limited to) contracts of employment, the employee handbook, employers guides and HR policies and procedures ONLY in connection with your employees and that you will not use or supply for use any information, advice or documentation we supply in connection with any other person, nor will you allow third parties (including but not limited to other HR services who may be or may seek to be in competition with us) to access or have copies of any of the materials, information or advice provided to you by us. You may continue to use contracts and other information supplied by us for your own employees beyond the expiry of the period of notice of cancellation but you should be aware that documents can become quickly out of date.

1.9. You must supply accurate information to us. ‘Premium Plus’ and fixed price services are priced according to the information you supply which may include the number of employees, annual payroll cost, HR history and the type of business you operate. It is a condition of continuing supply that you provide accurate information upon commencing services with us and that you advise us of any substantial changes that arise. Where you supply inaccurate information which would have had a substantial bearing on our decision to support you or at a particular cost, we will be released from our obligations to you and may cancel any Services supplied without notice and without refund, providing we exercise this right within 56 days or our learning of your breach of this requirement.

1.10. Direct Debits – increasing/decreasing the amount you pay. Where Services are paid for by a Direct Debit arrangement are strictly governed by the direct debit guarantee operated by the major UK banks, and under this guarantee we cannot vary the fee charged to you unless we have strictly complied with certain conditions, which normally include our notifying you in writing in advance of any increase in charges. For multi-year contracts we will normally include a provision to increase charges each year to reflect inflation.

1.11. If you fail to pay for the agreed term. Premium Plus subscriptions are for a minimum of 12 months from the date of purchase, irrespective of the payment method preferred. Should you cancel your payments before the complete term has been paid (except where your Contract has been cancelled by us) you agree to pay to us on demand the balance of payments that would have been due over the remaining period of the term not later than 30 days from our demand for payment and you also agree to our adding late payment penalties as is permitted under UK legislation for our reasonable administration costs incurred in connection with the recovery of the amounts due.

1.12. Rolling contracts/Termination. Unless replaced by new contracts, Premium Plus Contracts and Premium Contracts on Direct Debit terms will continue to operate after the agreed term and monthly payments will continue to be collected unless cancellation terms are applied as will be described in the Premium Plus Contract. Premium subscriptions may be cancelled at any time by the Client providing written notice to us of their intention to cancel. Where cancellation has taken place after a Direct Debit collection has been paid we will not normally offer a refund for the unused portion of the period covered by the Direct Debit and will in any case reserve the right to charge a reasonable administration fee against any agreed refund.

1.13. Copyright. A great deal of time, effort and cost has been put into developing this site and its product range, and we require Clients using the site not to reproduce any part or whole of any product in any way, nor store in a retrieval system or to transmit by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise. All rights are reserved on this site and on all products except where expressly marked otherwise. The only exceptions to this are where you need to make a copy of a document for your own personal records. We allow you to make reasonable copies for this purpose only as a part of our copyright conditions.

1.14. Data Protection – information about you and your business. By supplying us with details about you and your business you give us permission to use that information in the course of our providing services to you and for the purposes of our informing you of additional services or HR/employment law developments. We will not supply information about you to third party organisations without your consent.

1.15. Data Protection – information about your employees. We expect our Clients to take their responsibilities for their employee’s personal information seriously and this includes storing employee data on the myHRdept.co.uk employee database. You warrant that you have all relevant permissions in accordance with the Data Protection regulations to supply information about your employees to us, and that we may review such information and records in the ordinary course of our providing services to you whether in respect of employees in general or in particular. You warrant that any fines or penalties imposed upon us as a result of your supplying such information to us (whether via myHRdept.co.uk employee records or any other mechanism) without proper permission will be met in full by you.

You also warrant that only ‘authorised persons’ have access to your login details for the site and you that you use, regularly change and securely store passwords of sufficient complexity to ensure that only authorised persons are able to access your myHRdept.co.uk account. myHRdept.co.uk is an on-line service that can be accessed from any computer anywhere in the world. It is then particularly important to ensure passwords are robust and refreshed and we are not responsible for documents lost or personal data revealed through your failing to do so and/or other failures of your responsibilities under GDPR. Where an ‘authorised person’ leaves your business, you should change your password for myHRdept.co.uk. It is good practice to regularly change passwords and ensure that your password pattern is not predictable through using a mix of letters, symbols and numbers.

1.16. Loss of data upon expiry of subscription. Subscription holders can store details about employees in their account in myHRdept.co.uk. This allows for easier storage and creation of documents and letters etc. for those employees. Where a subscription is not renewed, or a direct debit instruction is cancelled, this data will be lost. We will make reasonable efforts to remind Clients of subscription renewal dates and of the consequences of failing to reinstate direct debits, but we will not be responsible for the consequences of a loss of data under such circumstances. Similarly should we cancel a subscription by our own choosing all data entered into the system will be deleted and again we will have no liability to you under these circumstances.

1.17. Data protection queries. If you are concerned about any of the data that may be held by us about you as a result of your transactions with myHRdept.co.uk (or for any other reason) please send an e-mail in the initial instance stating your concern and the reasons for it by emailing us from the ‘contact us’ facility from the bottom menu bar. Mark your email ‘Data Protection Query’. We will fully investigate your concern and respond promptly indicating the course of action we intend to follow to progress your query.

2. Premium Plus specific terms and conditions

2.1. Our general expectations of our Clients. We expect our Clients to behave honestly, decently, with due diligence and in good faith at all times with regard to their employees, ex-employees, prospective employees, workers, contractors and Clients.

2.2. Provide sufficient timely information and feedback. We expect our Clients at to work with us in a timely and efficient manner to help us construct contracts of employment & HR policy sets sufficient for their business needs and to deal with employee issues arising. This includes approving/amending drafts without delay and supplying pre-existing information promptly when requested to do so (contracts, policies etc.) We cannot be held responsible for delays or suboptimal case management results arising from a Client’s failure to supply information or respond to contact requests. We deal with numerous issues simultaneously and often do not have the time to chase Clients for missed responses to our enquiries.

2.3. Tell us about issues EARLY. We ask Clients to contact us by email or by the business hours telephone number given if they become aware of a potential employment issue or dispute arising concerning current, ex or prospective employees.

2.4. Always tell us about relevant issues. We require Clients to notify us about (but not limited to) disciplinary action (verbal warning or above); grievances received; dismissals planned; retirement disputes or enforced retirement; redundancies; flexible working requests (that won’t be granted); any planned detrimental change to contractual terms (including pay, hours, days, duties or location of work); any proposed deduction from wages; any reported acts of alleged discrimination (however minor) or the receipt of statutory discrimination questionnaires; claims or complaints about employment status; complaints or issues arising from a woman’s pregnancy, maternity leave (or proposed), or her actual or planned return from maternity leave; concerns over an employee’s legal right to work in the UK etc.; equal pay complaints; an intention to acquire a business or service contracts which may result in an inbound TUPE transfer of employees; an intention to sell or dispose of a business or service contract which will result in an outbound TUPE transfer of employees.

2.5. Your employees, your meetings, our support. We expect our Clients to conduct their own HR meetings & hearings with employees but we will provide templates and guidance where necessary to assist with this. In some cases our Clients may want us to assist directly with certain meetings or hearings. Where we agree to do so we may charge a reasonable fee and expenses for attending Client premises but will in all cases advise our Clients of this prior to finalising arrangements.

2.6. Face to face meetings. We are available for face to face meetings with the Director/Owner of the Client business on request at our premises or by our agreement at Client premises. HR Audits will normally be conducted at Client’s premises. For Clients not local to our office locations we will either cost relevant travel into our service plans or make arrangements telephone/skype meetings.

2.7. Updating myHRdept database. Where Clients opt to use the myHRdept database and document generation systems we ask Clients to update the database regularly and not remove ex-employees until 6 months after their leave date, unless relevant documents are otherwise stored.

2.8. Keep copies of employee documents & templates. Clients are responsible for keeping copies of all documents including templates and letters etc. drafted by us for their use and should not assume that we keep copies of the same.

3. Fair usage Policy

3.1. Ebbs and flows. We expect ebbs and flows of support requirements from our Clients according to their circumstances and needs. These will not affect the support provided through myHRdept.co.uk, which we will flex according to the needs of our Clients. Our Premium Plus Clients are expected to require additional support over and above Premium Clients and this is factored into the price of the Premium Plus package.

3.2. Limits on support. Notwithstanding 3.1., if we reasonably judge the support required by a particular Client to be consistently excessive (and our experience indicates to us that it will continue to be so) we will:

a. in the initial instance contact the Client to explore ways in which to reduce the support burden (and provide reasonable time for these measures to take affect); and then if necessary

b. agree with the Client an adjustment to subsequent fees; or

c. offer the Client an option to cancel the myHRdept HR support package; or if the Client is unwilling to do so;

d. cancel the Client’s myHRdept HR support package with a minimum of 1 month’s notice to enable the Client to arrange an alternative provider.

3.3. Premium Customers support. Premium customers may opt to add HR support to their Premium subscription for a small additional fee. This low cost service provides peace of mind but is not designed as a cost effective way of replicating the Services provided under Premium Plus packages. For anything other than very occasional advice (e.g. an hour or so in any contract term) we recommend a Premium Plus package which (save for the above) is not similarly limited. If a Client does not wish to upgrade they may be refused future support under their Premium Package without refund.

3.4. Complaints under the Fair Usage Policy. If a Client has reason to feel aggrieved at actions taken or proposed by myHRdept.co.uk. under this policy they may submit a written complaint to Catherine Larke, Director, at the registered office (given on myHRdept.co.uk). The complaint will normally be investigated within 28 days of receipt and a response issues to the complainant within a further 14 days of the conclusion of the investigation of the complaint.

4. Fixed price HR services specific terms and conditions

4.1. Contract. All fixed price assignments should be covered by a contract for services.

4.2. Maximum charge. Under a fixed fee arrangement we will not charge the Client more than the fee we have quoted even if dealing with the case takes more time than we originally estimated.

4.3. Excess charge. Clause 4.2. does not apply in the event that the Client has materially failed to give us an accurate briefing as to the incident in question and that as a result of that omission (whether by design or unintentionally) the case becomes more complex than was originally thought. In such circumstances a further fee may be levied by us or we may decide at our discretion to cancel the Contract and reimburse the Client the unused proportion of fees paid for the Services.

4.4. Payments. Payments for fixed fee work are normally required by us in advance of work to be undertaken.

4.5. Advice. We are an experienced HR outsourcing provider established in 2002. We have a track record of being able to deal effectively with HR and employment issues arising more efficiently and cost effectively than lawyers. We do not however present ourselves as lawyers the services of whom may still from time to time be required.

4.5. Liability. In the event of our advice, act or omission being judged by a court or a mutually appointed independent qualified assessor as being patently negligent and as a result inaccurate and in the event of which our act or omission resulted in additional costs to the Client, our liability to that Client will be limited to the lower of the proportion of the actual loss suffered attributable to that negligent or wrong advice, act or omission or to the whole fee paid by the Client for the fixed price service.

5. Single document purchases specific terms and conditions

5.1. Single documents may no longer be purchased from the site but previously purchased documents were presented in PDF form or in MS Word format. It was the responsibility of purchasers to

a. ensure they selected the correct document for the intended purpose

b. only used the document once (except where expressly stated)

c. only used the document for the purpose for which it is intended

d. carries out any amendments accurately where marked

e. not to have amended other text except where marked

f. checked to ensure the document is reasonably up to date at the date of purchase

myHRdept staff will be happy to advise customers in the event of any queries in respect of a – f above. This does not extend to case management advice, which should be procured under subscription services or fixed price services.

5.2. Copies. Clients must save copies of completed documents on their own systems (and in accordance with data protection regulations.

5.3. Liability. In the event of loss or damage arising from the use or misuse of a myHRdept document and howsoever that loss or damage occurs (including whether through document inaccuracies, out of date documents or any other act or omission), our liability is expressly limited to the actual purchase price paid for the document in question.

6. Employment Tribunal Guarantee Scheme (Part of the Notices of Terms and Conditions)

NOTE: THE ETGS WAS DISCONTINUED FOR ALL NEW CLIENTS JOINING AFTER AUGUST 2012.

These terms and conditions describe the myHRdept.co.uk’s Employment Tribunal Guarantee Scheme optionally available to all myHRdept.co.uk Premium Plus subscribers joining the service or renewing from August 2011 or earlier where membership of the scheme has been expressly granted by us.

The terms and conditions relating to the ETGS should be read in conjunction with general terms and conditions for myHRdept.co.uk.

Overview & general principles

6.1. Scope. The ETGS is designed to help manage and deal with the costs of qualifying claims registered and accepted by an employment tribunal and where that claim falls under the category of ‘Unfair Dismissal’. All other categories of claim are expressly excluded. The ETGS is designed to provide protection against the costs of contesting claims made against you by prospective or ex-employees. For the scheme to operate ‘claims’ must be made to and accepted by an employment tribunal. ‘Costs’ includes the costs of responding to a tribunal application, preparing for a hearing and representation at the hearing by an experienced tribunal lawyer (where we deem this to be necessary). The ETGS applies to single claims only (not co-joined or multiple claims) and only to claims brought by ex-employees or prospective employees i.e. dismissed employees or those who have resigned or job applicants who had applied for an advertised employment vacancy. The ETGS does not apply to other categories of worker, nor does it apply to claims pursued in legal forums other than the employment tribunal system of England, Wales and Scotland.

6.2. Providing partial ETGS cover for ‘accepted risk cases’. Some HR services are in reality an insurance product with ‘HR advice’ added on. myHRdept.co.uk is different in that, unlike many insurers, we recognise that risk cannot always be avoided, for example when carrying out the many categories of dismissal that is permitted by UK domestic laws. We are happy to use our extensive experience to advise our Clients on the levels of risk attached to particular courses of action. Parts of the ETGS cover may be refused where an accepted risk approach is followed, but where we have discussed and agreed the action concerned with the Client we will still honour our promise under the ETGS to respond to and prepare for the tribunal hearing subject to the terms below. Because representation by a lawyer is provided by a third party we will not normally cover the cost of tribunal lawyers where an accepted risk is involved, but we will pass on our specially negotiated rates to our Clients in these circumstances.

6.3. Minimising fees and excess charges. To join the ETGS we charge a modest premium and provide attractive levels of benefit to reflect the reality of the situation. Paying an experienced HR company or lawyer to prepare for and attend an employment tribunal on your behalf will always cost thousands of pounds, and the final cost could run past £10,000 in some cases. Our experience suggests most sensible employers will only rarely receive an employment tribunal claim, and so we have designed the ETGS to reflect this. Under the ETGS the full costs of our responding to a claim and preparing for a tribunal hearing on your behalf will be paid by us, and we will pay for a tribunal lawyer from an internationally renowned law firm to represent you for up to 2 days per year – most cases are listed for only 1. In the unlikely event of a reasonable employer suffering a second or third tribunal case in a year though we will ask you to make a contribution towards our costs via an excess charge. Similarly if more than 2 days lawyer representation time are required in a year you will be required to pay the balance, and we will afford you our specially negotiated rates in the unlikely event that this proves necessary.

6.4. Acting in good faith. We expect you to behave honestly, decently, with due diligence and in good faith at all times with regard to your employees, ex-employees, prospective employees, workers, contractors and Clients. If you (or your employees designated with people management responsibility) behave negligently or wilfully in a manner such that any ordinary person would regard it as likely to result in a breach of employment, civil or criminal law, the ETGS cover will be regarded as void and we may terminate any support package in place with minimal notice. There will be no past or future liability to us for losses arising to you as a result of our actions under these circumstances.

6.5. Notify early of issues requiring support. To enjoy the benefits provided by the ETGS you must notify us as soon as you are aware, or we deem that you should reasonably have become aware, of a potential employment issue or dispute arising concerning current, ex or prospective employees.

6.6. The requirement to notify us described in 4.5 includes (but is not limited to) disciplinary action (verbal warning or above); grievances received; dismissals & planned dismissals; retirement disputes or enforced retirement; redundancies; flexible working requests (that won’t be granted); any planned detrimental change to contractual terms (including pay, hours, days, duties or location of work); any proposed deduction from wages; any reported acts of alleged discrimination (however minor) or the receipt of statutory discrimination questionnaires (where discrimination concerns age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership or pregnancy and maternity); claims or observations of bullying, harassment or victimisation; claims or complaints about employment status; plans to return a woman to a role after her maternity that is different to the one she previously held (or on detrimentally different terms and conditions); complaints or issues arising from a woman’s pregnancy, maternity leave (or proposed), or her actual or planned return from maternity leave; concerns over an employee’s legal right to work in the UK etc; equal pay complaints; complaints regarding the alleged withholding of a statutory or contractual right, an intention to acquire a business or service contracts which may result in an inbound TUPE transfer of employees; an intention to sell or dispose of a business or service contract which will result in an outbound TUPE transfer of employees, a request for information made by an employee, ex-employee or prospective employee under the Data Protection Regulations.

6.7. Forward tribunal paperwork immediately. To enjoy the benefits provided by the ETGS you must, in addition to complying with other parts of this document, have immediately upon receiving an employment tribunal claim against you, forwarded it to us by secure post or in person. We may reject cover for claims received later than 14 days prior to the response deadline date given in the ET1 form.

Benefits & excesses

6.8. Subject to the conditions above and below the Cover provided under the ETGS includes:

6.8. a. Responding to an employment tribunal on your behalf and preparing for the tribunal hearing including:

• Responding to an ET 1 (tribunal claim form) on the ET3 (response form)
• Preparing the bundle of evidence
• Co-ordinating witness statements
• Preparing witnesses
• Negotiating via ACAS on possible settlements

Excess fees for multiple claims: For the first claim received in any one rolling year of cover there is no excess fee for the service described in this 4.6a. However for a second claim in the same period an excess of £500 + Vat will apply. For a third claim in the same period an excess fee of £750 + Vat will apply and fourth and subsequent claims in the period will be subject to an excess fee based on the actual time expended in managing the response and preparation @ £115 per hour + Vat. Excesses must be paid in advance of our commencing work for you on the claim against you.

6.8. b. Employment tribunal representation:

Up to 1 day representation at employment tribunal hearings in any one rolling year. We normally instruct qualified and experienced employment tribunal lawyers from an internationally renowned law firm to represent myHRdept.co.uk Premium Plus Clients at employment tribunal hearings, pre-hearings or reviews.

Excess fees: Where more than 1 day representation is required the additional days will be charged to you at a discount against the publicly available fee rates for the nominated lawyer.

6.9 Further and specific exclusions. All claims not classed under the employment tribunal category ‘unfair dismissal’, and any and all claims to any other Court (other than an employment tribunal) whether or not in connection with unfair dismissal are expressly excluded. We may at our sole discretion refuse claims under the ETGS in whole or in part, or we may stop claims progressing even if initially accepted if it is apparent either at the outset, or it becomes apparent as the claim progresses that:

a. You have a separate employment tribunal insurance policy designed to meet the same or a similar purpose to the benefits intended to be provided by the myHRdept.co.uk ETGS. If present this insurance (sometimes called legal expenses insurance) should be used in preference to the myHRdept.co.uk ETGS. Under these circumstances Clients should ensure that they comply with the notification and progression requirements of the insurance company.

b. The claim is raised by an employee who is in ongoing employment i.e. is not an applicant for a position, nor has the employee being dismissed. (Should you receive such an application please contact us for assessment of the case and advice. In most cases we will be able to deal with these issues within the normal operation of the myHRdept.co.uk cover but outside of the operation of the ETGS).

c. You did not alert us to a developing issue at the outset (4.5 & 4.6 above).

d. The claim has arisen from you or one of your employees with people management responsibility behaving in bad faith or seriously negligently (see 4.4 above).

e. You fail or have failed to follow our advice when dealing with the issue and we reasonably believe this failure to be a contributory cause of the claim arising, and/or to have resulted in an increased risk of losing the case at tribunal and or of a higher award being made against you than would have been the case had you followed our advice as directed.

f. You fail or have failed to follow reasonable settlement or remedial actions recommended by us that probably would have prevented the case progressing to an employment tribunal application or hearing, and as a result of which we would incur additional cost if we accepted the claim.

g. The claim arises from your failure to make statutorily or contractually (as defined in your employee’s employment contract) required payments, conditions or benefits, including payments under the national minimum wage, paid holiday entitlement, wages generally and statutory redundancy, maternity, paternity, adoption or sick pay.

h. The complaint raised essentially or wholly relates to or stems from an event that occurred within a 6 month period of the beginning of your myHRdept.co.uk subscription, and therefore upon which you were unable to comply with the requirements of 4.5. and 4.6, i.e. you could not have notified us at the outset of the issue because you did not hold a myHRdept.co.uk subscription at the outset of the issue.

i. The claim is or is part of a collective claim relating to more than 1 person (a collective action).

j. The claim relates to someone who is not classed as an ‘employee’ for the purposes of UK employment legislation.

k. You fail, having received fair warning from us, to provide adequate support for us in dealing with your claim e.g. by not making key information, contacts or witnesses available when we reasonably require, or by providing incomplete, inaccurate or inconsistent information (see also clause

l. We did not receive an employment tribunal application from you in enough time for us to deal properly with it (see 4.7 above) or, where an excess premium applies, if you also have not settled your excess invoice within 7 days of it being issued to you.

Making a claim under the ETGS & your responsibilities

6.10. Starting a claim. To start a claim under the Schemes Clients should contact us as soon as possible either by email at enquiries@myHRdept.co.uk or by telephone on 01628 820516. You will be contacted normally within 2 working days so that we may obtain the necessary details to compile a case file and begin dealing with your claim.

6.11. If a claim is refused. If for any reason we do not accept your claim under the Scheme we will contact you directly to discuss the reasons for this.

6.12. Documents. Copies of tribunal applications etc. should be marked ‘confidential and urgent’ and sent securely to: Bill Larke, Managing Director, at the registered office. You should keep copies of all documents sent.

6.13. Claim management. Once a claim has been accepted and the case file has been created we will nominate a claims handler to work with you on your claim. This may or may not be your normal HR Account Manager, depending on the skills required for the particular claim. Your claim will be progressed under our management once accepted unless or until the claim is concluded, settled, heard at tribunal or we deem it appropriate to reject the claim under the rules of the ETGS as are defined in this document.

6.14. Legal responsibility. Although we will, subject to the terms and conditions of the myHRdept.co.uk ETGS as set out here, act as your representative, you remain legally responsible to the employment tribunal service for the entirety of the case against you. In fulfilling your responsibilities you must in particular:

i. comply and ensure we comply with the dates by which certain actions will be required by the Employment Judge; and

ii. carefully and promptly check any information and statements prepared by us or our agents on your behalf to ensure they are accurate, truthful, consistent and complete, informing us promptly of any errors, inconsistencies or omissions; and

iii. send all information and evidence to us at the outset whether you consider it to be helpful or harmful to your case; and

iv. make available in accordance with our or our agent’s requirements:

i. yourself and others by telephone, email or in person if necessary; and

ii. any and all such additional information we request; and

v. attend and ensure others are available to attend witness preparation meetings when we or our agents require it, and attend the hearing itself; and

vi. ensure that you do not write or send emails internally within your own organisation or externally (including to us) that may be defamatory to the claimant or harmful to the case (it is safest to regard anything you write as being producible evidence); and

vii. not (and instruct others not to) delete or destroy information (including emails (on office and portable devices) personnel file contents, letters, forms, electronic records, text messages etc that relate to the employee and particularly to the complaint made by them; and

viii. ensure that you keep the case and developments confidential at all times.

For the avoidance of doubt, a failure to comply with this clause 4.14 and in particular sub clauses ii. – v, could result in our withdrawing our representation for you and, at our sole discretion, our cancelling the ETGS scheme benefits & cover with respect to the case against you.

Complaints under the myHRdept.co.uk Employment Tribunal Guarantee Scheme

6.15. If a Client has reason to feel aggrieved at actions taken or proposed by myHRdept.co.uk. under this policy they may submit a written complaint to Catherine Larke, Director, at the registered office.

6.16. The complaint will normally be investigated within 28 days of receipt and a response issues to the complainant within a further 14 days of the conclusion of the investigation of the complaint.

7. Limits of our liability – general statement

Our liability to myHRdept.co.uk subscribers is limited to that expressly described here under the terms of Employment Tribunal Guarantee Scheme (ETGS), Except as expressly stated here we accept no liability financial or otherwise for loss caused to you as a result of your using directly or indirectly the services or advice offered by us to you either via myHRdept.co.uk or via any other medium or mechanism used by us, whether or not such losses arose or were contributed to by our error, inaccuracies or omissions.