Buyers Guide
buying fixed fee employment law and HR support services
If you are thinking about using the services of a fixed fee employment law and/or health & safety service provider then we strongly recommend that you do some homework first! There are plenty of service providers in the market place, each offering slightly different propositions and each with their own strengths and weaknesses.
As a starting point, we suggest that you read our short ‘market overview’ document.
What’s so special about us?
We provide an extremely high quality, professional, practical and pragmatic service.
We carry out regular client satisfaction surveys. Our last survey was conducted in Spring 2008. The results speak for themselves:
*97%* of clients/respondents rate the QUALITY OF ADVICE given by the employment support/HR team as GOOD or VERY GOOD.
*97%* of clients/respondents rate the EFFECTIVENESS OF ADVICE given by the employment support/HR team as GOOD or VERY GOOD.
*91%* of clients/respondents report that if their contract was to be up for renewal in the next 3 months they ARE LIKELY or WILL renew their contract with us.
*94%* of clients/respondents report that they would recommend another business to ourselves.
*92%* of clients/respondents describe the COST of the service as either FAIR, GOOD or EXCELLENT value for money.
Overall 93% of clients/respondents report that they are either SATISFIED or VERY SATISFIED with us.
The quality of service is as good as that provided by firms of UK solicitors – but with the advantages of fixed fees, payment of compensation/defence costs, training, provision of precedent documents and more.
Find out more about our Employment law and HR services.
Questions & Answers
We hope that the following Questions & Answers will give you a little more insight in to what makes us so special:
Q. Is quality of advice and service excellence important to you?
A. Every regulatory consultancy firm and every firm of solicitors promises both first class advice and a commitment to service excellence! How do you decide if the promises reflect the reality?
With us:
Your dedicated lawyer will either be a UK solicitor or be otherwise qualified by legal examination, with a minimum qualification of a law degree (LLB) and more than 2 years (normally much more!) relevant experience;
We set service standards and define the time periods for completing your contracts and handbooks;
We are pro-active and (if you do not contact us) we will contact you on a regular basis;
Every year we will ask you to score each of our lawyers against criteria such as “speed of response” and “quality of advice”. Each of our lawyers must achieve certain minimum ratings and we build ongoing improvement into our appraisal process; and
We apply the quality standards and ethics of the law firm to our business.
Q. If there is an employment dispute, who will represent you at Employment Tribunal?
A. If you end up at Employment Tribunal you want to have the best possible representation.
With us, if there is an employment dispute, your dedicated lawyer will fight the case for you. He/she is the best possible person to do so having been involved with the dispute from the outset. With us, if your case proceeds to an Employment Tribunal your lawyer will either deal with the hearing him/herself or instruct an expert employment law barrister to represent you.
Q. If you lose an Employment Tribunal Claim, how good is the legal expenses insurance policy? Are you confident it will pay out? Do you fully understand the terms and conditions relating to your policy, to ensure coverage if an employee claim occurs?
A. We work with ESP, who enjoy an excellent relationship with one of the UK’s leading providers of commercial employment protection insurance. ESP are also directly authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority and can ‘place’insurance cover with ANY leading insurer they feel meets the needs and best interests of our clients. If you join us, as part of our standard service, ESP put in place a professional employment protection insurance policy to cover your costs of legal representation and compensation. Provided you take and follow advice in certain circumstances, claims against you will be covered and paid! However, we would urge to read and fully understand the terms and conditions of the policy relating to any insurance you purchase, so you make a genuinely informed decision.
Q. Who will be your main point of contact for day to day advice?
A. We will allocate a team of lawyers to look after your business and you are free to choose whom, out of that team, you best get on with and can request this person(s) time and again. That person(s) is, of course, supported by others in your team but you will build a close working relationship with your lawyer and he/she will quickly learn to understand your business, its challenges and objectives.
Q. What sort of help and advice will you get?
A. As well as giving you telephone advice and support, we will email advice to you and we will draft relevant letters and documents for you. We do everything that you would expect a leading firm of employment law solicitors to do for you – and much more.
Q.Is advice that we give restrictive, negative or unnecessarily cautious?
A. We don’t simply recite the law to you. Our aim is to understand your business objectives and to give you the right advice to achieve your specific objectives.
Q. How will you access precedent letters, your contracts of employment and Employee Handbook documents?
A. When you join us we will give you access to a secure section of our website from which you can read, amend and print out all of your employment documents, contracts of employment and employee handbook.
Q. How will we keep your contracts of employment, employee handbook and health & safety documents up to date?
A. We will review and update both as necessary to reflect changes in law and best practice. We will then upload the latest versions to your section of our website. This means no more clumsy exchanges of hard copy drafts or costly reviews and rewrites of inflexible documents. Your contracts and handbook will always be up to date!
Q.You currently use a firm of solicitors for your employment law and HR issues. Why should you consider us?
A. We provide at least the same fast, practical and pragmatic advice that you might reasonably expect to receive from a leading firm of specialist employment law solicitors. However, unlike most firms of solicitors:
- You can call us as often as you want and we will not charge you a penny extra. No ticking clock every time you pick up the phone! You pay the same fixed price every month.
- We will draft and update your contracts of employment as necessary as part of our standard service.
- We will draft and update your Employee Handbook as necessary as part of our standard service.
- If an Employment Tribunal claim is made against you the claim is defended as part of our standard service. You will not get an extra bill for several thousand pounds (win or lose) just for defending the claim.
- If compensation is awarded against you, as part of our standard service, it is paid on your behalf – up to £100,000 per claim or £1,000,000 per client per annum!
- We provide you with a bank of employment/HR related letters and forms for your day to day use as part of our standard service.
- We will provide you with practical updates every month, by email.
Q. What sort of training and support do you provide?
A. As part of our standard service we will provide regular plain English updates and regional training, if requested. Our training courses are genuinely educational and informative and not an excuse for a ‘sales pitch’.
Q. Are there any other benefits in joining us?
A. Lots! Over the years that we work with you we will become one of your main points of contact for professional help. We aim to provide holistic corporate support. This means that we work with trusted third parties to offer additional benefits and services to our clients. Please ask for details of those current offers available to new clients.
Find out more about our Employment law and HR services.
We hope that you will choose to join us, but whatever you decide…please make an informed decision!