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Zero-hours contracts/predictable working patterns

Right to guaranteed hours

  • Currently

    Workers on zero-hours contracts have no right to predictable working patterns, hours are set and agreed in accordance with the terms of the zero-hour contract.

  • What will change?

    The ERB does not ban zero-hour contracts but introduces a new duty for employers to offer a ‘qualifying worker’ a guaranteed hours contract. Qualifying workers will be workers who, during the reference period, will either have worked on a zero-hour contract or on a guaranteed hours contract (where the number of guaranteed hours is low) and their working pattern will have met certain conditions as to regularity or number. These conditions are to be confirmed in regulations as is the reference period although we expect it to be 12 weeks. The minimum number of guaranteed hours has also yet to be confirmed.

    A worker can refuse the guaranteed hours offer after the initial reference period; however, the offer must be repeated after subsequent reference periods. The guaranteed hours offer must set out the days of the week and the times on those days when the employer must make work available or a working pattern of days and the times of days when the employer must make work available. The guaranteed hours offer can be a fixed-term offer but only if that is reasonable.

    A worker may present a complaint to the tribunal if an employer does not comply with this duty and fails to offer guaranteed hours to a qualifying worker.

    The duty to offer a guaranteed hour offer (and to provide reasonable notice and compensation for cancelled or curtailed shifts without reasonable notice) can be excluded if;

    – a relevant collective agreement contains terms that expressly exclude this right and the terms that expressly replace the excluded duty or right;
    – the terms are incorporated into the contract of employment, and;
    – the employer notifies the worker of the incorporation and effect of those terms.

    A relevant collective agreement is a collective agreement that is in writing and made by or on behalf of one or more trade unions and the worker’s employer.

    The Government has provided some anti-avoidance measures within its March amendments.  The extension to agency workers is noted below. In addition, the amendment includes additional grounds of action for employees if their employer has tried to manipulate or avoid the requirement to provide a guaranteed hours offer. This may be by limiting the work available in the reference period to avoid triggering the obligation.

    Following the March 2025 Government amendments, the right to be offered guaranteed hours will extend to qualifying agency* workers and follow the same process outlined above. It is the hirer who must make a guaranteed hours offer to an agency worker after the end of every reference period during which an agency worker was a qualified agency worker. A qualified agency worker is like a qualifying worker, must have worked for under the supervision and direction of the hirer for a number of hours, ‘reference period hours’, the regularity and number of those hours fulfil the conditions (yet to be set) and during this period the agency worker was not an excluded agency worker. This definition has not been provided. The offer made by the hirer to the qualifying agency worker is an offer to enter into a worker’s contract which will require the hirer to provide the qualifying agency worker with work for a number of hours that reflects the reference period hours in the relevant reference period. The agency worker will remain an agency worker, this offer does not change that status.

    An agency worker may present a complaint to an employment tribunal against the hirer if the hirer does not comply with the duty to make a guaranteed hours offer. In certain circumstances, the qualifying agency worker may bring a claim against the agency by limiting the agency worker’s hours during the reference period with the sole or main purpose of preventing the agency worker from qualifying for a guaranteed hours offer.

    The duty to offer a guaranteed hour offer (and to provide reasonable notice and compensation for cancelled or curtailed shifts without reasonable notice) for agency workers can be excluded if;
    – the agency worker is supplied to work for the hirer by virtue of a worker’s contract that the agency worker has with another person ‘the other party’;
    – a relevant agreement contains terms that expressly exclude the duty or right and terms that expressly replace the excluded duty or right;
    – the terms are incorporated in the contract;
    – the other party notifies the agency worker in writing about these terms.

    A relevant collective agreement is a collective agreement in writing made on behalf of more or more trade union and with the other party.

    *an agency worker is an individual who has a worker’s contract or an arrangement with a work-finding agency and under that contract/arrangement, is supplied to work for and under the supervision and direction of another person, they are not employed by that other person and nor are they providing work to that other person as a contractor, customer or client.

  • When will it come into force?

    Draft regulations are needed on issues such as the length of the initial and subsequent reference periods, the form of the contract to be offered, the minimum hours in a guaranteed hours contract etc.

  • Consultation

    Consultation on extending zero-hour worker rights to agency workers – consultation closed 2.12.2024.

    Consultation response announced on 4 March 2025 and agency workers to be included in right to guaranteed hour offer.

  • Other documentation

Right to reasonable notice of shifts

  • Currently

    Any notice provision will be included in the terms of an individual zero-hour contract and must comply with the general principles of reasonableness and not undermining the underlying trust and confidence between the parties. There is no blanket right to a certain period of notice.

  • What will change?

    An employer must give a worker reasonable notice of a shift where the worker is a zero-hour worker or working under a contract where the contract does not provide on what days or at what times the employer is to make work available to the worker. Reasonable is not less than a specified amount of time before the shift is about to start – we anticipate the ‘specified amount of time’ to be defined in regulations.

    A worker may present a claim at tribunal should their employer fail to give reasonable notice of a shift. The tribunal may make a declaration to that effect and may make an award of compensation to be paid to the worker. The amount of compensation will be what the tribunal consider just and equitable in all the circumstances to compensate the worker for any financial loss suffered. The worker will be under a duty to mitigate their loss.

    For agency workers, the right to reasonable notice of a shift applies unless the shift is an excluded shift. This definition has yet to be provided, however, it will depend on several factors including the amount payable for working the shift being more than a specified amount and the number of hours worked being more than a specified number.

    The responsibility for providing this reasonable notice to agency workers rests with either the agency or the hirer.

Right to reasonable notice of cancellation, moved or curtailed shift

  • Currently

    Any notice provision regards the change of a shift any notice provision will be included in the terms of an individual zero-hour contract and must comply with the general principles of reasonableness and not undermining the underlying trust and confidence between the parties. There is no blanket right to a certain period of notice when a shift pattern is changed.

  • What will change?

    Where an employer has given notice of a shift to an employee, then they must give reasonable notice of a cancellation or any change to that shift. Again, we expect regulations to define a specified amount of time, and anything less than that time will be considered unreasonable.

    A worker may present a claim at tribunal should their employer fail to give reasonable notice of a cancellation or change to a shift. The tribunal may make a declaration to that effect and may make an award of compensation to be paid to the worker. The amount of compensation will be what the tribunal consider just and equitable in all the circumstances to compensate the worker for any financial loss suffered. The worker will be under a duty to mitigate their loss.

    For agency workers, the responsibility for providing reasonable notice of the cancellation of or change to a shift lies with either the agency or the hirer. Where the cancellation is the agency’s fault then they will have the responsibility to give notice and vice versa.  In addition, the hirer is not responsible for failure to give reasonable notice if it gives notice to the agency of the cancellation or change to the shift to enable the agency to give reasonable notice and the agency fails to do so.

Right to payment for a cancelled, moved or curtailed shift

  • Currently

    Any provision regarding payment in lieu of a changed shift will be included in the terms of an individual zero-hour contract and must comply with the general principles of reasonableness and not undermining the underlying trust and confidence between the parties. There is no blanket right to compensatory payment when a shift pattern is changed.

  • What will change?

    An employer must compensate a worker when a shift is cancelled or changed or curtailed at short notice. Short notice is defined as less than a specified amount of time before the shift and that specified time to be confirmed in regulations.

    The amount of compensation is a specified amount, again to be confirmed in regulations although it will not exceed the amount of money the worker would have earned had they worked the original shift that has been cancelled, changed or curtailed.

    A worker may bring a claim at tribunal should their employer failed to make the whole or any part of the payment due following a cancelled, moved or curtailed shift.

    For agency workers, it is the responsibility of the agency to make a payment of a specified amount each time there is a cancellation or curtailment of a shift at short notice. This will not apply to excluded shifts (see details above).

    Where an agency pays an agency worker in accordance with their right to compensation, that agency can recover from the hirer the proportion of the payment that reflects the hirer’s responsibility for the cancellation or curtailment of the shift but only by virtue of a pre-existing agreement to that effect between agency and hirer. A pre-existing arrangement is one that was entered into on or before the date two  months after the ERB receives Royal Assent. Where there is no pre-existing arrangement, the parties will be able to negotiate further contractual provisions regards the recoupment of payments subject to further amendments to be made by the Government.

  • When will these changes come into force?

    Draft regulations are required to give more details on these provisions relating to notice of shift, changing of shifts and payment for cancelled or moved shifts.

  • Other documentation

Repeal of Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act 2003

  • Currently

    Legislation which the previous Government introduced was due to come into force in September 2024 (12 months after Royal Assent of the Act). The Act gave workers on zero-hour contracts the right to request more predictable hours after they had been employed for a reference period. The employer was then able to accept the request or reject it on a number of grounds. The process was similar to the statutory flexible working request procedures.

  • What will change?

    This Act will not come into force.

  • When will this change come into force?

    The Act will be repealed the day the ERB receives Royal Assent.