Employment Contracts, Staff Handbooks & HR Policies – Tailored to Your Business
Contracts of Employment & Staff Handbooks
A Contract of Employment is the cornerstone of the employer–employee relationship, setting out rights, responsibilities, and expectations.
The Staff Handbook complements it by explaining how your business runs day to day.
We prepare tailored employment contracts and handbooks – either as a one-off project or as part of our outsourced HR set-up service.
Our expertise also covers specialised agreements, such as casual worker contracts, influencer agreements, and hairdresser chair rental arrangements.
We work closely with you to ensure each document fits your operations. For example, if your team works remotely, we’ll address practical points such as insurance, flexible working, childcare considerations, and confidentiality obligations.
Our contracts and handbooks are designed not only to meet legal requirements but also to reflect your culture, values, and commitment to compliance.
Your Legal Obligations – Section 1 of the Employment Rights Act
By law, every employee must receive certain key information from their first day of employment, including:
- Names of both employer and employee
- Job title or description
- Place of work and any requirement to work abroad for more than a month
- Start date for continuous employment
- Pay and pension arrangements
- Holiday entitlement and other paid leave
- Sickness and incapacity procedures
- Notice periods and any fixed-term conditions
- Applicable collective agreements
- Training requirements
- Disciplinary and appeal procedures
The simplest way to ensure full compliance is to issue a complete employment contract on or before day one; one of the many benefits of our proactive approach.
Bespoke HR Policies for a Modern Workplace
Employment documentation should be both practical and relevant. In addition to the core policies, we offer a wide range of optional and bespoke HR policies tailored to your needs – from commission structures and menopause policies to unlimited holiday schemes and even “dogs at work” guidelines.
We especially enjoy working with forward-thinking businesses and are always ready to turn innovative workplace ideas into clear, compliant, and workable policies.
Get Expert Support with Employment Contracts, Staff Handbooks & HR Compliance
Whether you need a single employment contract, a compliant staff handbook, or a suite of bespoke HR policies, Thrive will ensure your documentation is accurate, up to date, and aligned with English and Welsh employment law. We work with businesses of all sizes to create clear, practical, and legally sound agreements that protect you and your employees from day one — while keeping HR compliance at the heart of every document.
Contact our employment law specialists today to find out how we can help you stay compliant, reduce risk, and build a strong workplace culture.
FAQs
At minimum, the written statement of particulars (which employers must provide from day one of employment) needs to cover the matters required by section 1 Employment Rights Act 1996. But a good employment contract goes further than satisfying that statutory minimum.
Well-drafted contracts protect both parties. For employers, that means clauses covering confidentiality, intellectual property, restrictive covenants where relevant, and clear provisions around sickness and absence. The contract should also be consistent with your staff handbook, since conflicts between the two create problems down the line. If your contracts are more than a couple of years old, they’re likely overdue a review given the volume of legislative change since the Employment Rights Act 2025. Our team can advise on contracts and staff handbooks here.
Legally, there’s no obligation to have one, but practically it’s one of the most useful documents an employer can have. A handbook sets out the rules and procedures that govern day-to-day working life: disciplinary and grievance procedures, sickness absence, flexible working, equal opportunities, and so on. Done well, a handbook reduces disputes, makes managing difficult situations easier, and provides a clear framework that employees can rely on.
The key thing is that a handbook needs to be kept up to date. An out-of-date handbook is sometimes worse than none at all, because it can commit you to procedures you can no longer follow or that don’t reflect current law. If you haven’t reviewed yours since the Employment Rights Act 2025 came into force, now is a good time. We can help you draft or review your handbook.
As a rule, review them whenever there’s a significant legal change, and carry out a comprehensive review every two to three years regardless. Given the pace of change since 2023, many employers are well overdue. The Employment Rights Act 2025 affects contracts and policies across flexible working, statutory sick pay, unfair dismissal, family leave and more. Our overview of the ERA 2025 changes gives a guide to what’s changed and when.
Beyond legislative updates, reviews are also triggered by changes in your business: new roles, restructures, changes in working patterns, or anything that means your current contracts no longer reflect how people actually work. Our team can help you work through the implications for your documents and policies.
