Terms of employment
Affected by Brexit?
When you hire staff you should provide them with their terms of employment in writing. You should ideally give them their terms of employment on or before the day they start working. In some EU countries (in this case, the 28 EU member states) you have between 1 week and 2 months after the first working day give your new employees their terms of employment.
Your staff contracts or equivalent written statements confirming working conditions – such as letters of commitment – must contain at least the following information, or give a reference to the relevant law:
- parties to the employment contract (employer and employee)
- place of work – if there is no fixed place of work, you should highlight that the employee will work in various locations and say where your business is registered
- title, grade, category of work or a job description/brief specification of tasks
- start date
- expected duration of the job if the contract is temporary
- number of days of paid annual holidays
- length of notice periods for you and the employee if one of you terminates the contract
- initial basic salary, frequency of payment, any other components of remuneration
- length of the normal working day or working week (working hours)
- rules of any collective agreements governing the employee's conditions of work, if appropriate
For annual holidays, length of notice periods, working time and remuneration, you can simply refer your employees to any relevant national/regional laws and administrative provisions.
Some EU countries apply simplified working schemes for staff employed for a maximum of 1 month or fewer than 8 hours per week.
Find out if this applies to your country:
