Government to extend right to request flexible working arrangements

At present, the right to request flexible working is available to parents of children under 17 and disabled children under 18, and carers of certain adults. It is believed that the extension should benefit 288,000 employees and will make it a lot easier to identify whether an employee is eligible to make a request.

The effect of this is that a lot more employees are going to be making requests or flexible working arrangements. All employers must ensure that they follow the correct procedure (outlined below) when dealing with a request for flexible working arrangements.

1. Within 28 days of receiving a written request to work flexibly, the employer must arrange a meeting with the applicant to consider the application. The employee may be accompanied, but only by a colleague form the workplace
2. Within 14 days of the meeting, the employer must make a decision about whether to grant the application to work flexibly.
3. If the application is granted, arrangements must be made to put it into practice. If not the following appeal process may come into play. The refusal must be based on valid business grounds, must be phrased in plain English and includes relevant and accurate facts. The business grounds must be from amongst the following reasons:
   • Burden of additional costs.
   • Detrimental effect on ability to meet customer demand.
   • Inability to reorganise work among existing staff.
   • Inability to recruit additional staff.
   • Detrimental impact on quality.
   • Detrimental impact on performance.
   • Insufficiency of work during the periods the employee proposes to work.
   • Planned structural changes.
4. If the employee is dissatisfied with the employer's decision, he/she may appeal.  Initially this is an internal affair. The appeal should be in writing, setting out the reasons why the applicant thinks the decision is wrong.
5. Within 14 days of receiving the appeal letter the employer must arrange an appeal meeting. The employee may again be accompanied, but only by a colleague form the workplace.
6. A decision must be made within 14 days of the appeal meeting.
7. In the event of a refusal, if the employee does not accept the decision, he/she may appeal through any of the following 3 routes:
   • Employer's own grievance procedure
   • Acas arbitration scheme
   • Employment Tribunal