Employment Law – Workers

It is important to know if you are a worker as you will need to make sure that you have your rights and protection under the employment law. There are three main types of employee status that come under employment law: worker, employee or self-employed. These key terms will help distinguish what rights and responsibilities you should have at work.

The status of a worker includes individuals who are working under a variety of contracts rather than just one single employment contract. Employees are defined as workers as well, but employees have different employment rights and responsibilities than a worker does.

A worker is entitled to the standard employment rights,which include the right to; receive the national minimum wage, protection against unlawful deduction in wages, a minimum period of paid annual leave, minimum length of rest periods, not work more than 48 hours on average per week or to opt out of this right if you can choose; protection against unlawful discrimination and protection for ‘whistle blowing’ in the workplace. A worker will also be entitled to statutory maternity, paternity and adoption pay and statutory sick pay. However, as a worker, you should check the entitlement to these rights as it will depend on certain aspects of your employment, such as your earnings.

The main factors that are used to establish a worker status is that you have to perform work or services personally and cannot send a substitute or sub-contract the work to anyone else or you are not undertaking the work as part of your own business.

Worker are entitled to statutory maternity pay, but to qualify for this, you must be paying national insurance contributions, which means you have to be earning at least £87 a week if the end of your qualifying week is in 2010-11 tax year. If you have a working visa that allows you to work and live in the United Kingdom, then you may be able to get statutory maternity pay. The visa may include the condition that you have no recourse to public funds, but this does not mean you will not be entitled to statutory maternity pay, provided you satisfy certain qualifying conditions which will depend on your recent employment and earnings history.

If you are a worker and your wife or partner or gives birth, or adopts a child, you may be entitled to ordinary statutory paternity pay. The amount that will be paid to you will all depend on your average weekly earnings, generally paid for one or two consecutive weeks or 90% of your average weekly earnings depending on which is less.