Newsletter Winter 2006
Email scams-the Euro Business Guide (again). You may have received an email from info@eubusinessguide.net recently offering a “free of charge” update to the Euro Business Guide. This is a well-known scam that has been operating for several years. In fact the small print reads “I HEREBY ORDER A SUBSCRIPTION WITH SERVICE PROVIDER EU BUSINESS SERVICES LTD “EURO BUSINESS GUIDE”. I WILL HAVE AN INSERTION TO ITS DATA BASE FOR THREE YEARS. THE PRICE PER YEAR IS EURO 965.” In the words of the great Tom Waits, ‘the large print giveth, and the small print taketh away’. As always with scams like these, delete the message-don’t use the unsubscribe link, as this simply confirms they have an active email address.
Companies House Make sure you apply the correct postage! Mail with incorrect postage is held for 21 days by the Post Office in case Companies House decides to collect it (which is unlikely!) and provided the sender’s address is marked on the envelope it is returned to sender. If packages are sent to Companies House without the correct postage, there is a real risk it will either not be delivered or may be returned out of time-which could be a major problem bearing in mind all the time limits that you need to comply with.
Maternity-new rights Mothers whose babies are expected on or after 1 April 2007 have a number of new rights:
All employees are entitled to an additional 6 months maternity leave (previously, 26 weeks minimum service required) so the total leave now available is one year;
The period of notice for early return from maternity leave is extended from 28 days to 8 weeks;
The period of statutory maternity pay is increased from 26 to 39 weeks. The extra 13 weeks are paid at £108.85 per week;
The small employer’s exemption is removed (previously employers with 5 or fewer employees were exempt from an unfair dismissal claim if they did not allow a returning employee to go back to their old job).
Workplace bullying The House of Lords has confirmed that the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 can be used by employees to bring a claim against their employer, if they have been bullied at their workplace. For there to be harassment there has to be conduct (occurring on at least 2 occasions) targeted at the Claimant calculated to cause distress and is (subjectively) oppressive and unreasonable. Unlike normal claims for personal injury there is no requirement that there is a recognisable psychiatric illness, nor foreseeability. All that is required is distress and financial loss. One final point-many employer’s liability policies will not cover claims under the Act.-if in doubt contact your broker. There is an article about employee stress claims on our website at http://www.cleggssolicitors.com/occupational_stress_claims.
Data protection Are you registered under the Data Protection Act 1998? If your business possesses even a single PC, you may well need to. Fortunately the Information Commissioner’s Office has a great deal of useful information, a search facility to find out if you (or an organisation you are interested in) is registered and you can even register online at http://www.ico.gov.uk. Registration costs £35 and has to be done annually.