Grievance Policy

Policy

We will try to resolve, as quickly as possible, any grievance you may have about your employment. This procedure is open to any employee who has a grievance in relation to their employment. The Company wants you to use this procedure when necessary so that we can deal with such matters appropriately. If you raise a grievance the matter will be dealt with promptly, fairly and in confidence.

Purpose and scope

Grievances are concerns, problems or complaints that employees raise with their employers. Grievances may relate to, amongst other things, terms and conditions of employment, health and safety, work relations, new working practices, organisational changes, equal opportunities and harassment. If the grievance relates to discrimination, bullying or harassment you should also refer to the equal opportunities, bullying and harassment policies.

Principles

A written record of the grievance meeting and any appeal should be agreed between, and signed by, the interviewer and you and will be recorded on your personnel file.

Information and proceedings relating to a grievance will remain confidential as far as is possible. All stages of the procedure shall be dealt with without undue delay.

If you set out the grievance in writing and send a copy to the Company, the formal grievance procedure (stage two) will be automatically invoked.

Procedure

At all stages of the procedure, during any associated meetings as outlined below, you have the right to be accompanied by a trade union official or a colleague during the grievance meeting and any appeal meeting. See the chapter in this handbook on Disciplinary Rules and Procedure for further details on who can be a valid accompanying person.

Stage one - informal

Your first step is to raise any grievance with your manager, who, in most cases, will be best placed to respond to the complaint. If this informal approach fails to resolve the issue, or the complaint is sufficiently serious, you should raise it as a formal grievance (stage two).

Where the grievance is against your Line manager you may approach another Line manager.

Stage two - formal

If the matter cannot be satisfactorily resolved, or is sufficiently serious, you should raise the matter formally by setting out the grievance in writing and sending a copy to your manager.

Once the manager receives a written copy of the grievance, you will be invited to attend a meeting with them to discuss the grievance. After the meeting they will take time to consider the grievance.

They will then inform you of their decision and any proposed action to be taken in respect of the grievance. You will also be informed of the right to appeal this decision.

Stage three - appeal

If you wish to appeal a grievance decision, you should inform the Managing Director in writing within five working days with grounds for your appeal. You will then be invited to attend an appeal hearing. The CEO will hear all appeals, and the appeal decision is final. After the appeal, when the grounds for your appeal have been considered, you will be informed of the appeal decision.

Alternative Chairperson

There may be occasions where following receipt of a grievance or a grievance appeal the Company deems it necessary for an alternative person of appropriate seniority to conduct the meeting and/or make the decision regarding the grievance or appeal. This could for example (although not exclusively) be because the relevant manager has already been involved in the process. The alternative person may be an independent third party.