Casual workers
Key points
- The term 'casual workers' is not defined in employment law
- The rights and protections available to a casual worker depends on the legal status of the individual in question
- Casual workers could potentially be employees, workers or self-employed
- The status of the casual worker may be determined by the contractual documentation. If no such documentation exists, it will be necessary to assess how the relationship works in practice
- Where the contract does not reflect the reality of the arrangement, consideration should also be given to how the arrangement operates in practice
- A key consideration in determining the status of a casual worker will be whether or not mutuality of obligation exists in the working relationship
- Where there is no mutuality of obligation, a casual worker will not be an employee.
Recent developments
11 November 2023
The government announced in November 2023 that it will introduce legislation allowing for the 12.07% method of calculating holiday accrual to be used for irregular hours workers and those who work for part of the year. This will be based on the number of hours worked in the pay period, for example weekly, monthly, or even daily. Agency workers who work for part of the year or have irregular hours will also be able to have their holiday accrual calculated in this way. This will overturn the effect of the ruling in the Harpur Trust v Brazel case.
This constitutes a huge change for “tens of millions” of employees across the UK who currently must wait to have their hours, if any, to be confirmed.
On 25 October 2023 Acas opened consultation on a new Code of Practice on handling requests for a predictable working pattern, following the passing into law of the the Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act. More information is available in our 'in-depth' section.
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