Letter confirming an increase in hours request

Use our letter to issue to an employee once it’s been agreed they can increase their hours of work. It sets out the relevant changes to their contractual terms consequent on such a request.

Statutory provision

Section 4 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 states that where changes are made to any of the terms and conditions of employment required to be covered in the employee’s written statement of employment particulars (hours of work, salary, holidays, etc.), including those now required to be covered under the regime in force from 6 April 2020, you are obliged to give the employee a written statement containing details of the changes no later than one month after the changes take effect. Section 4 doesn’t mean you have to issue a wholly new version of the written statement of employment particulars to the employee. A side letter detailing the changes will suffice and this is where our Letter Confirming an Increase in Hours Request comes in.

Increased benefits

Where an employee requests increased working hours (whether this is to full-time hours or simply an increase in part-time hours) and you agree to this, normally you will sit down and agree the new working hours and the revised salary but have you thought of the other associated issues such as annual leave? It’s important you make the appropriate increases to all relevant benefits, such as annual leave, bonuses, commission, etc. when an employee increases their hours. Our letter is intended both to comply with Section 4 and to ensure you cover everything you need to on an hours increase. It provides for the employee’s written statement of employment particulars to be amended from the effective date of the changes and it covers hours of work, salary, annual leave (including the position in relation to bank and public holidays) and overtime. With annual leave, any that has already accrued at the date of change doesn’t need to be recalculated retrospectively to take account of the increased working hours but future annual leave entitlement does need to be recalculated to reflect the increased working hours. Our letter also provides that any employer contributions to a pension scheme or life assurance benefit will be calculated based on the higher salary and any bonuses or commission will be paid according to the days or hours worked. Finally, the letter asks the employee to sign and return a copy to signify their consent to the changes - as all the changes are consequent on their increased hours, there shouldn’t be a problem with this.