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Introduction to this document

Sunday working opt-in letter

There are specific statutory provisions in place relating to shop and betting workers and Sunday trading. Use this letter for shop or betting workers who wish to opt in to Sunday working.

Opting out and back in to Sunday work

Shop and betting workers who are or may be required to work on Sundays (but not those employed solely to work on Sundays) are able to give a written “opting-out” notice, signed and dated by them, registering their objection to working on Sundays. Once opted out, a worker can opt back in to Sunday working by giving a written “opting-in” notice, again signed and dated by them, in which they expressly state they wish to work on Sundays or that they have no objection to being required to do so, and then they subsequently expressly agree with you to do shop or betting work on Sundays or on a particular Sunday.

See our Sunday Trading Statutory Rights Statement and Letter Explaining Opt-out Rights for Betting Workers.

Future reform

The Enterprise Act 2016 contained significant provisions to strengthen the rights of shop workers relating to Sunday working. Firstly, there was to be a reduction in the notice period to opt out of Sunday working from three months to one month for shop workers in large shops (those shops with an internal floor area exceeding 280 square metres). If you failed to give these shop workers a Sunday Trading Statutory Rights Statement within two months of their starting work as a shop worker (or within two months of the new provisions coming into force in the case of existing shop workers), their opting-out notice would then take effect after only seven days, rather than one month. For those working in smaller shops, the notice period to opt out of Sunday working was to remain at three months and the other opt-out provisions were to remain the same.

Secondly, you were to be required to give all shop workers who work on Sundays, and who are required under their employment contracts to work additional hours on Sundays that are beyond their normal Sunday working hours, an explanatory written statement setting out their right to object to doing shop work for additional hours on Sundays and not to be dismissed or subjected to any other detriment as a result of doing so. This statement was to be given within two months of the date when the employee started work as a shop worker, or within two months of the new provisions coming into force in the case of existing shop workers.

Thirdly, all shop workers were to have a new right to be able to object to working additional hours on a Sunday beyond their normal Sunday working hours. A worker would be able to do this by giving you a written “objection” notice signed and dated by them, to take effect one month after it had been given in the case of workers in large shops and three months after it had been given for workers in smaller shops. However, if you’d failed to give the above explanatory written statement, the shop worker’s objection notice would then take effect after only seven days in the case of large shops and one month in the case of smaller shops. A shop worker would still be able to revoke their objection notice at a later date by giving a written “revocation” notice, again signed and dated by them, in which they expressly stated they wish to work additional hours on Sundays or that they had no objection to being required to do so, and then they expressly agreed with you to do shop work for additional hours on Sundays or on a particular Sunday.

However, these provisions have so far not been brought into force and it is not known whether they will still be brought into force at some point in the future. Note that they only affect shop workers, not betting workers.