The following provides a summary of some of our main People policies and procedures. For more detailed information, please refer to the relevant People policy (found on radar).
We reserve the right to amend these policies periodically in line with both employment legislation and the needs of the business in delivering excellent patient care, therefore please refer to the prevailing policy at the time of enquiry which may not necessarily be the policy dated at the time you commenced employment with BrisDoc.
Equal Opportunities Policy Statement
We value the right of every staff member (and prospective staff member) to be fairly treated and to receive equal opportunity. We are committed that every individual who comes into contact with BrisDoc on any basis be treated with the dignity, respect and consideration they deserve and are protected from unlawful discrimination. We are committed to ensuring that everyone has the opportunity to reach their full potential.
Please refer to BrisDoc’s Equality & Diversity Policy (on radar) for more details.
Our Commitment
- To create an environment in which individual differences and the contributions of all our staff are recognised and valued.
- To provide a healthy working environment for every employee that promotes dignity and respect to all.
- We care for a community of diversity. BrisDoc is committed to having a staff that reflects that community.
- To provide training, development and progression opportunities that are accessible to all staff.
- To ensure all our employment practices and procedures provide equality and fairness.
- We will ensure that the policy is circulated to any agencies responsible for our recruitment and a copy of the policy will be made available for all employees and made known to all applicants for employment. The policy will also be communicated to all private contractors reminding them of their responsibilities towards equality and diversity.
- To comply with the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED). Public organisations are subject to the general duty and must have due regard to the need to:
- eliminate unlawful; discrimination, harassment and victimisation;
- advance equality of opportunity between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not; and,
- foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not.
All employees have a personal responsibility for the application of our Equality & Diversity policy. Breaches could be regarded as gross misconduct and lead to disciplinary proceedings in line with our Disciplinary Policy & Procedure.
Holiday Entitlement & Conditions
Our holiday year begins on 1st January and ends on 31st December each year.
If an employee joins or leaves BrisDoc, or changes their contracted hours, part way through the holiday year, their annual leave entitlement will be calculated on a pro rata basis, equivalent to the proportion of the holiday year in which they have been employed.
Holiday Entitlements:
The following provides a summary of the holiday entitlements for staff employed on BrisDoc Terms & Conditions of Employment.
We recognise that other staff groups have transferred to BrisDoc under TUPE regulations and therefore have different holiday entitlements. Please refer to your own contract of employment / Terms & Conditions and/or contact the People Team for more information.
Requesting Annual Leave
| Process for requesting holiday | Complete an Annual Leave Request Form (from RotaMaster self-service) which gets submitted to your line manager (please do not book your holidays until your request has formally been authorised). | ||
| If you work in more than one service, you have to request annual leave in each service. If you have more than one post in one service (e.g. two or more posts in BMC), you may have to request annual leave for each post. | |||
| Notice for requesting holiday (guidance for managers) | Requests for 1-3 days | 4 weeks’ notice although discretion by manager can be used | |
| More than 3 days but less than 2 weeks | 8 weeks’ notice | ||
| 2 weeks or more | 26 weeks’ notice | ||
Please ensure you take your statutory minimum holiday each year (this equates to 5.6 weeks per annum). Failure to do so will result in the loss of that annual leave (exceptions include those on long-term sick leave, maternity leave and other types of parental leave)
Please note:
- No more than two weeks’ paid annual leave may be taken at any one time without the prior written agreement of line manager particularly at peak times e.g. school holidays. Longer holiday requests are left to manager’s discretion.
- BrisDoc is a 24/7 service and has services that are open on Public Holidays – we therefore need the cooperation of all staff during these busy times.
- Annual leave must be spread across the year rather than leaving it until the end as requests are subject to current staffing levels – ensure you regularly check RotaMaster for your own balance of holiday remaining.
- All requests will be subject to resourcing levels on the date requested as we do not wish to compromise patient care.
Holiday Buy Back
BrisDoc operates a flexible holiday arrangement (called ‘Buy Back’) to enable all staff to ‘sell’ holiday back to BrisDoc at their normal (or average, if more than one) rate of pay. This only applies to holiday above the statutory minimum that has not been used, and must be agreed in advance with your Line Manager at least 4 weeks before 31st December. Holiday entitlement not used by the correct date or agreed to be bought back by BrisDoc will usually be lost. Holiday buy back is paid in January payroll.
Carrying forward annual leave into following year
In exceptional circumstances, employees can carry forward up to a maximum of 1 week’s worth of annual leave over and above the statutory minimum into the following year. This equates to the employee’s average weekly hours. Any holiday carried forward must be taken by the 31st March each year, or it will be lost.
Bank Holidays
There are 8 official bank/public holidays each year:
New Year’s Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, First Monday in May, Last Monday in May, Last Monday in August, Christmas Day and Boxing Day
As some of our services are open on public holidays, all annual entitlements include a bank holiday entitlement. If you work in a service that is open on public holidays, you will be expected to participate in the rotas on these days – please check with your line manager if this applies to you. If a public holiday falls on your normal working day and you do not work that public holiday (including if the service itself is closed), you must deduct the hours you would have normally worked from your overall leave entitlement.
Sickness & Injury
Notifying us of your absence
You must adhere to the sickness absence policy and your local procedures for reporting absence – ask your line manager for further details. You should notify your line manager by voice (not by leaving answerphone message or text message) as soon as possible i.e. before commencement of duty. You must also notify your line manager of the nature of your sickness and of the likely duration of your absence. All information in relation to your sickness will be maintained in a confidential manner.
Evidence of incapacity for work
All periods of sickness absence between one and seven calendar days must be covered by a self-certificate, completed via Rotamaster self-service.
For absences exceeding 7 calendar days (inclusive of weekends and rest days), you must provide a medical certificate from your GP (“fit to work” note), which should be forwarded to your line manager as soon as it is issued. (If BrisDoc is not your main employer, please send a photocopy of your GP certificate to your line manager as soon as it is issued).
Sickness absence that is not certified will be classed as Absent Without Leave (AWOL) & will incur a pay deduction. Repeated unauthorised absence will be investigated.
On your return to work, you will be required to have a return to work discussion with your line manager. If you are absent on a regular basis you may be required to attend a sickness review meeting. This is in order to asses if there is the possibility of any underlying heath condition or any concerns relating to attendance.
Please refer to the Sickness Absence policy for more details and your Terms & Conditions of Employment for information on contractual sick pay allowances.
Termination
During Probation:
During the probationary period, the following notice periods apply:
- Operational staff – 1 week
- Clinical staff – 4 weeks
Should you wish to give notice during the probationary period, please inform your line manager in writing.
There is NO entitlement to notice in the event of summary dismissal.
Payment in lieu of notice may also be made at the Employer’s discretion.
Following Probation:
For all Clinical and Managerial Staff:
This agreement may be terminated by either party giving 12 weeks’ notice (excluding probationary period).
There is NO entitlement to notice in the event of summary dismissal.
Payment in lieu of notice may also be made at the Employer’s discretion.
For all other staff:
This agreement may be terminated by either party giving the following notice period:
- 4 weeks notice up to the first 52 weeks of employment (excluding probation).
- 8 weeks notice if your period of continuous employment is more than one year but less than 5 years.
- 12 weeks notice if your period of employment is five years or more.
There is NO entitlement to notice in the event of summary dismissal.
Payment in lieu of notice may also be made at the Employer’s discretion.
Working Time Regulations
The EU Working Time Directive 1998 determines the maximum weekly working time, patterns of work and holidays, plus the daily and weekly rest periods. The intention of the Directive is to protect employees’ health and safety at work. BrisDoc strongly supports the Directive and does not expect or encourage employees to work long hours on a regular basis. Long hours working is not a measure of good performance and/or well-being and may not be effective over a prolonged period.
The regulations state that a worker’s average weekly working hours over a 17 week period must be limited to no more than 48 hours per week.
If you are working an average of more than 48 hours for a 17 week period or more (including ALL other paid employment/work outside BrisDoc), you can voluntarily sign an ‘Opt-out’ form to exclude you from the regulations (please note that this does not include staff who work primarily overnight).
Please speak to the People Team for further information and advice.
Working time is defined as any period when the worker is carrying out their duties, and is at the employer’s disposal. The table below illustrates what should and should not be taken into account when calculating working time:
| INCLUDED | NOT INCLUDED |
| Normal daily working hours, including paid 30min break | Any breaks outside of paid 30mins break |
| Time spent travelling on official business | Travel time to and from work |
| Times when people on call are actually called upon to work | Periods “on call”, but not actually working |
| Time spent on training courses | Leisure time when working away from home e.g. time spent in hotels |
| Overtime | Annual leave, Sick leave, Maternity leave, Special leave |
| Authorised working at home | Any period where the individual has formally agreed to work more than 48 hours per week |
| Any additional time which is agreed between the employer and workforce |
Rest Periods
As part of the EU Directive, all employees have the right to:
- 11 consecutive hours’ rest in any 24-hour period.
- A 30-minute uninterrupted rest break if the working day is longer than six hours. (NB: This allowance cannot be taken at the beginning or end of a shift in order to change your start / leaving time)
- Two days off in a 14 day period or one day off in a 7 day period.
On rare occasions where this is not always possible, ‘compensatory rest’ will apply. Compensatory rest is normally the same length of time as the period in which the employee has worked when they should have been resting.
Please speak to the People Team for further information and advice.
Time Keeping and Absence
With our focus on providing excellent patient care, it is important that you attend work punctually and be ready to work by the start time of your shift. Equally, it is important that you do not leave work before your normal finishing time. All staff working in our patient-facing services will be working shifts that have been based around patient demand. Therefore, persistent lateness and leaving early without authorisation will be treated as ‘Absent without leave’ and may result in a formal investigation with potential disciplinary action.
Dealing with Disciplinary / Grievance Issues
Disciplinary procedure
BrisDoc recognises that from time to time members of staff may fall short of the standards required by the service or may fail to behave in an appropriate manner, either within or outside of the workplace. Many potential disciplinary issues can be resolved informally. A informal and supportive conversation is often all that is required to resolve a problem. However, where informality does not work or the issue is more serious, the matter may be pursued formally via our Disciplinary Policy & Procedure. Please refer to this policy for further details.
Grievance procedure
BrisDoc believes that all employees should be treated fairly and with respect. We also recognise that occasionally employees may have problems or concerns with their work, working conditions or relationships with colleagues that they wish to raise with management.
Grievances are best dealt with at an early stage, informally, with the immediate line manager; this should be your first point of contact for resolution. However, if you feel that the matter has not been resolved through informal discussions, you should raise it formally with your line manager and thePeople Team, preferably in writing stating the nature of the grievance – if the grievance is against your line manager, please approach your line manager’s line manager.
Please refer to the Grievance Policy and Procedure for more details.
Safeguarding
Safeguarding Vulnerable Adults
Please refer to BrisDoc’s “Safeguarding Vulnerable Adults” Policy.
Safeguarding Children
Please refer to BrisDoc’s “Safeguarding Children” Policy.
Social Media
Did you know? Every time you post on Facebook or other social media platforms, your comment is shared with all your friends and followers. It is also shared with all the friends of people who ‘Like’, ‘Comment’ or ‘Share’ your post.
You can’t control or know who will see your social media posts once you click Post; what you write can go viral.
That means a Facebook post such as the one shown on the left, which has been ‘Liked’ just 24 times and ‘Commented’ on by 3 friends could potentially be seen on average, by over 9,000 people!!!
Negative statements about BrisDoc or any of our partner organisations such as NHS111 can damage working relationships and destroy public confidence in the quality of our service. Such posts are not acceptable.
YOU are responsible for anything you post online as well as anything you ‘share’, ‘like’, ‘re-tweet’ and so on. Even if the original statement was not yours, you could still be held accountable for sharing or endorsing support which may result in disciplinary proceedings.
Did you know…. Non adherence to BrisDoc’s Social Media Policy could constitute gross misconduct? Below are some real-life examples where staff in other companies have been dismissed due to their online activities.
- Two NHS nurses were dismissed for tweeting about patients whilst on duty. The nurses joked about a vulnerable patient’s physical appearance and toilet habits, describing one patient as “looking like a corpse”.
- A pub manager was found to have been fairly dismissed for gross misconduct after posting negative comments about two customers. Even though the posts were made in the employee’s personal cyberspace, the tribunal concluded the dismissal was justified because of the risk of damage to the business’ reputation.
- A young man was fired after his boss learned that the “family emergency” he had to miss work for was a fib. How was his lie sniffed out? The intern’s co-workers found a Facebook picture of him attending a Halloween party the same day he blew off work.
So please be extremely careful with the tone and content of any online posts related to work.
BrisDoc’s Social Media Policy is available on Radar.
Health and Safety
BrisDoc recognises its Health and Safety duties under Health and Safety legislation. It is our policy to maintain safe and healthy working conditions, equipment and procedures for all staff, visitors and contractors, and to provide information, training and supervision for this purpose. All staff are reminded that they have a legal duty to fully co-operate in the implementation of all Health and Safety matters and to take reasonable care to avoid injury to themselves or to others by their work activities. If you notice any unsafe or potentially unsafe working conditions, equipment or practices, please report them immediately to your line manager (via the Learning Events and Service Feedback Report Form available on the BrisDoc Weblinks).
Our strategic lead for Health & Safety is although each service has an operational Health & Safety Lead (please ask your line manager who your local Health & Safety Lead is). If you have any health & safety concerns, please contact BrisDoc’s Head Office on 0117 9370906 / brisdoc.governance@nhs.net.
For more information, please refer to the Health & Safety Policy found on radar.
Eye Tests
Under the Health and Safety at Work Act, BrisDoc has a legal requirement to offer sight tests and single vision DSE spectacles to those employees who are eligible.
Display Screen Equipment legislation was originally put in place a number of years ago when the true effects of visual display units were unknown. Although it is still in place, it is now known that the only real issues DSE users might experience is eye fatigue. Eye fatigue is known to occur when a person using DSE is looking at the screen without looking elsewhere for large periods of time. This is a specific focal length depending on the equipment. To qualify as a true DSE user, you must regularly spend 4/5ths of your working hours continuously looking at a screen.
BrisDoc does not apply this restriction and all co-owners are eligible for a Specsavers eye care voucher paid for by BrisDoc.
Please contact Traci Clutterbuck on 0117 9370908 or traci.clutterbuck@brisdoc.org to obtain your voucher
Work Accidents
If you have an accident at work:
- You must tell your manager at once;
- You must also record it in the accident report book, located within each of our sites (please familiarise yourself);
- You must report the accident by completing a report form via the Learning Events and Service Feedback portal accessible through the BrisDoc Weblinks
- Each site will also have a first aid box. Please ensure you notify your line manager if you use it so that stock can be replenished.
- Any work accidents that cause the individual to be incapacitated to work for more than seven days must be reported under RIDDOR to the Health & Safety Executive.
Fire Procedures
If you discover a fire, you must:
- Immediately operate the nearest alarm call point;
- Leave the building, closing windows and doors and congregate at the assembly point;
- Check that the Fire Brigade has been called. If not, call them yourself or send someone else to do so.
Please familiarise yourself where the following are located at the base you work in: Fire Alarm, Fire extinguishers, Fire Exits and Assembly Point.