Are you ready for October 1st?

Soon, it might be illegal to:

Ask someone their age in a job interview

Offer medical check-ups to staff over 50

Move persons over 60 off manual duties or shifts

Exclude older members of staff from training

Recruit and promote on the basis of age

Ask for five years experience

The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006 come into force on 1 October 2006, Non-compliance with the legislation could result in your company being fined*, and there is no upper limit to the amount of compensation that can be claimed.

And yet… 50% of UK employers do not have a policy on age discrimination. Ageism can be deeply embedded in an organisation’s policies and behaviours – requiring timely training to ensure legal compliance.

The draft regulations:

· Prohibit unjustified age discrimination in employment and vocational training

· Require employers who set their retirement age below the default age of 65 to justify or change it

· Introduce a new duty on employers to consider an employee’s request to continue working beyond retirement

· Require employers to inform employees in writing, at least six months in advance, of their intended retirement date. This will allow people to plan for their retirement

· Remove the upper age limit for unfair dismissal and redundancy rights, giving older workers the same rights to claim unfair dismissal or receive a redundancy payment as younger workers, unless there is a genuine retirement

· Remove the age limits for Statutory Sick Pay, Statutory Maternity Pay, Statutory Adoption Pay and Statutory Paternity Pay.

· *Includes provisions relating to service related benefits and occupational pensions

P.S: Keep an eye out for Epic's forthcoming Epic Professional suite of e-learning courseware, designed to help organisations and individuals within both public and private sectors understand and react to the implication of forthcoming legislation and regulation, including The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations