Time for a chAnGE

By Ericka Newton, Marketing Assistant, Epic

Age discrimination costs the UK economy £31billion a year in lost production, according the Employer’s Forum on Age (EFA). With the new legislation coming into force in October, the Final Regulations and ACAS guidelines are due by the end of March.

So, while they are gearing up…how prepared are you for the change?

The EFA believe readying for the new Legislation will be ‘employer’s biggest challenge yet.’ Demographic change, and the pension ‘crises’ have made the case for Age Legislation impossible to avoid, and more importantly ignore. They recommend
‘Strategic HR moves and a rock solid awareness program for all staff ‘essential elements in successfully adhering to the legislation, and what’s more companies should be doing this now!

Forewarned is forearmed

We know the new legislation is going to cover retirement, unfair dismissal, age criteria in pay and benefits, service related benefits, pension schemes, as well as recruitment, selection, promotion and training to name but a few areas – but how can we make sure all our policies are in line with the new laws before they have even come out?

The EFA are urging companies to go back to basics. ‘Audit all employment policies, recruitment and selection processes for age bias, removing all age elements wherever possible, rollout an age discrimination awareness training program for all employees.’ They also suggest developing systems for analyzing staff surveys and monitoring employee information by age to help identify problem areas, as well as reviewing all pension and retirement scheme policies.

Maybe the most important area for development and perhaps the hardest to embrace will be effecting the culture change ‘Stereotypes are deeply entrenched and arguably, challenging ageist behaviour and attitudes amongst employees is going to be the most difficult issue for employers to tackle going forward’.

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