Employment Rights Bill - Zero (and low) hours contracts

Our previous article summarised the provision of the Employment Rights Bill (ERB) as it travels through the governmental arms (it’s currently at the committee stage in the House of Lords) before receiving Royal Assent. We were going to focus this next article on five key areas falling within the (government prescribed name) ‘one-sided flexibility’, but as we read deeper, we realised that the focus needed to stay on just one of those areas because it’s a big one for the higher education sector, zero AND low hours workers.

Please note that this article is based on information available at 10 April 2025. 

It’s important to note that the ERB doesn't ban zero/low hours contracts outright but introduces mandatory offers of guaranteed hours to qualifying workers. For H E institutions, where casualised employment is widespread, e.g. lecturers, teaching/research assistants, visiting staff, etc., this could be a major operational and budgetary shift. For the avoidance of doubt, the proposed measures apply to zero AND low hours contracts (for anti-avoidance purposes).

What are the Proposed Legislative Measures (Employment Rights Bill)?

1. Right to Guaranteed Hours - eligible workers who regularly work specific hours over a (likely) 12-week reference period will have the right to be offered a contract reflecting those hours.
2. Right to Reasonable Notice of Shifts - employers will be required to provide reasonable advance notice (yet to be defined) of work shifts. Workers who receive unreasonably short notice may bring a claim to an employment tribunal, which will assess whether notice was reasonable based (government to consult) on regulations.
3. Right to Compensation for Short-Notice Changes - if a shift is cancelled, curtailed, or rescheduled at short notice (yet to be defined), the employer will be legally required to compensate the worker.
4. Agency workers - hirers will typically be responsible for offering guaranteed hours, though in some situations, agencies may assume this obligation. Both the hirer and agency must provide reasonable notice of shifts.

Staff do not have to accept these new hours and could retain their zero/low hours contract, or negotiate other hours. However, it appears that HEIs may need to continue offering contracts after each reference period (current thinking is that this will be 12 weeks, but has yet to be properly defined) until the staff member accepts, or no longer qualifies, meaning there is a continuing burden on the employer to monitor hours.

There are exceptions where the work is “inherently temporary”, e.g. one-off events, short projects, unusually high levels of work. The employer is likely to have a heavy burden of responsibility to evidence that the roles are genuinely temporary, or offer a limited term contract instead.

If you do not comply with the ERB, the employee can bring an employment tribunal claim, with any subsequent award (if successful) being ‘just and equitable’ (typically the lost earnings).

Impact for the H E sector

There are many different roles that could be affected in the sector, including (but certainly not limited to):

• Hourly paid lecturers and seminar tutors,
• Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs),
• Visiting/guest lecturers,
• Library and student support staff on zero/minimum hours,
• Research assistants or casual researchers on flexible arrangements, and
• Visiting academics or agency workers may also fall under this scheme if used regularly and universities will be responsible if they are the "end hirer".

Student Unions will definitely be impacted as they tend to rely on casual, flexible student workers who are on zero or low hours contracts, typically on shift work. It may lead to challenges for the student union on flexibility, e.g. covering sick leave at short notice and will rely on the SU to think about staff schedules and budgeting far in advance.

With the majority of measures not expected until 2026 at the earliest, the H E sector should take this opportunity to understand the ERB measures in relation to their own systems/processes. We have identified potential financial and system implications, and set out recommended ‘next steps’ to help you prepare.

Financial implications

The likely result of the ERB on zero/low hours contracts will be:

• Higher staffing costs - with guaranteed hours becoming fixed and employees being paid at that rate regardless of whether you have any work to give them, and compensation for changing/cancelling shifts at short notice. For the former, this does mean staffing costs may be more predictable with guaranteed hours, rather than the, perhaps unconsidered or unbudgeted, additional hours worked by zero/low hours workers, but may also result in overstaffing without the legal framework to reduce hours without redundancies.
• Legal compliance/defence – the employee has greater ability to bring an employment tribunal claim, which will require legal fees and potential tribunal awards.
• Greater administrative requirements to monitor hours worked for affected staff members, which could fall on department heads, line managers, or HR staff if you don’t have a staff management system (which most universities do not).

The greater your reliance in previous years on zero/low hours workers, the greater the impact.

System improvements

After numerous discussions with payroll and employment tax specialists in the sector, it is clear that universities are not equipped to monitor hours worked by their employees. This is not just from a systems perspective, but also culturally, where asking employees how many hours they’ve worked could result in responses from “I’m always working” to “it’s none of your business”.

At present, this causes significant issues with National Minimum Wage, but with the potential monitoring required under the ERB, universities may need to seriously rethink their approach to tracking and managing hours, despite any potential pushback. At this stage, the monitoring could be targeted towards the zero/low hours workers, but this will still need:

• HR software that allows adequate and accurate recording of hours worked, whether by employee self-serve, email notifications, etc.,
• Integration with payroll systems for automated calculations to ensure ERB compliance, and
• Staff management systems to properly prepare, schedule and monitor changes, particularly for shift workers – potentially automated but with notifications to appropriate teams.

Without system enhancements, the monitoring and calculation will fall onto existing staff members, which runs the risk of misunderstanding, lack of resource, lack of information, etc.

How to prepare

To get ready for the changes, universities and student unions should:

• Audit your workforce – who is on zero/low hours contracts? (FYI, there’s no definition of a ‘low hours’ contract in the ERB, we’ll have to wait for consultations to define it).
• Review hours – compare hours actually worked with their contractual requirement, what would a 12-week average pay calculation look like/cost for this group of workers?
• Look at alternatives – are there more appropriate contracts some workers could or should be placed on, e.g. term time or limited-term contracts?
• Plan the year – are there times of the year where your need for additional hours peaks, such as around exam times – can you justify this as a temporary need?
• Consider your systems – are they fit for purpose, will they help or hinder the calculations and monitoring needed?

What next?

The government will be consulting with stakeholders on various definitions including low hours contracts, reference period, review period, exceptions, anti-avoidance measures and statutory maximum compensation awards, with the majority of measures not implemented at the earliest. For the H E sector, there is potential for a collective agreement (through UCU negotiations) to allow a contractual opt-out, but it seems an unlikely ask. At this stage, it’s best to understand how the proposed rules may affect you, prepare for the changes and wait to see what the eventual shape of the ERB is when it’s actually rolled out.