Susan's Legal Bits

In May 2011 Susan was interested in...

...the abolition of the default retirement age.

Hi everyone, Susan here again and, although I promised to be back in January after having December ‘off’ from writing my blog, I’ve had my arm twisted and once again give my page over to my esteemed colleague here in the office.

I would be interested to hear from you with regards to whether you think this new piece of legislation is positive or negative? Anyway, over to Wole, and from me it’s, have a good month. See you next month!

Default retirement age abolished with effect from October 2011.

The Government has confirmed plans to abolish the default retirement age with effect from 1st October 2011. Before the change in rule, your employer could notify you 6 months prior to your 65th birthday that you were due to retire and could compulsorily retire you on your 65th birthday except if you indicated your intention to work longer – then of course it would be subject to your employer’s agreement (they had the right to refuse your request to continue to work).

There is a transitional period of six months from 6 April 2011 to 1 October 2011, so that retirements that have already been initiated can continue through to completion, provided that:

• notification of retirement is issued by your employer prior to 6 April 2011
• the date of retirement falls before 1 October 2011
• all requirements of the statutory retirement procedure are met.

So, how will this new rule affect you?

Reading our blog you may be one of our umbrella employees – well you may or may not know that we have never forced any of our umbrella employees to retire – in fact we have always written to our employees a year before and again six months prior to their retirement age to ask if they would like to set a new retirement date!

This will now change and we won’t be sending this type of communication out to any of our employees coming up to retirement age. We will be happy for them to continue to work until they tell us otherwise.

Of course, if you happen upon this blog and are not employed by Gabem be aware of your rights and note that, although it will be unlikely for employers to prescribe a compulsory retirement age it may still occur if the employer can justify it as a proportion means of achieving a legitimate aim – for example if performance of a specific task over the age of 65 could lead to significant safety risks or where evidence shows a link between age and deterioration in performance.

These changes do not affect an employee's state pension age and entitlements, which may well be separate from the age at which they retire.

If you have any concerns that we can help with please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us by clicking below.

Thank you for reading.

All comments provided on my blog are for informational purposes only. My thoughts and opinions are my own with agreement from my employer as being suitable for sharing with the wider world. Any advice, or writing that might be taken as advice, should not be deemed in any way as professional Legal advice and are only the musings of a HR practioner whose sole aim is to help where she can.