ACAS (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service)

In this article, Croner covers ACAS (Advisory, Conciliation, and Arbitration Service). Acas is an independent UK body offering free advice, conciliation, and arbitration to resolve workplace disputes like pay, dismissal, and discrimination, helping avoid tribunals. Conciliation negotiates informal settlements; arbitration delivers binding decisions after hearings. Acas provides guidance and codes of practice on best employment practices.

As an employer, there is a good chance that you will run into conflict between yourself and an employee. There could be several reasons underlying this conflict, such as pay and/or working hours disputes.

How you deal with these issues can be challenging; if the conflict is handled incorrectly under UK law, you could face employment tribunal claims.

In the article, Croner will cover what Acas is, how the organisation seeks to help employers and employees, and how its services work.

• What does Acas stand for?
• Who does Acas help?
• What issues does Acas help with?
• How does Acas help enforce employment law?
• What is conciliation?
• What's the purpose of Acas early conciliation?
• How does Acas conciliation work?
• What is Arbitration?
• How does the Arbitration service work?
• What is the Acas code of practice?
• Get expert Acas advice from Croner

What is Acas?

Acas is an independent and impartial organisation that helps to improve the working life of employers, employees, and organisations overall.

They offer free advice, information, training sessions, and guidance on the rules and practices for employers, employees, and trade union representatives.

Who does Acas help?

Acas offers support and advice to employees, employers, and their representatives, guiding on matters regarding:

• Employment rights.
• Helping employees and employers adhere to best practices.
• Helping to resolve disputes and workplace conflicts.

What does Acas stand for?

Acas stands for the Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service. Acas provides three separate services that are utilised by small businesses and workers to help them both reach a suitable resolution in times of conflict. That is, advisory, conciliation, and arbitration.

To understand Acas fully, you need to break conciliation and arbitration into separate entities and understand how they can help you and your workforce.

What issues does Acas help with?

Employers need to understand the kinds of problems Acas can help with if needed. Generally, these issues include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Dismissals.
• Disciplinary and grievance issues.
• Discrimination, harassment, and/or bullying.
• Working hours.
• Pay and wages.
• Holiday entitlements.
• Redundancy procedures.
• Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) (TUPE).

How does Acas help enforce employment law?

Acas was established to help businesses find solutions, improve organisational performance, solve disputes, and promote good practices in workplaces. The organisation works to help employers avoid large-scale industrial disputes by preventing or solving problems before they become larger disputes, such as strikes.

Acas helps businesses enforce employment law by providing free impartial advice and guidance on:

• Best employment law practices, rules, and policies.
• Working with employees to resolve workplace conflicts.

What is conciliation?

Conciliation is the process of resolving conflict between two or more parties in a way that benefits both.

Acas provides employees and employers conciliation assistance when both parties are looking to voice complaints, before the employment tribunal stage.

What's the purpose of Acas early conciliation?

The purpose of the Acas early conciliation process is to avoid both employers and employees going to an employment tribunal to solve their dispute.

How does Acas conciliation work?

The main use case for conciliation is to avoid employment tribunals. This process is mainly used to help individual complaints, or group complaints, go through an informal conflict resolution process.

On an individual complaint, Acas will speak to both parties, arrange a conciliator, and aim to reach a settlement agreement without the need for an employment tribunal. If you have had a claim made against your business, you could look at conciliation as the last chance to solve any issues before the employee's claim is heard, and potentially upheld, at a tribunal.

Once the early conciliation period has ended, Acas can still maintain involvement if the parties want to continue exploring settlement options.

What is Arbitration?

The Acas arbitration service is slightly different from the conciliation service. Arbitration is where a third party is brought into a dispute to help facilitate a legally binding resolution. For collective disputes, the arbitrator’s decision is not legally binding, but, rather, binding in honour. This means that once the arbitrator makes a decision, neither side can go to court to get this decision changed at a later date.

Acas will work with both an employer and an employee to provide the following two types of arbitration:

• Individual arbitration, for example, could be a case regarding flexible working, or an unfair dismissal related to an individual worker. It is essential to note that individual arbitration can only be given to flexible working cases and/or unfair dismissal.
• Collective arbitration, for example, will cover cases that involve an employer and a group of workers.

How does the Arbitration service work?

Acas's arbitration service is there to help make and maintain a better relationship between employers and employees.

Typically, the arbitrator is appointed by Acas, and each side must agree to arbitration for the process to start.

From here the arbitrator will arrange the date of the hearing, which will cover all the aspects of the dispute or events.

The arbitration hearing process is as follows:

1. Confirmation of the dispute the decision needs to be made on.
2. Allow all parties to explain their case and present any evidence.
3. Discuss the case and answer questions related to the dispute.
4. Each party is allowed to ask questions based on the evidence they have presented.

The results of the hearing are sent within 21 days for collective disputes and 14 days for individual disputes.

What are the Acas code of practice?

The Acas codes of practice is a set of standards that are expected to be enacted in the workplace by employers and employees.

The code includes the following:

• Code of Practice on disclosure of information to trade unions for collective bargaining purposes.
• Code of practice on settlement agreements.
• Code of practice on time off for trade union duties and activities.
• Amendment to Code of Practice on requests for flexible working.
• Code of practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures.

The Acas code of practice should be used by employers to run their organisations successfully and avoid employment tribunals. Remember, employment tribunals will take the use of Acas codes into account in relevant cases.

Croner only offers employers Acas code of practice-based advice, for disciplinaries, contracts, sickness absence, and tribunals.

Get expert Acas advice from Croner

Croner has a team of award-winning HR consultants who are specialists in their field. We have been helping businesses for over 80 years, and our advice line is open 365 days a year, 24 hours a day.

Speak to a Croner expert for specialist legal advice on 01455 858 132.