Rights and Responsibilities of Employer and Employee Essay Example for Free

Rights and Responsibilities of Employer and Employee Essay The Trusts purpose is to provide the best possible health care to defined standards of cost, volume and quality. Generally all employees are expected to adopt values and standards of conduct consistent with the trusts purpose. Employees are expected, at all times, to deal politely, respectfully and use civilised language and behaviour with all patients, public and other employees. Aggressive, abusive, threatening or violent behaviour is not acceptable. Employees are also expected to be aware of the need for quite and calm movement and behaviour in many patient, public and office areas. And are not permitted to consume food or drinks in view of patients or the public in the workplace, unless it is part of the model care, or in the absence of appropriate facilities, the manager has given his or her permission. On the other hand, employees are expected to be considerate of others and present themselves with due regard to social acceptability, tidiness and personal hygiene. However, they are expected to help patients and the public feel confident and at ease with the services they provide, with this they are expected to comply with particular requirements regarding the dress applicable in their Department. Employees are required to handle patients humanely, respectfully, courteously and with physical care. Employees should not have sexual relationships with patients who are in care or receiving treatment. Employees are told that sexual behaviour with patients who are mentally ill or mentally handicapped is not acceptable, if an employee is caught or reported of any suspicions he or she would face the Mental Health Act, and carry a liability to prosecution. Finally, Employees are expected to be honest in all their dealings with the Trust, for example, making reports and giving information, presenting claims for payment (travelling expenses, attendance records, recording work done etc.).Dishonesty, making false claims for payment etc., is treated as a serious offence. All employees are also expected to comply with all legal requirements at all times (Discrimination, harassment, victimisation and bullying at work on grounds of gender, race, colour, ethnic or national origins, social group, marital status, pregnancy, disability, sexual orientation, religion or creed, age, and so on). All employees have got responsible to meet their terms and condition of their job description and job specification. Employees rights: To begin with all employees in the NHS are entitled to receive statutory sick pay if the individual earn more than à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½67 a week. In the NHS, majority of the female group tend to use their Careers leave. All employees are entitled a reasonable time off work without pay, to deal with an emergency involving a dependant. For example, if a dependant falls ill or is injured, to arrange or attend a dependant funeral. In addition to this all employee are entitled 28 day paid holiday a year, this depend to the individuals title and period of time theyve worked for the hospital (the longer youve been in the job the more days you are given). Moreover, all pregnant employees are entitled to time off with pay to keep appointments for antenatal care made on the advice of a registered medical practitioner, midwife or health visitor. Likewise all working mothers are entitled to 18 weeks maternity leave. Most women will qualify for statutory maternity pay or maternity allowance. Alternatively if an employee is been employed by the NHS for more than a year he or she is qualify for 13 weeks of unpaid parental leave to be taken before the new-born is five. Although the rules apply to mothers and fathers, few men are expected to take it since the leave is unpaid. It is important for employees to meet the terms of their contracts because, if an employee fails to comply with his or contract of employment or policies set by Barts and The London. For example, if an employ does not attend work for the hours stated in the contract, they will be dealt with in an appropriate manner depending on the circumstances. The mission of the hospital is to excel in patient care, staff employment, education and training and research into new cures and treatments. For almost, every member of staff have objectives relate to achieving Pathfinder priorities directly; others are about delivering the ambitious programmes that underpin Pathfinder. These include Clinical quality, Service efficiency, Patient experience, Systems, culture and partnerships, Patient access, Patient choice, the hospital environment , access to information, The performance of workforce and Financial management. There are supervisors that work with junior staff, at the (a month or three) they meet and discuses (review) whether they have achieved their targets or not. Health and Safety is Making the work environment safe for personnel, patients and the public. Health and Safety Management is the strategy for eliminating or reducing hazards so that people are not injured or affected by disease. It is important for employer to follow Health and Safety regulations because employers must comply with a request to establish a safety committee which has the function of keeping under review the measures taken to ensure the health and safety at work of the employees. As they have a duty to cooperate with safety representatives usually appointed by a Trade Union. A hazardous substance can be any substance, whether solid, liquid or gas that may cause harm to your health these substances (corrosive, flammable, explosive, spontaneously combustible, toxic, oxidising, or water-reactive) they must be identified in the work place by a coloured diamond symbol. Moreover, Hazards in the healthcare sector is identified by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work such as, Working shifts, Needle stick injuries, Latex allergy; Manual handling; Psychosocial issues such as violence at work. In this case it may be necessary for the employer to resort to the legal process or to approach the emergency services for assistance, depending on the nature and imminence of the hazard. Alternatively employees have a duty under section 7 of the Act to take care of their health and safety, and the health and safety of their colleagues, and to co-operate to the extent necessary to enable the employer to comply with his duties under the Act. This could include maintaining or co-operating in the maintenance of safety equipment such as breathing apparatus or fire fighting equipment. Like wise all employees expect promotion and pay rise from their employer. According to the contract of employment, all employees in the hospital will be paid monthly by credit transfer. If an employee is paid less than the sum stated in their contract the individual can explain this to a manage and the manage will discuss the matter to the payroll manage. On the other hand, an employee can take legal action is her payment is not on time and the sum stated is not paid on her next payment. Anyone aged 22 or over must be paid at least à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½3.70 an hour. Those aged 18 21 get a minimum of à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½3.20. Some groups are excluded (prisoners and family members working in a family business). The advantages of minimum wage is that minimum wage laws have raise the level of unemployment and make those that do have a job work harder. It is also a means of reducing poverty and improving the well-being of low-income workers. The key responsibilities for work place health and safety are set out by the occupational Health and safety Act 1985. Employer should by law provide a healthy and safe working environment for their employees. It is important to provide employees with a safe working environment because an employer has control and management of the work place; they have the primary responsibility for ensuring it is safe. Alternatively employees must also take responsibility for looking after their own health and safety, and must not place others at risk by their actions (or by any failure to act which could result in an incident). However, if the hospital (employers) fails to provide employees with a safe working environment, they are liable to heavy fines and may receive bad reputation or publicity. The benefits of a safe and healthy working environment include; Better employee health and well-being, improved productivity and reduced legal pressures on employers, as many health and safety at work issu es come under statutory responsibilities. All nurses in Barts and The London belong to an association called The Royal college of Nursing (RCN). The Royal College of Nursing membership is the largest professional association and union of nursing staff and students in the UK. It is an influential voice for nursing at home and abroad. The RCN promotes nursing interests on a wide range of issues by professional bodies and voluntary organisation. The RCN provides a comprehensive range of services and benefits for its members, this include advice and support on a range of clinical, employment and welfare issues. The RCN also promotes research, quality and practice development through the RCN institute. The royal College of Midwives (RCM) is the only trade union and professional organisation run by midwives for midwives. It is the voice of midwifery, providing excellence in professional leadership, education, influence and representation for and on behalf of midwives. The RCM produces information and advice on a wide range of midwifery issues. The Trust encourages employees at all level of the organisation to belong to a Union and use their services. The Trust recognises UNISON, RCN, RCM, British Medical Association (BMA for doctors) and THE Chartered Society Physiotherapy (CSP). The Unions have sole recognition and bargaining rights to represent employees with the expectation of Directors, individual Senior Managers and Clinical Managers Contracts. The Trust promise not to recognise or negotiate with Unions that are not known to the Trust. However the Trust will comply with the Employment Relations Act 1999 on the recognition of trade unions which are not currently recognised. It is important for employer to train their employees appropriately because this can help to make employees more efficient at their jobs, and in return can help to make the business more competitive with other branches (hospital). For example, employer must HBV vaccination must be made available to employees within 10 working days with occupational exposure. Before the vaccination is given employees must receive the training required. If an employee has previously received the complete HBV vaccination series or antibody testing shows that the employee is already HBV-immune then he or she will not be vaccinate. Hepatitis B Virus is a virus that causes illness directly affecting the liver. It is a blood borne pathogen. In this case you can see that the well being of employees is taken into account. With this attitude the hospital is helping to stop the virus from spreading and protecting the employees. The consequences of poor trained can seriously damage a company, if an employee is affected (ill) due to hygiene problems or poor training. Replacing that employee can cost six months or more of that employees salary when all costs are taken into account. However, recruitment expenses (newspaper advertising) losing an employee will costs the hospital time spent by other staff interviewing, training, and doing the work of the former employee until a replacement is found. It can also result in lower morale and productivity as employees discuss the situation around the hospital as a result this will leave them with fear in their jobs. Employers must pay both men and women equally for doing the same work, unless one of the following exceptions applies, a valid seniority system is in place, when entry level salary is based on experience, or If the job title is the same, but the work involved is different, equal pay rules do not apply. However, if a wage inequity exists between genders, an employer cannot lower the higher-paid employees salary; the employer must raise the lower paid employees salary to equal the higher paid employee. The Trust recognises its responsibility to ensure that the terms of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, the Race Relations Act 1976, the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, and other relevant legislation are observed. According to Barts and The London they said employee will receive less favourable treatment than another on grounds of sex, sexual orientation, race, age, religion, colour, ethnic origin or disability. Therefore, any direct or indirect racial or sexual discrimination or harassment will be treated as serious as a disciplinary offence. The N.H.S allows certain document to be access, base on under the Freedom of Information Act an employee client can access information base on the list below. 1. The NHS and how they fit 2. Who they are 3. Financial and Funding Information 4. Corporate Information 5. Aims, Targets and Achievements 6. Their Services 7. Reports and Independent Enquiries 8. Policies and Procedures 9. Public Involvement and Consultation 10. Regular publications and information for the public 11. Complaints 12. Human Resources 13. Communications with the Press and Media Releases 14. Environmental Information On the other hand, data protection laws are quite complex but generally they are base on principles. The first data protection Act came into force in the UK in 1984 to protect individuals who had information on them held on computers (meaning personal information must be obtained legally). This Act gave people the right to see their personal file, recently the data protection Act of 1998 was introduce because the previous Act does not apply to written data, therefore individuals had little control over the use of personal data. However the Act regulates the way personal is collected, stored, process and used. It applies to all data stored in a computer systems and paper based on manual records that are stored in a structure way. Within the N.H.S a person, called the data controller should take charge of the storage of all personal records. All managers are accountable to have good code of conduct of employees relations within NHS every effort should be made to resolve grievance without the need to put the law into use. It is in the interest of both parties that grievance should be resolve as quick as possible at its lowest level of management, and to the closest point of referral. For instance if an employee feels unhappy about a situation that he/she think the firm has acted unreasonable or failed to take his/her into account. This can then lead to complaint and may even lead to dispute. In the NHS all employees have the right to have their grievance fairly considered by a supervisor or manager, their grievance should be considered at a higher level of management, if it cannot be resolved at the first stage the individual should be accompanied by a Trade Union representative, a friend or colleague at all meetings convened under the procedure of grievance. ACAS offer employers, trade unions and individuals the opportunity to obtain unbiased assistance in solving disputes and negotiation. ACAS can offer advice to all sides in the disputes. It can also try to bring the sides together as it tries to conciliate and suggest ways to move towards a solution. Finally ACAS can list evidence from both sides and then provide a solution. Never the less, it will insist that both sides agree to abide by its decision before starting the arbitration process. Arbitration and conciliation involve, giving support to both parties in resolving disputes. Conciliation involves listening to both parties before suggesting solutions, whereas arbitration involves providing a solution given certain criteria that both parties are comfortable with. For instance, docking pay or dismissing the employee. The employee may then take the case to an Employment Tribunal. ACAS will be involved in trying to resolve these issues so that they do not go as far as the Tribunal or by creating codes of good practice and giving advice so that an employer can establish working relationships that do not lead to such disputes. ACAS will conciliate by working with the two parties. In addition to this, most of the disputes dealt with by an employment tribunal are for unfair dismissal. In this case the employee must first of all ask ACAS whether the case needs to be taken to an employment tribunal. The tribunal is made up of individuals who have specific knowledge of employment law. After listening to the evidence presented, the chair of the tribunal and other solicitors will make decision by simple majority verdict. Individual whose complaint are upheld are entitled to compensation, reinstatement or reengagement. For example, a deaf worker takes a case for disability discrimination to an Employment Tribunal and wins. A co-worker, who is hearing, appears as a witness for the deaf worker. Later, the employer does not promote the co-worker and this was due to her support for her deaf colleague. This would be victimisation and, under the DDA, the co-worker could take a case to the Employment Tribunal. Moreover appeals made by an employment tribunal can be referred to the Employment Appeal Tribunal. Some cases can be taken further to the court of Appeal, and sometimes up to the final court of appeal in the UK, the House of Lords. Since the UK is part of the European Union, individuals and employers can take their cases to the European court of justice. For example, Customer Service Customer service is an organisations ability to supply their customers wants and needs. Excellent customer service is the ability of an organisation to constantly and consistently exceed the customers expectations. And customer satisfaction is a top priority at each point of interaction. Customers are demanding more service, more convenience and more personalised communications. Businesses a-days must maximise every interaction with their customers to make positive impressions and enhance loyalty and preference with good customer service businesses can position for long-term success. Excellent customer service is about being aware of customer needs and reacting to them effectively. Gain and retain customers Good customer service is good business. It costs much less to keep an existing customer than to win a new customer, so retaining existing customers is more profitable for business. If Barts and The London NHS Trust has effective customer complaints systems in place, many of those customers with questions or problems can be retained. Satisfied complainants can be nearly as, or even more loyal than, patients who did not have a problem. Even if things do not go badly, research suggests that some patients will still leave because they are not totally satisfied with the service. Never the less, Poor service drives patients away, and they will not always come back and give you the chance to put it right. Often businesses are the last persons to hear about their customers problem. They will talk to their friends and talk with their feet by taking their custom elsewhere. Even if they do complain to you, you could still lose a number of these customers after only their first complaint. Businesses can gain customer through advertising, public relations, press releases, direct mail, sales letters and promotional items. Whereas in the retail industry, businesses like Mark and Spencer, Tescos, Sainsburys, provide similar products and charge similar prices. Improving the quality of customer service can help their businesses to gain and retain customers. For instant, if Tescos opens for 24 hours and prices are low then Tescos will gain customers from other competitors and retain their own customers. Gain customer satisfaction and loyalty: Satisfying customers will help to make customers more loyal and less tempted to go to its competitors. Now a-days Customer loyalty matters because selling more to existing customers is easier, and cheaper, than finding and selling to new ones. Loyal customers tend to buy more, more regularly. And they will frequently recommend your business to others. In this case, the NHS will have to provide patients with good health service. But patients are less likely to move from the NHS; unlike if the patient would like to be treated privately. Improving the image and reputation of the business: Good customer service allows business to improve the image and reputation of the business by fulfilling or satisfying customers. Satisfy customers spread good news about the business service and attract new customers. However, customer reputation is more likely to win more customers in a business. Barts and The London NHS Trust would put patients interest first and by doing so they should not let patients be on the waiting list for a long period. It is important for businesses to recognise that the reputation of years can be determined and destroyed by 60 seconds of poor conduct at the front line service delivery level. Providing information about the product in use: Moreover, good customer service means the business listen to their customers, they can find out what customers think about their product or service that is been offered to them. This feedback can help find ways to improve goods or services for customer. For NHS the competition to get drugs prescribed is fierce. Sales and marketing managers therefore need to have confidence that their sales plan is having the maximum effect. In order to do this, sales and marketing managers should surround their sales representatives with the necessary training and development tools. By helping patients to make savings in their prescribing budgets the hospital will also have helped them to release money to spend on other products and services as a result, they may be more receptive to meeting the hospital representatives. Patients will see the hospital as a prescribing partner who understands and is responsive to their needs and resource pressures. Help your business to keep market share: By providing good customer service, customers who remain loyal and new customers won by quality service will decide to buy shares from the business and retain their shares in the market. In the NHS modern sales representative needs to have superior knowledge of the market; effective access to customers; and an accurate means of assessing their impact. The NHS is based around controlling the uptake of a product as appropriate given the evidence, priorities and resourcing. Increase your business sales revenue and profit: Good customer service will allow businesses to increase sales and profit because satisfied customers can encourage others to go for the same good or service. Extra days off from work mean more opportunities for customers to buy goods, and that most often translates into increased sales for retailers. As a result, businesses today are seeking ways to make returned goods enhance financial performance, rather than reduce it, retailers and consumer goods companies can turn the reverse supply chain into a powerful source of profit and customer satisfaction. In the NHS there are departments that serve as internal customers; their job is to check the service that will be provided for external customer. The internal customers help the NHS to provide high quality service to patients. For example, secondary care organisations are the internal customers of primary care, and operating departments are the internal customers of central sterilising units and linen services. Quality depends on all (external and internal) customers in a system getting what they need, when they need it. External customers are the people who the NHS provides their service to (patients), they are the final customer. Final customers could be in-patients or out patients, these patients are individual that go to hospitals for treatment To begin with value for money is very important in the NHS (for private patients, within the country and over sea patients). I will not conduct a customer survey, but will try and search for a survey that will be available in the internet from that survey I will try and explain the most important customer expectations of the NHS. Customer satisfaction is vital for the survival and growth of any business. Findings from the National Homeowner Satisfaction research study indicate that most customers of the participating investigation are very satisfied with the service offered to them. In fact, the average index score of all NHS study participants is an extraordinary 96. The study measures the following components of customer satisfaction: project design, quality of materials, quality of workmanship, work-site conditions, production schedules, budget, price/value of projects, sales process. The survey also asked respondents to rate their willingness to recommend their hospital. Each respondents score for this question is averaged with its overall satisfaction score to yield an NHS Index score. However, the survey has a great percentage of patients who would recommend it to family and friends. Patients like to know services the NHS provide and price that they are expected to pay if any. Clear labelling can help patients with to build their trust and loyalty to any business. The NHS can win new patients by offering specialised advice about their service. The NHS target is to improve patients time to excel in anticipating and quickly responding to customer needs, many patients are not happy for the time they spent in the waiting list. The NHS should try and treat patients on time of need. I also think the NHS should improve Document Management service, in line with best industry standards and good value for money. Add value by providing a wider range of products and services to patients. Personal believe that good Employer should be able to sustain a working environment that attracts, retains and develops committed employees and to improve by investing in people, technology and processes, at the moment the NHS is not fulfilling much of this. Never the less the NHS should be working to build on reputation as a strong and self-reliant business with customer focus, profit orientation, and professional outlook. Market research allows businesses to target customers, sell effectively, compete with suppliers and sport new opportunities. There are many ways in conducting market research, Depending what the business is and the group the business is hoping to aim its product at, particularly the resources allocated to marketing research, there are two main ways of carrying out market research. First and for most, a small business can do the market research personally. This is often in smaller businesses. Here, marketing staff do the research themselves. Sample sizes tend to be small which may be appropriate if there are a relatively small number of customers. Secondly, a business can employ a marketing research manager, as the business may benefit from specialist research skills. Barts and The London NHS Trust has recently conducted a patients surveys, questionnaires and suggestions. Most Market research uses quantitative techniques to discover answers to broad questions from questionnaires. Employees can ask patients questions to know out they think about the NHS or the service being offered to them. Normal this take place when nurses and doctors are in regular contact with patients that are having difficulties with staff or have being in the waiting list for years, sometimes it could be that they are not satisfied with the service theyve received. For example, a new born baby had heart problem and was put on the heart transplant waiting list and he was admitted to the Pediatric ICU at Saint Marys Hospital to wait for a donor heart. Years later the parents were told a possible donor heart had been found, he was taken to be prepared for surgery, after the surgery the baby was doing fine. Expect weeks later when his parents were told that infections could mean a serious illness for him and at a time hes already infected. This took a long period of time for him to recover (something that the hospital could have prevent from happening) finally his family was told that the boy have hope for the future. After many complaints managers may decide to research, managers may achieve this by observing and assuming staff as they deal with patients. Sometimes ward managers employ elderly people, parents to assess and report on how well their workers are doing. In the case of observation, it takes long for GP to put their patients on a hospital waiting, this is due to how many people that are sill waiting and GPs are told to observe the attitude of the patient. Meaning many patients have to be referred by their GP to attend an outpatient clinic where their need for an operation will be assessed. However, the common way to find information from patients is getting them to complete questionnaires, which they will send by post or a nurse will help a patient complete, like an interview. Alternatively the NHS have a committee where patients report about services they provide to the public. This committee gives their views on how the NHS should run and sometimes provide useful and detailed information on how communication can take place in the NHS (patients and workers). As we all know almost all big businesses have websites that are available to clients. Barts and THE London have a website that patients can use regarding the service they offer, most of the time the site have information about the hospital, recent achievements, health information and so on. The website also has an E-mail which patients can use to contract Barts and The London NHS customer service. This way gives patients the chance to offer their views on the NHS and it service it does provide. Patients can use this method (e-mail) to complain about unsatisfactory service or complete forms before visiting the hospital. Barts and The London NHS must supply high quality of service to patients; their service must be of high standard and reliable. Patients must be assured about safety when in the hands of specialists; for instant doctors must explain to patients about side effect of any treatment or medication they are taking. Information on medication must be clear to patients in order to avoid over-dose and help patients to be safe. Barts and The London should have employees with the right skills and attitude to work in other provide patients with right treatment. Nurses or any other work in the NHS are well trained to carry their duties as stated on their contract of employment. All staff wear their uniform this is to help patients recognise all employees in the hospital. As weve been hearing there have been many complaints that the hospitals are not clean enough for patient to be treated and patients often suffer from different sicknesses while in hospital, this is said to be that it is the spreading of disease. Never the less, Barts and The London NHS provide signpost so that patients can find their way around the hospital. By using technology effectively, its possible to do more with fewer resources and compete work in a larger field. Businesses that shy away from technology find themselves at a disadvantage; technology is best suited for customer interaction and information. E-mail is as important as the telephone for the average working man and woman, and in some cases, more important than any other communications, nowadays people send more email than postal mail, exchange drafts of reports via email, schedule meetings via email, and close deals via email. Workers who dont know how to make use of email servers will waste hours or lose information. And those that are content to continue with one-to-one communications will fall behind their competitors. Protecting the customer means making sure that the customer is receiving the actual goods or service he or she wants, and that they are in the right condition to work as expected. There are many laws that exist to protect the customer, on such things as the contents and labelling of food, consumer credit and claims about sale price. In addition, in some cases business has set up its own help for the consumer through such things as voluntary codes of practice. The Trade Descriptions Act 1968 makes it an offence for a trader to apply, by any means, false or misleading statements, or to knowingly or recklessly make such statements about goods and services. This means you have rights as a consumer for what you purchase to do what it says it will. As a consumer if you feel like you have been ripped off or treated unfairly by a shop or a manufacturer then you can speak to a Personal Adviser at your local Connexions or the consumer and trading standards business advice service. If a description has been applied thee a business is not sure about, If at all possible, the trade description should be removed forthwith. Customers should certainly be informed about any doubt about any significant description. The Health and Safety at work 1974 state that all employers were required keeping their workplaces healthy and safe. The act provides a strong framework for good. Never the less, the consumer protection Act 1987, improve the law on the sale of dangerous goods. Certain goods must be marked with warnings and safety advice (bleach). Other goods, including heaters and toys, are covered by safety regulations. The sale of goods Act 1979 set the principles of fit for the purpose, as described and of merchantable quantity. This means products must be as described, fit for purpose and of satisfactory quality. If goods do not conform to contract at the time of sale, purchasers can request their money back within a reasonable time. Weight and measures Act 1985, makes it an offence for traders to give short weight or measure. The Act was established to ensure that buyers receive sufficient and accurate information with which to compare quantity and price.