Employees do not have a right to work flexibly but employers do have a duty to consider requests for flexible working if it is made by a qualifying employee.
If a statutory request is made, employers must follow the prescribed procedure as set out in the Flexible Working (Procedural Requirements) Regulations 2002.
If a request is granted, the effect will be a permanent change in that employee’s terms and conditions of employment.
The Flexible Working (Eligibility, Complaints and Remedies) Regulations 2002 and the Flexible Working (Procedural Requirements) Regulations 2002 (the “Regulations”) which came into force on 6 April 2003, flesh out the provision of the 2002 Act. The Regulations afforded the right initially only to parents of children under the age of 6, or a disabled child under 18.
Amended regulations, brought forward under the Work and Families Act 2006, widened the scope of the statutory right by extending it to working carers of adult dependants with effect from 6 April 2007. The right was extended further on 6 April 2009 by the Flexible Working (Eligibility, Complaints and Remedies) (Amendment) Regulations 2009 enabling requests to be made in respect of non-disabled children under the age of 17.
In 2010, the coalition government stated its intention to extend the right to all employees, starting with the extension to parents of children under 18 in April 2011. However, the Flexible Working (Eligibility, Complaints and Remedies) (Amendment) Regulations 2010, which would have effected this extension, were subsequently revoked as an unnecessary intermediary step.
However, on 16 May 2011, the Consultation on Modern Workplaces was published. Among its proposals is the extension of the right to request flexible working to all employees who have accrued 26 weeks` continuous employment. The existing procedure for considering request will be replaced with a duty on employers to consider requests reasonably. The consultation closes on 8 August 2011.