Q: I need some guidelines on best practice approach to changing the dates of a fortnightly pay period so that it is all in arrears, instead of some arrears/some advance please.

Currently Thurs to Weds & would like to change to Mon to Sun.

Pay day is not changing & still Wednesday.

A: Here is a rough overview.

As this is an agreed term included in an employees employment agreement the following steps are recommended:

• Create a business case on why the business believes this is needed, ensure the reasons are valid and stack up (or employees will rip it apart)
• Think about all the potential issues that employees may raise about the change and have answers ready to go.  Typical issues for employees:  Its in my employment agreement and you can’t change it, potentially I could get less pay than I am getting now, The transition will impact on me in a negative way and I will be out of pocket
• Set up a consultative process with employees:  Intro them to the business case and reasons the business wants to change, ask employees to go away and think about any issues they may have with this change and bring it back for the employer to fully investigate, provide the business decision.
• Some employers will provide a special payment (one off good will payment) so employees are not out of pocket (if they are) during the change, give them a good timeframe on when it will happen (in 2 months time not next week)
• Make sure all the way through it is stated we want to hear from you (the employees ) on your views/issues etc, do investigate what they put forward (if anything) and come back with valid solutions

If you have an employee or a small group employees not wanting to do this, if it is just because they don’t want to (not based on a real valid issue) and all the other staff have said yes, then you can provide a decision to change based on the majority of staff happy with it, the business case and the few that said no not having a truly valid reason not to do it.