HR Action List

3 Things HR Teams Should Be Doing During May 2026

If you were thinking that with the April ERA 2026 changes behind you, May might be a month where you would take a breath and catch up, you may want to stop reading here.

As we all know, we are in the slipstream of the most significant tranche of employment law changes in a generation and there is a LOT to get ahead of. During May, June and July you need to be laying the groundwork for the changes due to hit in October 2026 and January 2027 – remembering that the unfair dismissal qualifying period of 6 months essentially bites for all new hires from 1 July 2027 so policies and contracts need updating.

1  Audit April 2026 Changes

Check that payroll is properly paying SSP to the newly eligible employee cohort. The removal of the lower earnings limit and the 3-day waiting period has increased eligibility for SSP. Check how payroll is approaching the changes generally and particularly in relation to atypical workers where issues crop up more frequently than we would like to admit.

Check that day one paternity rights and unpaid parental leave changes have been made to policies, handbooks, templates and any manager facing guidance.

Ensure that your whistleblowing policies and grievance procedures have been updated to recognise that allegations of sexual harassment are now a qualifying disclosure for whistleblowing purposes. Consider training or a briefing for managers on how to appropriately handle any complaints.

Don’t lose sight of voluntary gender equality and menopause action plans. Employers with 250+ staff can publish voluntarily now and might want to consider getting ahead of the game with first drafts, rather than scrabbling around in the run up to the mandatory duty in April 2027.

Think about the Fair Work Agency and audit their areas of remit. The FWA is operational and presumably looking for early wins. Do not assume there will be a grace period. A sensible May task would be a desktop compliance audit of NMW, holiday pay, agency worker regulations and SSP. In particular look at holiday pay calculations for variable hours staff which is often a weak spot.

2  Think about Harassment

In addition to reviewing your whistleblowing policies and grievance procedures and considering training for managers on how to handle complaints which now amount to protected disclosures for whistleblowing purposes you need to start preparing for the October upgrade in an employer’s duty to prevent sexual harassment. We are currently still under the October 2024 duty to take “reasonable steps” to prevent sexual harassment. On 1 October 2026 that duty increases to an obligation to “take ALL reasonable steps”, coupled with the return of an employer’s liability for from a duty to Third-party harassment liability (abolished in 2013).

• Update policies, templates and guidance.
• Consider how you will evidence “all reasonable steps”.
• Source providers for any anti-harassment training to be run in advance of the changes.
• Prepare any risk assessments to be conducted June, July and August.
• Think about sourcing or creating appropriate signage (particularly in relation to client / customer areas).
• Consider messaging on your website, phone lines.
• Ensure complaints procedures and manager escalation protocols are prepared and, if appropriate, can be trialled once risk assessments have been conducted.

3  Manage your Unfair Dismissal Risk

The qualifying period for unfair dismissal reduces to six months for dismissals from 1 January 2027. However, that means that anyone onboarded late June onwards is likely to be protected when it comes to dismissal and needs to be handled accordingly (especially given the removal of the compensatory cap).

Review the probation clauses in your contracts ensure they are fit for purpose and that ALL new contracts contain them. No more removing them for senior executives as part of a negotiation. You could concede that there will be no change in the length of notice to be given but probation clauses should remain.

Review probation procedures and guidance. Consultation on the “light touch” dismissal procedure during probation is expected, but there is little information about what that looks like as yet. Employers are going to need to have proper mid probation reviews (consider at 2, 4 and 6 months) and appropriate end of probation procedures. Be clear about what success looks like, set objectives, document review outcomes and action points.

Manage your managers. They need to understand the changes, their obligations to follow appropriate probation review procedures, and the risks if they do not. They need to ensure they appraise, keep notes, document outcomes and objectives and critically ensure they deliver the hard messages when someone isn’t performing, rather than just complaining about it after the event. Managers, especially those managing for many years who have relied on the 2 year rule may not have picked up on quite how dramatic this shift is. Make sure they know. Plan training for the summer and refresh in the autumn.

Happy to Help

OK, fair comment, that was more than 3 action points but the principles hold. 2026/7 is going to be busy for HR – and that’s on top of the day job, which was hectic enough to begin with! If you feel like offloading any of the above, the audits, redrafts or reviews, do let me know. Equally if you’d like EDI or manager training / workshops now is the time to shout before I get booked up for September, which is a historically busy training period anyway….. Fun times!

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