Sunday trading statutory rights statement

There are specific statutory provisions in place relating to shop workers and Sunday trading. Use our Sunday trading statutory rights statement to ensure you comply with the law.

Opting out statement

You are required by law to give those shop workers who are, or may be, required under their contracts of employment to work on Sundays (but not those employed solely to work on Sundays) an explanatory written statement setting out their right to opt out of working Sundays and not to be dismissed or subjected to any other detriment as a result of doing so. This is what our Sunday Trading Statutory Rights Statement is. The statement must be given within two months of the date when the employee started work as a shop worker. You don’t need to give the statement to any shop workers who don’t work on Sundays. The relevant provisions apply to shop workers, defined as someone who, under their contract of employment, is or may be required to do shop work. A shop includes any premises where any retail trade or business is carried on, including barbers and hairdressers, the hiring of goods otherwise than for use in the course of a trade or business and retail sales by auction. It excludes catering businesses or the sale at theatres and places of amusement of programmes, catalogues, etc.

Opting out and back in to Sunday work

Shop workers who are or may be required to work on Sundays (but not those employed solely to work on Sundays) are able to give a written “opting-out” notice, signed and dated by them, registering their objection to working on Sundays. An opting-out notice takes effect three months after it has been given and it then continues in force for as long as the employee remains continuously employed as a shop worker. However, if you’ve failed to give the shop worker a Sunday Trading Statutory Rights Statement, their opting-out notice will take effect after only one month, rather than three, which obviously wouldn’t then give you long to find alternative Sunday staff cover. So you should give our statement to all new shop workers who are contracted to work on days that include Sundays. Once opted out, a shop worker can still opt back in to Sunday working at a later date by giving a written “opting-in” notice, again signed and dated by them, in which they expressly state they wish to work on Sundays or that they have no objection to being required to do so, and then they subsequently expressly agree with you to do shop work on Sundays or on a particular Sunday.

Protection against dismissal and detriment

An opted-out shop worker is entitled not to be dismissed or to be subjected to any other detriment by reason of their refusal to work Sundays. A dismissal of a shop worker for asserting their statutory rights is also automatically unfair and does not require any minimum period of qualifying employment. However, it’s not a detriment to refuse to pay the employee in respect of Sundays which they don’t work, nor is it a detriment to pay those employees who do work Sundays a higher rate of pay or to offer them enhanced benefits. Likewise, where a shop worker works a fixed number of weekly hours including Sundays and the effect of opting out means their total hours of work per week is reduced, you’re under no obligation to increase their hours on weekdays to compensate them for that reduction.

Future reform

The Enterprise Act 2016 contained significant provisions to strengthen the rights of shop workers relating to Sunday working. Firstly, there was to be a reduction in the notice period to opt out of Sunday working from three months to one month for shop workers in large shops (those shops with an internal floor area exceeding 280 square metres). If you failed to give these shop workers a Sunday Trading Statutory Rights Statement within two months of their starting work as a shop worker (or within two months of the new provisions coming into force in the case of existing shop workers), their opting-out notice would then take effect after only seven days, rather than one month. For those working in smaller shops, the notice period to opt out of Sunday working was to remain at three months and the other opt-out provisions were to remain the same.

Secondly, you were to be required to give all shop workers who work on Sundays, and who are required under their employment contracts to work additional hours on Sundays that are beyond their normal Sunday working hours, an explanatory written statement setting out their right to object to doing shop work for additional hours on Sundays and not to be dismissed or subjected to any other detriment as a result of doing so. This statement was to be given within two months of the date when the employee started work as a shop worker, or within two months of the new provisions coming into force in the case of existing shop workers.

Thirdly, all shop workers were to have a new right to be able to object to working additional hours on a Sunday beyond their normal Sunday working hours. A worker would be able to do this by giving you a written “objection” notice signed and dated by them, to take effect one month after it had been given in the case of workers in large shops and three months after it had been given for workers in smaller shops. However, if you’d failed to give the above explanatory written statement, the shop worker’s objection notice would then take effect after only seven days in the case of large shops and one month in the case of smaller shops.

However, these provisions have so far not been brought into force and it is not known whether they will still be brought into force at some point in the future.