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Use this guide to understand the law and good practice on employee grievances, including the effective management of grievances and the practicalities of dealing with grievances.
Grievances are concerns, problems or complaints that employees raise with their employer. A grievance might concern matters such as an employee's work, physical working environment, pay and benefits, working hours, health and safety, working relationships or general treatment at work.
The purpose of a grievance procedure is to allow employees to raise genuine workplace grievances and have them dealt with fairly and objectively without fear of recrimination.
The grievance procedure should be in writing, as this helps to clarify the process. The structure of a grievance procedure It should be possible for most grievances to be dealt with informally by the employee's line manager. However, as it may not be possible to resolve some grievances informally, the organisation's grievance procedure should also allow employees to raise grievances formally with management or with the HR department if the organisation has one.
Most employers will stipulate in their grievance procedure that an employee who has a formal grievance should, in the first instance, raise it with his or her immediate line manager (unless the line manager is the subject of the grievance - in
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This guide reflects the "ACAS code of practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures", which provides practical guidance on handling workplace grievances.
Yes. This template has been designed for organisations of all sizes, including small businesses, charities and growing employers. It follows UK employment law best practice and can be adapted to suit your organisation.
Our templates are developed with UK employment legislation, Acas guidance and HR best practice in mind and are reviewed and updated as relevant requirements change. However, every employment situation is different, so the template should be adapted to the circumstances and checked against the employee's contract and your organisation's procedures before use.
Yes, we highlight the areas of the document that you need to update with your own details, and where you need to make decisions to suit your situation. This saves you time and ensures that you meet best practice.
Yes. Once purchased, you'll be able to download it instantly. Templates are provided in editable format (such as .doc or .xls) so you can customise them easily, and in PDF format for easy sharing.
If you're looking for broader support, we also offer toolkits and library bundles that include the Managers guide to grievances, along with other HR templates and policies for fully managing your situation. These may be more cost-effective if you need deeper advice.
AI can produce a document quickly, but effective HR documentation needs to be more than well-written words. It needs to reflect relevant UK employment law, HR best practice, practical considerations and the circumstances in which it will be used. These resources have been professionally developed around that wider HR context, drawing on extensive practical experience, rather than simply generating a generic document from a prompt.
How this content is developed and reviewed
The Managers guide to grievances is developed using a practical HR methodology that considers current UK employment legislation, ACAS guidance, CIPD good practice and the real-world HR process it supports. Templates are regularly reviewed and updated, with additional reviews triggered by significant changes to legislation, guidance or established HR practice, helping ensure each document remains practical, relevant and suitable for UK employers.
Darryl Horn, Chartered HR Director
Darryl is a Chartered HR professional with over 25 years' experience in senior HR and employee relations roles.
He has extensive practical experience of managing grievance processes and founded hrdocbox to provide businesses with practical, professionally developed HR resources grounded in UK employment law and best practice.
HRDocBox has been creating practical UK HR documents since 2009.
"Darryl provides support and advice with excellent judgement, and has a strong understanding of people, policies and UK employment legislation."
"He is someone I trust; consistent, dependable, and committed to doing things properly."
Grievance toolkit
23 templates
£34.90
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