How do I go about terminating a self employed stylist 🤔

[Andrea stringer]

There has been no rent payments since 1st December, I'd happily have her at work if she can get herself together, she doesn't admit to having any mental health problems but it's clearly obvious and her long time clients that have been to her prior to coming to us say how bad she was after loosing her dad, when I spoke to her yesterday which was the first verbal conversation with her dunce November she was irrational, and uptight, she's understandably not coping well with dealing with her moms passing, she mentioned a friend was helping her but any conversation with her when she's like this is detached, confusing and irrational.

 

[Andrea stringer]

I have txt message's on my phone which documents how many times I've tried to instigate conversation and the few times she's responded.

 

[Chriss87]

There has been no rent payments since 1st December, I'd happily have her at work if she can get herself together, she doesn't admit to having any mental health problems but it's clearly obvious and her long time clients that have been to her prior to coming to us say how bad she was after loosing her dad, when I spoke to her yesterday which was the first verbal conversation with her dunce November she was irrational, and uptight, she's understandably not coping well with dealing with her moms passing, she mentioned a friend was helping her but any conversation with her when she's like this is detached, confusing and irrational.

When it boils down to it having been told by customers and saying you've noticed something still works against you unless you've taken steps to help. If you terminate her contract you could still be found partly liable if she goes down hill. Be open with her send her a recorded letter saying she seemed to be struggling under current circumstances and provide her with the number to a free service such as one offered by a union or NHS. State you note that fees haven't been paid since December and you'd like to work with her to cover this during her future with you, or if she would feels like she needs an extended break she would contact you to discuss releasing her chair.

That way your being flexible.

I

 

[AcidPerm]

As mental health has been mentioned you have a duty of care towards them even though they are self employed. If they have been paying throughout lockdown and haven't breached the contract they have if you were to even suggest termination of the contract and the person in question suffered fruther mental heath issues or it pushed them to act on any thoughts they might be having you could well be found liable.

Please quote the relevant case law or statute that requires the landlord to exercise a duty of care towards the tenant who is allegedly suffering from mental health issues, as I am unaware of any such directive.

 

[Chriss87]

Please quote the relevant case law or statute that requires the landlord to exercise a duty of care towards the tenant who is allegedly suffering from mental health issues, as I am unaware of any such directive.

Its based on supervising a self employed worker. Not being a landlord. Would you prefer I didn't say anything and she possibly had a much bigger issue?

You seem like you'd let an Co worker take drastic action rather then show any form of humanity.

I've overseen thousands of employees both directly employed and self employed and had to deal with incidents where people have taken there own life due to the actions of there boss. I'm offering my experience having been in the position. If you want case law then talk to a solicitor.

Just trying to share my extensive experience in employment rather then watching someone take a risk they don't need too.

 

[Chriss87]

How ever to assist Andrea stinger

The health and sefety at work act 1974 is for businesses such as yours. As you have 5 or more people working in the business (including self employed).

This means your have responsibility for health, safety and welfare. It does state at work but if clients have commented it can be argued that it has affected work. And this is where the incident I referred to with the chef tripped us up. While it couod of been argued either way the backlash would of been worse. The self employed chefs solicitor argued that we were made aware of issues during the time he was contracted to. Work in our premises and we there for had a duty of care for his welfare. It may not have been seen that way if we had gone to court. But the act also states 'so far as is reasonably practicable' in relation to your requirements. So offering a payment plan, providing a number to call a professional and offering a way of leaving without prejudice would be reasonable as you still have bills to cover.

I'm very lucky that moving over from hospitality means I've had extensive training in HR and have dealt with (sadly) hundreds of issues that I wouldn't of if I had started out direct into hair and beauty. If anyone has a spicific question I'm happy to help. However bare in mind this will be from my experience and training in HR and recruitment and not from a university degree etc.

 

[AcidPerm]

Its based on supervising a self employed worker. Not being a landlord. Would you prefer I didn't say anything and she possibly had a much bigger issue?
You seem like you'd let an Co worker take drastic action rather then show any form of humanity.

In other words, there is no legally defined duty of care responsibility on the shoulders of a landlord renting chairs towards a chair renter suffering from undiagnosed mental health issues.

Please be mindful that when when offering advice to fellow Geeks that you make clear whether something is indeed a legal fact or an anecdote based opinion. There is an important difference between the two, as I’m sure you can appreciate.

The Health & Safety at Work Act ’74 was originally intended to require employers to take steps to protect their employees from serious harm related directly to their employment and over the years case law has helped define the duty of care owed by employers. However, I’d be astonished if any court, even at tribunal level, would require an employer to take responsibility for harm caused by an external situation wholly unconnected with the workplace.

 

[Chriss87]

In other words, there is no legally defined duty of care responsibility on the shoulders of a landlord renting chairs towards a chair renter suffering from undiagnosed mental health issues.

Please be mindful that when when offering advice to fellow Geeks that you make clear whether something is indeed a legal fact or an anecdote based opinion. There is an important difference between the two, as I’m sure you can appreciate.

The Health & Safety at Work Act ’74 was originally intended to require employers to take steps to protect their employees from serious harm related directly to their employment and over the years case law has helped define the duty of care owed by employers. However, I’d be astonished if any court, even at tribunal level, would require an employer to take responsibility for harm caused by an external situation wholly unconnected with the workplace.

Its not an option, it's from a case I was involved with as previously mentioned. Where solicitors saw that there a case for this to happen.

The 74 act now covers this as explained, but just for you il not offer any advice to anyone. And when businesses find themselves in trouble they can come back to salongeek where your listed as a staff member and take action based on salongeeks advice and comments made by yourself.

 

[Chriss87]

In other words, there is no legally defined duty of care responsibility on the shoulders of a landlord renting chairs towards a chair renter suffering from undiagnosed mental health issues.

Please be mindful that when when offering advice to fellow Geeks that you make clear whether something is indeed a legal fact or an anecdote based opinion. There is an important difference between the two, as I’m sure you can appreciate.

The Health & Safety at Work Act ’74 was originally intended to require employers to take steps to protect their employees from serious harm related directly to their employment and over the years case law has helped define the duty of care owed by employers. However, I’d be astonished if any court, even at tribunal level, would require an employer to take responsibility for harm caused by an external situation wholly unconnected with the workplace.

And a chair renter is classed as a self employed staff member under the act. Not a landlord and set up as you claim.

 

[Andrea stringer]

I thank you for your advice, there's 6 of us, myself and my business partner, 1 assistant and 2 self employed beauty therapists and the self employed stylist in question, ive raised her mental health wellbeing on numerous occasions and offered to help her with accessing help but she herself is in denial that she has any need for intervention, a frustrating situation as we can all see, clients included that she isn't fully aware at times of how she is, im in no way discriminating against her, rather the opposite but as a businesses owner and she not being employed by us I have a duty to make sure that our financial situation is protected, the chair rent we require going forward I cannot have this be an indefinite situation where I'm left in limbo not knowing if I have rent coming in or not based on her ability/ willingness to return to work, she has a duty of care to herself to seek proper help but part of her is not addressing the issue instead ignoring it or not being capable of moving forward to seek help for herself.

 

[Chriss87]

No problem. Id send something recorded delivery so you have proof of receiving at least. But that's me.

 

[Andrea stringer]

Unfortunately most online advice only covers employed staff and not if a person is self employed, the advice from the HHBF on the fact of paying rent whilst closed does state that its still payable by the individual who rents the chair/ space and the only caveat is that there has to be an agreed amount of time for repayment of those arrears, if she won't tell me if she is even coming back to work because she's not being proactive in regards to contacting her clients to tell them she's returning, she can't just leave it to fate come April 12th, or maybe she can, its her business but at this point her agreement is yo work 3 days and I'm not even sure she has 3 days worth of business left to come back to her after her lengthy time off

 

[Chriss87]

Unfortunately most online advice only covers employed staff and not if a person is self employed, the advice from the HHBF on the fact of paying rent whilst closed does state that its still payable by the individual who rents the chair/ space and the only caveat is that there has to be an agreed amount of time for repayment of those arrears, if she won't tell me if she is even coming back to work because she's not being proactive in regards to contacting her clients to tell them she's returning, she can't just leave it to fate come April 12th, or maybe she can, its her business but at this point her agreement is yo work 3 days and I'm not even sure she has 3 days worth of business left to come back to her after her lengthy time off

Employment rights
Employment law doesn’t cover self-employed people in most cases because they are their own boss.

However, if a person is self-employed:

• they still have protection for their health and safety and, in some cases, protection against discrimination
• their rights and responsibilities are set out by the terms of the contract they have with their client

The helpful extent of yougov advice.

 

[Amber5748]

If you are really worried about her mental health I would contact the mental
Health team again and explain her situation. Tell them she works with you and rents a chair and that you feel you have a duty of care towards her and that her parents have died. I am sure they will try to do something for her.

 

[AcidPerm]

If you are really worried about her mental health I would contact the mental
Health team again and explain her situation. Tell them she works with you and rents a chair and that you feel you have a duty of care towards her and that her parents have died. I am sure they will try to do something for her.

This isn’t how mental health support services work. They are chronically underfunded for starters.
They will only intervene if the person is at risk of serious harm and needs sectioning. Refusing to communicate with your landlord in a timely fashion isn’t likely to lead to someone being sectioned unlessyou have evidence of other harmful behaviours.

 

[TheDuchess]

Like Chriss87 and many other salon owners snd self employed beauty professionals here, I also had extensive managerial and professional consultancy experience before I entered the hair and beauty industry. I’m also professionally qualified in law including contract law and liability. I’m no longer insured to give advice professionally so this is my opinion only, based on experience.

There are 3 basic classifications for employment status. Employed, Self employed contracting your services (called a worker) and self employed running your own business. In the hair and beauty industry there is a lot of misunderstanding about self employment. If the salon owner is running the business and clients belong to the salon, anyone self employed is actually classed as a contract worker and they have a right to holiday pay and a few other benefits that I won’t go into here.

When you employ self employed contract workers you may have a similar duty of care towards them as if they were employees because they are under your control. This would be the case for instance when employing a self employed contract chef as the chef isn’t running a separate business cooking meals for customers paying them direct. they are simply contracting their professional services to the owner of the kitchen. The business selling food/meals is the kitchen owners/operators. So if you have agency staff coming in, or a contractor covering for holiday absence you still have to treat them similarly to your staff.

There are guidelines which we follow to determine self employed status. We tend to refer to tenants (who are genuinely self employed, running their own business) and employees (who may or may not be self employed) to avoid confusion

Chriss87 has confused contract workers with self employed tenants. She is talking about self employed staff who are paid by the salon owner, or whose services and activities are controlled by the salon owner so don’t really have an independent business of their own.

Amber stringer has asked a question about a tenant who is renting space and has her own clients. Amber doesn’t have the same obligations towards her tenant as she does towards her staff and if she behaves too much as if she thinks this lady is her employee, she risks creating other difficulties and problems.

Imagine the salon as a covered market sub divided into little kiosks with many traders all working under the same roof. The traders will have some rules - the market may not permit some types of business activities (no naked flames, for instance or no selling fireworks) and the traders may co-operate with each other, joint advertising or even helping a customer with an enquiry for instance. However, if one of them fell behind with their rent and didn’t communicate with the market about their plans for return, the market would not legally need to factor their tenant’s health into their decision. The tenant would have no right to sue the landlord for unfair treatment as this only applies to employees snd some self employed contract workers.

 

[Andrea stringer]

Thank you for your time in responding, she is very much self employed, her clients are hers which she bought with her from her previous salon when it closed, we have offered our services to those clients rather than they go elsewhere, this was with the tenants approval, I have sent yet another understanding and gentle message to her, urging her to think of her future but I feel she isn't in a fit mental health state currently and is avoiding making any decisions.