In a bid to fight the credit crunch, many employers will be considering cutting staffing levels to save on costs. However, expecting the remaining workforce to work longer hours can have serious consequences. A social worker has been...

Buying a business can be a risky undertaking. Even if the normal due diligence work is done with great care, sometimes there can be skeletons in the cupboard, which can emerge to your detriment. It is a particularly risky business when the vendors are less...

Pleural plaques are small, localised areas of pleural thickening on the membrane covering the lungs, caused by the inhalation of asbestos fibres. Pleural plaques are in themselves benign but their presence is associated with an increased risk of developing...

The Government has recently raised the guarantee on deposits to £50,000 (from £35,000), but what does this mean for a business with substantial cash balances? The Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) is designed to...

A rambler who was injured while crossing a bridge on a public footpath has won compensation from the local council. Birgit Green, 63, was crossing the bridge in a nature reserve in East Sussex when part of the wooden planking collapsed....

The Health and Safety Executive has updated its website on managing occupational health risks in the construction industry, providing new information for Construction Design and Management coordinators (CDMs). The website gives information for CDMs,...

A study by accountants BDO Stoy Hayward has found that business fraud is up by over 70 per cent compared with last year and they estimate the cost of business fraud is now more than £700 million a year. Management fraud accounts...

The widow of a highly-regarded documentary film maker has won a High Court battle against three doctors who failed to diagnose and treat her husband's hypertension. Nick Rossiter, who was 43 when he died, had been a patient at the...

Nowadays, it is becoming less and less common for business to be transacted ‘on a handshake’ and a recent case highlights the dangers of failing to get formal documentation in place to confirm the terms of an agreement. The...

Since the introduction of the Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006, the enforced retirement of an employee who is below the age of 65 has generally been unlawful, unless it can be objectively justified. The Regulations provide for a default...

A member of a cycling club has won £11,000 in compensation after a badly designed cycle path caused him to fall off his bicycle. Stuart Bullen, 57, was travelling along the path when it suddenly ended, with no warning, in a raised...

A police mechanic who was exposed to high levels of noise from testing police sirens has been awarded compensation for occupational deafness. The mechanic’s job was to repair police vehicles and as part of this work he was...

Under EU law, agents have a degree of protection which mere resellers do not. For example, when an agency is lost, the agent is normally entitled to compensation from the principal. This does not apply where the relationship is one of a supplier and...

The family of a Polish man, who died of botulinum poisoning that doctors failed to diagnose, has been awarded more than £200,000 in compensation. The man came to the UK in 2002 to help support his wife and daughter back in Poland....

A care assistant who injured her back while helping an elderly woman from her bed has been awarded £8,000 in compensation. Mrs Margaret Yates, now 58, worked in a residential care home and was helping to dress the woman when the...

Landlords will breathe a sigh of relief following the recent reversal of the much-reported Scottish and Newcastle v Raguz case. It dealt with the requirement for landlords to serve notices on former tenants on each outstanding payment date...

According to a recent report, company receiverships (where a bank appoints a receiver to run a company in order to protect the banks position) are up by more than 150 per cent this quarter compared with the same quarter last year. The result...

HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) have always taken a dim view of claiming expenses without complete documentation , so this has been a perennial problem area. However, the reality, as every businessperson knows, is that maintaining complete and...

A tree surgeon who was badly injured in a chainsaw accident has been awarded an undisclosed amount of compensation. The man was using a large, powerful chainsaw to cut a sizeable tree into sections. Although he had received some...

The Court of Appeal has issued a ruling which will be unwelcome to social landlords that allow tenants in arrears to become ‘tolerated trespassers’, when a possession order is suspended because the tenant is paying off the arrears of rent which...

The family of a man who died of a deadly lung cancer has been awarded £205,000 in compensation. The man had been exposed to asbestos as a teenager while laying telephone cables when he worked for a company that was later bought by...

The Government has announced its intention to amend the law so that tips can no longer count towards payment of the National Minimum Wage (NMW). All workers are entitled to receive the minimum hourly wage. However, bars and restaurants...

The Health and Safety Offences Act 2008 received Royal Assent on 16 October 2008 and will come into force in January 2009. It amends Section 33 of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and will increase penalties for breaches of health and safety...

Owners of valuable trade marks will need to be quicker off the mark to oppose applications that infringe their trade marks  because of changes which took place on 1 October. The reason for this is that the UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) has...

Yet another case shows the importance of reading and complying with the terms of your insurance policies.  It involved the owner of a trawler valued at over £120,000 who claimed on his insurance policy when the vessel...