Are you organising your business Christmas Party ?
This week we investigate your obligations as an employer to protect your employees and strategies you can implement to do so.
This is, after all, a work function – meaning that you’re responsible for the health and safety of your employees.
Lets face it, in Australia, you’ll most likely go to somewhere lovely, have a party and drink a bit of alcohol.
But alcohol and workmates can sometimes lead to some difficult situations that as an employer, you’d like to avoid such as:
1. Harassment
Two main types of harassment that we see occur at Christmas Parties are:
- Sexual Harassment
- Racial Harassment
Sexual harassment (typically of a woman) in a workplace, or other professional or social situation, involves the making of unwanted sexual advances or obscene remarks.
Add a bit of alcohol at your Christmas party and this can become a hot issue that you need to eliminate.
Racial harassment in a workplace, or other professional or social situation, involves the making of unwanted racial comments or obscene remarks. We see this particular type of harassment often becomes a hot topic when a Chris-Kringle ‘joke’ present has gone too far.
2. Work Health and Safety
Because this is a work related function, you are still responsible for the Work Health and Safety of your employees.
Contrary to some belief, if you are offering alcohol to your employees, this includes up until the employee returns safely home.
You’re also responsible to ensure that the NSW Responsible Service of Alcohol rules and regulations are being followed.
So, if you are having a party in the office, you’ll need to hire somebody with an RSA for the evening.
Strategies to ensure a hassle-free Christmas Party
1. Send an email
Send an email to all employees reminding them that your Christmas Party is a work function and that they are representing your business.
This also means that their employment contract and employee handbook including code of conduct will be in action and that under no circumstances will harassment of any kind be tolerated.
2. Organise Return Transport
If you are offering alcohol to your employees, the employer is responsible for the safe journey home for all employees. So, make sure you’ve organised transport home.
Perhaps you’ll need to organise a bus, or taxi vouchers to drop employees off at home after the party.
3. Have a complaints handling procedure ready
We don’t want it to happen, but things may go wrong. Be prepared by understanding your complaints handling procedure.
If you don’t have a documented policy, Fair Work have a report you can use.
Check it out here.
Merry Christmas!
We wish you an amazing Christmas party and will see you in next week’s Catalyst Plus TV!
If this was of help to you or you know somebody it can, please, forward on social media!