HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) have published new guidance intended to help personal service companies determine their correct employment status. HMRC will take a risk-based approach to consider how likely it is that they need to check whether IR35 applies…
A recent case dealt with the vexed question of how similar one’s advertising can be to the trade marks of another company before this constitutes an infringement of its intellectual property rights. When supermarket giant ASDA sought to break into…
A Northern Irish company has been prosecuted under the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 (Corporate Manslaughter Act 2007) and fined £187,500, plus £13,000 costs, over the death of an employee. The employee was killed after being hit by…
In a recent case an employer dismissed a senior employee due to a breakdown in the working relationship with a payment in lieu of notice. It was then discovered that the employer could have dismissed the employee for gross misconduct…
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has fined Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust £325,000 following a serious breach of the Data Protection Act 1998. The fine related to the discovery of highly sensitive personal data belonging to tens of…
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) have accepted that smartphones supplied by employers are not computers and thus a 2006 statement of practice that these would be subject to the benefits in kind regime that applies to computers is not applicable…
Businesses should be made aware that making misleading claims in their advertising is illegal. The High Court, in judicial review proceedings, has recently held that the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) was entitled to find that a company had breached the…
In May 2011, a new law came into force requiring businesses to obtain consent from visitors to their websites to store or retrieve usage information from users' computers or mobile devices. Many businesses use cookies (small files that a website…
What is a Side Letter? A side letter is a document that is ancillary to another contract. The key question whenever the content or effect of a side letter is disputed is whether or not the side letter is binding…
A recent ruling in which ‘village green’ status was withdrawn from an area of land in Dorset highlights the fact that the granting of village green status does not necessarily mean that the land will be free from the risk…
