The biggest shake-up in UK employment law in a generation is already live.
Day-one rights arrived in April 2026. On 1 January 2027 the cap on unfair dismissal awards is removed entirely. Most handbooks written before 2025 reflect none of it. Check yours against current UK law in minutes.
7-day free trial. No credit card. Results in minutes.
- 1 Jan 2027
- Unfair dismissal compensation cap removed
- 6 months
- New qualifying period, down from 2 years
- £123,543
- Today's cap, gone from 2027
- 15+
- UK legislation sources Bounda checks against
Sources: Employment Rights Act 2025; gov.uk; legislation.gov.uk. Figures current to June 2026, verify before relying on them.
Your handbook was written for rules that no longer apply.
If your staff handbook predates 2025, it does not reflect the Employment Rights Act. Statutory sick pay is now payable from day one. Paternity and unpaid parental leave are day-one rights. The duty to prevent sexual harassment has been strengthened. And from January 2027 the unfair dismissal qualifying period falls to six months with no cap on what a tribunal can award. The gap between what your handbook says and what the law now requires is exactly where the risk sits.
What the Employment Rights Act changes, and when
April 2026 (live)
Day-one statutory sick pay, paternity and unpaid parental leave. Strengthened duty to prevent sexual harassment.
October 2026
Tribunal time limits extended to six months for relevant claims.
1 January 2027
Unfair dismissal qualifying period cut to six months. Compensation cap removed entirely. Fire-and-rehire restrictions take effect.
Across 2027
Guaranteed hours for zero-hours workers, gender equality and menopause action plans, and further provisions phased through the year.
The handbook is no longer a one-off job. It changes as the law does.
Paste, check, fix. In minutes, not legal hours.
Three steps from a handbook you are not sure about to one you can defend, without a legal retainer or a rewrite from scratch.
Paste your policies.
Drop in your existing handbook or start from a template. Bounda structures it into the policy types a UK employer needs, so there is nothing to format or organise first.
- Paste a whole handbook, a single policy, or start from a Bounda template.
- Sorted automatically into the 50+ UK policy types across the employment lifecycle.
- No tidying up beforehand. Bounda reads whatever you have and structures it.
See every gap, ranked by risk.
Bounda checks each section against current UK employment law and returns a ranked list of issues, so you fix what actually exposes you first rather than guessing.
- Checked against 15+ legislation sources, including the Employment Rights Act 2025.
- Issues ranked Critical, High, Medium and Low by severity.
- Every gap cites the specific law behind it, linked to legislation.gov.uk.
Accept the fix.
Take an AI-drafted compliant replacement, edit it yourself, or draft a missing policy from scratch. Built for UK employment law, not adapted from a US template.
- Accept a compliant redraft in one click, or refine it before you save.
- Draft missing policies from scratch in your own tone of voice.
- Export the finished handbook to Word or PDF when you are done.
- Built for UK law
- Legal citations on every gap
- ICO registered
- Encrypted in transit and at rest
- Word and PDF export
- Cancel anytime
Questions UK employers are asking
Is my employee handbook out of date after the Employment Rights Act 2025?
Probably. The Act received Royal Assent in December 2025 and is the biggest change to UK employment law in decades. Day-one rights to statutory sick pay, paternity and unpaid parental leave took effect in April 2026, and from January 2027 the unfair dismissal qualifying period drops to six months with the compensation cap removed. Handbooks written before 2025 will not reflect these changes. Bounda checks yours against current legislation and flags every gap.
What changes on 1 January 2027?
The qualifying period for ordinary unfair dismissal falls from two years to six months, and the statutory cap on compensatory awards is removed entirely. Employees with six months service on that date gain protection immediately, so anyone hired from around July 2026 is in scope. For employers this raises the stakes on how dismissals, probation and documentation are handled.
Do I need an employment lawyer to update my handbook?
Not to find the gaps. Bounda checks your existing policies against 15+ UK legislation sources, ranks the issues by severity, cites the specific law and drafts compliant replacements you can export to Word. It is built for UK employment law rather than adapted from a US template. For contentious individual cases you should still take legal advice, but the routine handbook work no longer needs a lawyer hourly rate.
How long does a handbook check take?
Minutes. Paste your existing policies or start from a template, and Bounda structures them, runs the gap analysis and returns a ranked list of issues with citations. You can accept AI-drafted fixes or draft missing policies from scratch.
Is the trial really free?
Yes. Seven days, no credit card. You can run a full gap analysis and see your handbook compliance position before deciding whether to pay.
What does Bounda cover beyond the handbook?
40+ HR document types including disciplinary and grievance letters, settlement agreements and return-to-work forms, a Handbook Chatbot that answers policy questions from your own handbook with citations, acknowledgement tracking for tribunal evidence, and alerts when the law changes.
Find out where your handbook stands.
Run a full gap analysis free. No card, no commitment, results in minutes.