The FIFA World Cup starts on 20 November 2022 and lasts until 18 December 2022. This is good news for football fans but could cause difficulties for employers. Employers could be facing a serious loss of productivity if staff phone in sick or do not turn up for work. Our guidance below should help you manage the situation and create a positive outcome for everyone. Plan ahead!
All of England’s group matches are on working days. England’s second two group matches are both in the evening, but the first match begins at 1PM on Monday 21st November. There are also other matches on working days that are likely to prove popular, such as Wales and Iran which begins at 10AM on Friday 25th November. You may see a rise in the number of holiday requests on such days and there is also an increased risk of unauthorised absence. To minimise this you could make it clear to employees that absences without authorisation will not be paid.
Your Sickness and Absence Policy should provide for return to work interviews; consider reminding employees that these will be carried out. This may prevent employees pretending to be sick so that they can watch matches or recover from a post-match hangover. If this is not already stated in your Sickness and Absence Policy, consider its implementation. If you do not have a Sickness and Absence Policy, please ask me.
There is a greater risk of employees being ‘under the influence’ or hungover at work during this World Cup period, so it is wise to remind employees of your Drugs and Alcohol Policies. If you do not have such policies in place, please ask me.
Flexible working and annual leave: You may wish to allow your employees to work flexibly around match times as this would minimise the reduction in productivity. If this is implemented, remember that flexi-time should be available to staff for other sporting events for instance Wimbledon fortnight, and for other reasons such as childcare arrangements. Don’t allow too much time to accrue as this time will need to be made up by employees. You could encourage employees to take days or half days off as annual leave and relax the cap on the number of employees allowed on holiday at once. This way absence levels will be known in advance and the decrease in productivity can be managed.
Show Key Matches in the Workplace: How about having a screen showing matches in a canteen or communal area? This is a good way to boost staff morale. However, you must ensure that you have a licence for the premises. A TV licence is also required if matches are streamed live on the internet. There should also be football-free zones for those who are not football supporters. If you cannot show matches at work, you could temporarily relax your Internet Policy to allow employees to follow matches. You should clarify that this will operate on a discretionary basis for the duration of the World Cup only, that employees should not use illegal means (e.g. pirated streaming) to view matches, and that any abuse of the privilege will mean that it will be withdrawn.
Other Issues to Consider: Possible legal pitfalls: 1: If you grant holiday to football fans, who are mainly male, around this period, female employees who were refused holiday during the same period could bring a claim of sex discrimination. 2: Where you allow employees to wear their national team’s shirts and an employee makes racial slurs against a colleague supporting another country, issues of racial discrimination or harassment could arise. You may be held liable for acts of discrimination carried out by employees in the course of their employment.
