Summer staffing: the flexible contracts you are relying on are about to change
- HRNews
- Jul 23
- 3 min read
What is it?
Atypical working covers anything outside the traditional full time permanent model. Fixed term, casual, annualised hours, zero and low hours all sit under that heading, and for seasonal peaks they are often the sensible choice.
The three reforms in the Employment Rights Act 2025 will change how the zero and low hours end of that works. Qualifying workers will get a right to be offered guaranteed hours reflecting the hours they actually worked over a reference period, a right to reasonable notice of shifts and changes to them, and a right to payment where a shift is cancelled, curtailed or moved at short notice. Agency workers are in scope too.
None of it is in force yet. The detail sits in regulations, and the government opened its consultation on 2 June 2026. It closes at 11:59pm on 25 August 2026, with the new regime expected during 2027.
What is being consulted on matters for anyone staffing a summer peak. The hours threshold for a low hours contract is on the table with options from 8 to 48 hours a week and a stated preference somewhere between 8 and 20. The reference period options are 12, 26 or 52 weeks, with 12 preferred. And the Act already says the duty to offer guaranteed hours does not arise where a limited term contract is reasonable, including for temporary need. The consultation asks whether temporary need should be defined to cover seasonal demand, which is exactly the question a summer employer wants answered.
This is not a ban on zero hours contracts. Workers can decline a guaranteed hours offer and stay as they are.
What does it mean for you?
✅ Respond to the consultation if seasonal work is part of your model. This is one of the few parts of the Act where employers can still influence the outcome, and the seasonal demand question is directly relevant. You have until 25 August.
✅ Look again at agency arrangements. If an agency worker qualifies for and accepts a guaranteed hours offer, they move onto a direct contract with the hirer. That has real consequences for headcount, cost and your contracts with the agency.
✅ Remember a fixed term contract ending is still a dismissal. Under section 95(1)(b) of the Employment Rights Act 1996 expiry without renewal counts as a dismissal, so it needs a fair reason and a fair process. That matters more from 1 January 2027, when the unfair dismissal qualifying period drops to six months. A seasonal contract that rolls over a couple of summers can quietly build up service.
✅ Watch the four year rule. Under the Fixed-term Employees Regulations 2002, someone on successive fixed term contracts totalling four years' continuous service usually becomes a permanent employee unless the continued use of a fixed term is objectively justified.
✅ Check your worker and employee lines now. Mutuality of obligation is what usually separates a casual worker from an employee, and on paper it often looks cleaner than it does in practice. If you have people who have been doing regular shifts for years on a casual agreement, that is the arrangement most exposed when guaranteed hours arrive.
How Lansbury HR can help.
We help employers work out which contract actually fits the work, rather than defaulting to whatever was used last summer. That means reviewing casual and fixed term paperwork, checking whether long standing arrangements have drifted into employee territory, and planning for guaranteed hours before it becomes a scramble in 2027.
If you are taking on seasonal staff this summer, it is worth getting the paperwork right at the start.
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