Lawyers have warned that doubling the time allowed for mandatory conciliation in employment disputes will do nothing to address the underlying problems in the system.
A law change coming into effect on 1 December will increase the time for early conciliation from six to 12 weeks.
All prospective claimants must contact the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas) before lodging a claim with the employment tribunal. Acas then offers a period for early conciliation between the complainant and employer, giving the opportunity to reach an agreement without the need to go to a tribunal.
Due to an ongoing increase in early conciliation notifications – potentially caused by employees pursuing claims through generative AI – Acas has come under significant pressure, with some parties reporting they receive no direct contact from the arbitrator until the end of the early conciliation period.
The government aims to ease the growing pressure on Acas and allow more time for resolving employment disputes before going to tribunal.
While Acas will welcome a longer window for early conciliation, but employment experts insist that doubling the period is merely papering over the wider problems in a system buckling under pressure from an increased backlog.
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Alex Kiernan, partner and head of employment law at south east firm Thomas Mansfield Solicitors, said the concept of a mandatory steps towards early resolution was a good one, but this change does little to ensuring it works in practice. ‘The process has, however, started to become ineffectual due to Acas backlogs,’ said Kiernan. ‘In a recent matter I dealt with, Acas did not contact the employer to conciliate until about 4pm on the final day of the six week formal conciliation period. This has become all too common of late.
‘Unless the root causes of the backlog are addressed, it seems inevitable that the extension will only be a short term fix.’
Seth Roe, employment partner at national firm Wiggin, said giving Acas a longer conciliation window was like offering someone an extended lunch break when they were already too busy to eat lunch in the first place. He added that the change could have a significant impact on employers trying to respond to claims.
Roe added: ‘With the new Employment Rights Bill set to extend tribunal claim time limits to six months, we could now see scenarios where employers are unaware of a potential claim for nine months. Or perhaps even close to a year in some cases given how long it can take tribunals to process claim forms these days.
‘Rather than fixing what’s clearly a resourcing issue, this change risks simply stretching the process (and everyone’s patience). With AI-crafted grievances and claims on the rise and expanded employment rights about to land, the system looks set for even more strain.’
The Acas annual report for 2024/25 stated that the service dealt with more than 117,000 early conciliation cases, the highest number since the Covid pandemic and 13,000 cases up on the previous year. Around 38% of early conciliation notifications resulted in a settlement between parties or another positive outcome.
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