Elise Turner
A Law Society of Scotland Accredited Specialist in Employment Law and a Senior Associate in Morton Fraser's highly rated employment law team, Elise Turner advises both employer and employee clients in relation to the legal and practical aspects of both day-to-day and complex HR issues. Her advice includes everything from discipline, grievance, performance and absence matters to redundancy, working time, TUPE, outsourcing and discrimination. She regularly advises on senior executive contracts and exits on both sides, often drafting and negotiating agreements in highly confidential or delicate circumstances.
Practice Area
Panel
- Contributing Author
3 Contributions by Elise Turner
PRACTICE NOTES
Employee Ghosting: Advising Employers on Investigation, Dismissal for Non-Attendance, and Post-Termination Notice, Pay, Property, References and Restrictive Covenants
Workplace ‘ghosting’
This Practice Note examines workplace ‘ghosting’, where an employee or candidate accepts a role but fails to start, or stops attending and disappears without giving notice of resignation or termination. For guidance on situations where an employer ghosts a prospective employee or candidate, see Q&A: What issues arise when an employer ghosts a prospective employee? The expression ‘ghosting’ originates in online dating, where, at some point in a relationship, one person cuts off contact without explanation—so the other is ‘dumped’ without ever being told. In employment, a candidate or employee may ‘ghost’ at any stage—from skipping an interview, or not arriving on their first day, through to walking out at any time during the relationship and never returning. Indeed’s 2023 study, When Candidates and Recruiters Vanish: Indeed’s Ghosting in Hiring Report, found 46% of US job seekers surveyed believed ghosting had become more frequent in the previous 12 months, up from 39% in 2022. In the UK, 75% of job seekers surveyed had ghosted one to four employers over the past year...
Employment
PRACTICE NOTES
Fertility treatment (including IVF) at work: legal rights, time off, discrimination, pregnancy protected period, policy guidance and case law
This Practice Note explores workers’ entitlements when they undergo fertility treatment, covering the range of treatments on offer (such as in vitro fertilisation (IVF), intrauterine insemination (IUI), medication and surgical options), how employers should handle time-off requests, when the protected period begins for pregnancy-related rights, safeguards against discrimination, considerations for introducing a workplace policy, and the most up-to-date guidance and current case law. It is crucial for employers to recognise the issues that arise for employees going through fertility treatment. The World Health Organisation reports that one in six people globally experience infertility. Fertility Network UK estimates that 3.5 million people in the UK face fertility challenges and recent surveys indicate that staff feel workplace support is insufficient. For example:
The 2023 Workplace Infertility Stigma Survey by Fertility Family found three in four respondents felt their employer did not foster an open environment to discuss fertility
A 2021 survey by Fertifa and Fertility Network UK reported that over one third of employees undergoing fertility treatment consider leaving their jobs
Types of fertility treatment
Fertility treatment is an umbrella term...
Employment
PRECEDENTS
Precedent fertility treatment (including IVF) leave policy: employees and partners - eligibility, entitlements, procedure and support
1 Introduction
1.1 This policy explains how [ enter name of organisation ] (the Company) will handle requests from employees for leave to receive fertility treatment, or to support a partner undergoing such treatment.
1.2 The term ‘fertility treatment’ covers a wide range of medical procedures and interventions designed to help individuals or couples experiencing difficulties in conceiving a child. Options span from taking medication that enhances fertility to more advanced procedures such as in vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatment. IVF usually includes stimulation of the ovaries to develop eggs, retrieval of those eggs under sedation (the ‘follicular puncture’), fertilising them, and subsequently the transfer of an embryo to the woman’s womb.
1.3 Currently, the law provides no general right to time off for fertility treatment (or to accompany a partner). Nor is there dedicated legal protection currently for those undergoing such treatment. However, a woman receiving IVF is regarded as pregnant for the purposes of the law on pregnancy/maternity from the point at which the embryo is transferred to the uterus thereafter...
Employment
If you expected to see yourself on this page, click here.
