The future of flexible working

Since the COVID-19 pandemic reshaped the world of work, flexible working has quickly become a vital part of how many people balance their professional and personal lives.

Recognising this shift, on 6 April 2024, the last government introduced several changes to flexible working legislation, making it easier than ever for employees to request flexible arrangements from the very start of their employment.

Labour’s Plan to Make Work Pay promises to take things even further, strengthening employee rights and making flexibility the default, not the exception. Given the new landscape, it makes sense to explore what’s changed over the past 12 months, and what might be coming next, to help employers navigate this new world of work.

What changed in April 2024?

On 6 April 2024, the Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Act 2023 came into force. The new legislation brought in four key changes:

• Day one access: Employees no longer have to wait 26 weeks to request flexible working – they can do so from their very first day on the job.
• More opportunities to request: Employees can now submit two requests every 12 months, as opposed to just one.
• No need to justify: Employees no longer need to explain how their request for flexible working might impact their employer.
• Faster decisions: Employers now have just two months to respond to a request (including any appeal) instead of three. This timeline can still be extended with agreement.

It remains the case that employers cannot just say no to a flexible working request – they must consult with the employee first. What’s more, any decision to reject a request must align with one or more of the following eight business reasons set out in the Employment Rights Act 1996, namely:

• The burden of additional costs.
• An inability to reorganise work among existing staff.
• An inability to recruit additional staff.
• A detrimental impact on quality.
• A detrimental impact on performance.
• A detrimental effect on the ability to meet customer demand.
• Insufficient work available for the periods the employee proposes to work.
• Planned structural changes to the employer’s business.

To provide further direction, Acas issued a new Code of Practice on flexible working requests, which also came into effect on 6 April 2024. This replaces the previous version, the Acas Code of Practice on handling in a reasonable manner requests to work flexibly.

While failing to follow the code will not automatically land an employer in legal trouble, it is not something to ignore, as employment tribunals will take it into account when reviewing relevant cases.

What is next for flexible working?

As part of its Plan to Make Work Pay, the Government aims to go even further, making flexible working the default from day one, unless it is genuinely not feasible.

Labour wants to build on the April 2024 legislation by tightening up how requests are handled, ensuring more transparency and fairness. It plans to do this by:

• Introducing a test of reasonableness where an employer refuses a statutory flexible working application.
• Requiring employers to state their ground (or grounds) for refusing an application, and justify why each ground is reasonable, when communicating their decision to the employee.
• Setting out clear steps that employers must take to comply with the requirement to consult. This could include inviting the employee to a meeting to discuss the request, allowing the employee to be accompanied, and keeping a written record of the discussion (as set out in the Acas Code of Practice).

What could this mean for employers and employees?

The proposed changes aim to make flexible working not just more accessible, but also fairer and more transparent. The key benefits for employees include greater protection against unfair refusals, clearer and more transparent decisions, and more meaningful consultations.

While the changes aim to empower employees, they could bring new challenges for employers.

With tougher rules around refusals, it is likely to become more difficult to say no to flexible working requests, opening the door to a potential rise in tribunal claims. That said, it is worth noting that the compensation cap for a successful claim remains unchanged: a maximum of eight weeks’ pay.

What should employers do now?

It would be wise for employers to start reviewing their flexible working policies and procedures to understand what changes may need to be made once the new legislation comes in. In doing so, it would be useful to think about how flexible working requests are currently handled.

The timing of these changes remains uncertain, as an implementation date has yet to be confirmed.

The updates to flexible working form part of the wider Employment Rights Bill, which is expected to be passed into law no earlier than this summer, with many of the reforms unlikely to take effect until 2026.

That said, the proposed changes to flexible working are relatively straightforward, so a chance exists that they could be introduced sooner, potentially later this year.

• Published in Vet Times (2025), Volume 55, Issue 32, Page 16-17