All employees have the legal right to request flexible working – not just parents and carers.

This is known as ‘making a statutory application’.

Employees must have worked for the same employer for at least 26 weeks to be eligible.

Employers must deal with requests in a ‘reasonable manner’.

For example:

assessing the advantages and disadvantages of the application
holding a meeting to discuss the request with the employee
offering an appeal process

If an employer doesn’t handle a request in a reasonable manner, the employee can take them to an employment tribunal.

An employer can refuse an application if they have a good business reason for doing so.
 

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