Notice advice

[ContractorEA]

Good Afternoon,

I know I am going to sound like a newbie here but I have actually been contracting for 17 years. In that whole time I have never once activated my notice period or had it done to me, so I count myself VERY lucky. Anyway on to the point I have had an offer of a contract nearer to home and better conditions and want to give my current client the notice required in my contract. If I do this can they say fine of you go immediately without any financial compensation or would they have to stick to my notice in some way?

[northernladuk]

Have you read and understood your contract?

Also notice periods have been covered extensively so if you go to google and type in something like notice period site:forums.contractoruk.com you will get a raft I'd posts discussing very aspects of notice period. There will be one message repeated a lot, similar to the first bit of your last question but it will explain why and it's also dependant on the terms of your contract.

Have a read. Pretty interesting stuff notice periods for us.

[mike67]

It does all come down to what is in the contract about the notice they have to give you and whether there is any right to immediate termination. However, normally there is no automatic right to terminate the contract just because you give notice.

If the contract doesn't say anything else and says that they need to give you, say, a week's notice, they have to honour that. There may be occasions where they don't want you on site if you are leaving, but even then you should be paid in lieu of notice.

Usually clients want you to see out your notice to tidy things up, hand over to a replacement etc.

But make sure you check the contract especially the part about notice periods from them to you and any section that talks about termination.