Employing young people

Workers aged 16 and 17: the rules

If workers are over the minimum school-leaving age but under 18, they must not work for more than eight hours a day or 40 hours a week. If you employ anybody in this age group you must also give them:

• a break of 30 minutes every four-and-a-half hours worked
• a rest period of 12 hours between each working day
• two days off a week

All 16 and 17-year-olds are also entitled to a national minimum wage of £3 an hour. Apprentices under 19 are exempt from the national minimum wage.

Risk assessments
You must carry out, or review, a risk assessment, paying attention to the health and safety implications of employing young people. Consider their immaturity as well as their inexperience when you do this - see our guide on risk assessment - an overview.

Under-18s may be employed in certain dangerous environments only if it is necessary for their training, and they are supervised and the risks are minimised.

Training
If you take on an employee aged 16 or 17 who has not received a certain level of education, they may be entitled to paid time off for study or training. Your business may be entitled to financial help toward the cost of this.

You can take on an employee up to the age of 24 under the apprenticeship programme or one of your employees can join the programme. Read about apprenticeships on the Learning and Skills Council website.

Young employees who believe they have suffered a detriment because of requesting time off for training or have been refused it may complain to an employment tribunal.

Redundancy
If you need to make a young worker redundant, workers under 18 are not entitled to statutory redundancy pay. For older workers, any time spent working for you before the worker turned 18 is not counted when calculating statutory redundancy pay.