Employment contracts are the basis of your business – they’re just too important to leave to chance.

If you don’t scrutinise every line of your contracts to make sure they’re legally correct, any employee could challenge them, take you to court and win.

And that’s not all – you could also find yourself facing hefty fines…

What should be included in an employment contracts?

Here are 10 things you must include in all of your employment contracts law:

1. The name of the employer.
2. The title of the job to be performed by the employee.
3. The commencement date of employment.
4. The basis of the employment (i.e. is it ongoing, fixed-term or casual?).
5. The amount of the employee’s remuneration and how it is made up.
6. The amount of notice that is required to be given by both employer and employee to end the employment relationship.
7. A provision clarifying the status of company policies (that is, are they part of the contract or things about which the employer has a discretion?).
8. A provision to enable over-award payments (i.e. the amount representing the difference between the statutory minimum wage and the actual wage paid to the employee) to go towards non-wage monetary entitlements, e.g. overtime or penalties.
9. Acknowledgement that the employee has a legal right to work in Australia.
10. A provision dealing with the effect of changes to the employee’s role on the contract. For example, if the employee’s duties, reporting arrangements, remuneration or job location change, will the written contract still apply?