The Commission for Conciliation Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) and Business Unity South Africa (BUSA) have collaborated to launch a free-to-use web tool aimed at helping smaller businesses with labour issues.

The joint initiative is one of the flagship projects outlined in the Presidential Jobs Summit Framework Agreement and has gone live following intensive testing and content mapping, the groups said in a statement.

In South Africa, many small businesses do not have in-house labour law expertise or the financial resources to comply with the complex administrative burden of hiring and managing staff.

In addition, the cost of compliance is proportionately higher for small businesses.

This often leads to non-compliance, a higher number of labour disputes and, at times, protracted court cases that are often detrimental to employment and the potential growth and success of small businesses.

The joint CCMA-BUSA Web Tool has up-to-date information including the recent amendments to employment law that factor the National Minimum Wage Act, as well as contract templates, information sheets and guides on labour law requirements.

Some of the features of the tool include:

How to recruit, select, appoint and contract employees;

How to manage employees during employment;

How to end the employment relationship in a fair manner;

Contracts of employment and Basic Conditions of Employment for full-time, part-time and fixed-term contracts;

Misconduct, incapacity and operational requirements processes and templates;

Union representation and organisational rights steps;

Strike or lockout steps and processes.

Free-to-use web tool