Employment law and other helplines

As a CIPD member, find out how you can get legal advice through one of our four different telephone helplines

CIPD
Legal requirements

Employment law helpline

Call on: 03330 431 217

Our specialist helplines are there to give you confidence when you need it most.

The Employment Law helpline provides free advice for CIPD members. As a member, you're entitled to 20 calls per year (25 if you’re a Chartered member). The helpline is available 24 hours a day, 7 day a week.

Call the helpline on 03330 431 217 to get advice on all aspects of UK employment law. Whether you need clarification or want to talk through a situation, the helpline is available for a quick check or second opinion on legal issues. Many members call to discuss issues from dismissal, discrimination, redundancy, collective labour law, contractual issues and new and impending legislation.

"I found the advice today brilliant. I’ve got clarification on a question that I felt I already know the answer to. I just wanted to confirm. It’s great, thank you." - Kay

All consultants providing advice will have either a minimum CIPD Advanced Level Qualification, or be a qualified solicitor with at least two years' Post-Qualified Experience (PQE). The helpline is provided by Croner.

When you call the helpline, you’ll need to have your membership number which you can find on your membership card or in the top right of your screen when logging into My Profile.

We know that our members and customers are facing challenging times and we are here to help you. Due to a high number of calls we apologise that your wait time may be longer than usual. We appreciate your patience and will connect you to an expert adviser as soon as we can.

What's not included

It's a telephone helpline only – no letters, faxes or emails please. Calls are recorded for monitoring and training purposes.

The helpline will not offer in-depth help on complex issues, provide follow up or ongoing advice on a particular situation, provide information for third parties – clients, colleagues, family or friends or take the place of your own or your employer’s solicitor.

Other helplines available to members

Phone: 03330 431 215

This helpline is provided by LAW Express, an independent company. Individual CIPD members can obtain confidential, one-to-one advice on personal difficulties affecting them at work covering issues such as them being made redundant or dismissed, contracts of employment and other aspects of employment law relevant to their personal situation.

How does it work?

  • It provides CIPD members with one free call per annum (1 July-30 June) to obtain in-depth advice on a work-related personal problem.
  • Telephone helpline only - no letters, faxes or e-mails, please!
  • Follow up or further advice in the same year is charged at £33.85 (including VAT) per call - credit card payments only.
  • Calls last no more than 15 minutes.
  • Calls may be recorded for training and monitoring purposes.
  • Lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

It does not:

  • provide advice on personal problems that are not work-related.
  • deal with non-legal aspects of personal problems eg counselling.
  • provide information for third parties - clients, colleagues, family or friends.

A message from Protect:

Following Government guidelines on Coronavirus and unnecessary travel, we have temporarily had to close our telephone Advice Line and the office. We hope to have the phoneline back up and running in a few days. We apologise for the inconvenience.

We are able to continue to offer some advice via email whistle@protect-advice.org.uk, but for confidentiality reasons our telephone service will be closed until we are set up to give advice remotely and crucially confidentially - which we are working on.

Phone: 0800 997 8839 (UK), 1800 303715 (Ireland)

As an HR or L&D professional, it is likely you will be involved at some stage in a whistleblowing concern, whether HR are responsible for receiving the concern, investigating, or implementing disciplinary proceedings.

We understand what a sensitive issue this can be, so we have partnered with Protect, the whistleblowing charity and leading authority in the field, to bring you an expert helpline.

How the helpline can support you:

Legally trained advisers provide independent, confidential, tailored advice based on your situation. This can take the form of practical steps on how to effectively raise a concern, right through to advice on your legal rights should you feel ignored or victimised.

They can also provide advice on how best to handle a whistleblowing concern should you be made aware of an issue by another party.

The helpline is open 09:00-18:00 Monday to Friday and there are no limits on the number of times you can call. They can even arrange contact out of these hours by appointment. Calls are generally free of charge, unless calling from a business phone.

Whistleblowing support for your organisation:

Help your organisation with their whistleblowing arrangements and culture by working with PCaW to obtain ongoing support and stand-alone consultancy that will help you to reduce risk and increase governance. You can take advantage of CIPD member only discounts that will help you and your organisation develop best-practice arrangements and encourage staff to raise concerns:

  • 20% discount off both open and in-house training courses
  • 15% discount on a whistleblowing policy review

To book, call +44 020 3117 2525 and ask to speak to the business support team or email business@protect-advice.org.uk.

Phone: 03330 431 216

This helpline provided by LAW Express enables CIPD members to access European employment advice. The service operates in conjunction with members of the Association of European Lawyers (AEL). For further details of the firms, see the Professional Services section of the LAW Express website.

Please note that all of the companies operate independently: any instructions that a CIPD member gives to a legal firm will be entirely at their own expense and the usual checks will be carried out by the firm before accepting any instructions.

How does it work?

  • Like the two other helplines, it's a telephone service only.
  • Members outline their employment query and leave a landline number. The relevant AEL firm from the country concerned will return the call within 24 hours.
  • Calls are charged at £65 per call (including VAT) - credit card payments only.
  • Lines are open 09:00-20:00 Monday to Friday.

Which countries does it cover?

Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Channel Islands, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Isle of Man, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland.

Phone: 03330 431 217

This helpline is open 09:00-17:00, Monday to Friday.

CIPD members can access free, unlimited health and safety advice via this helpline. Tax, VAT, PAYE and commercial legal advice is also available at £24.50 per call.

Call the helpline on 03330 431 217 to get advice on all aspects of health and safety (option 2), commercial legal (option 3) and tax, VAT and employment tax (option 4) advice.


Support with workplace situations, such as:

  • Reviewing and updating your health and safety policies and procedures to aid legal compliancy. Accident reporting and risk assessments.
  • How to understand and apply data protection (GDPR) laws, resolve property disputes, implement commercial contracts.
  • Tax, VAT and employment tax advice queries.

When you call the helpline, you’ll need your membership number, which you can find on your membership card or in the top right of your screen when logging into My Profile.


What’s not included:

It's a telephone helpline only – no letters, faxes or emails please. Calls are recorded for monitoring and training purposes.

The helpline will not offer in-depth help on complex issues, provide follow up or ongoing advice on a particular situation, provide information for third parties – clients, colleagues, family or friends.

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