Employment contracts and handbooks

I draft employment contracts, staff handbooks and HR policies for UK employers, for a fixed fee from £595. I act for employers only. I am Geoffrey Caesar, a solicitor of England and Wales admitted in 2008, acting for employers across England and Wales.

Most small employers are running on a contract downloaded years ago, amended by whoever was in HR at the time, and never looked at since. It usually still says the employee reports to a role that no longer exists, and it almost always has restrictive covenants copied from a much larger business, which means they are unenforceable.

The contract does not matter at all until the day it matters enormously: when a senior employee leaves for a competitor, when someone claims they were promised a bonus, or when you need to change terms and discover you have no right to.

What it costs

Employment contract, £595. One template you can reuse for a grade of staff. Five working days.

Senior or director service agreement, £995. With properly drafted restrictive covenants and garden leave. Five working days.

Staff handbook and core policies, £995. Five working days.

If you need contracts for several grades of staff, buy one per grade. Each is drafted for that grade rather than copied from the last.

Email me at geoffrey@caesar.co.uk with what you need and any documents, and I will confirm the scope and the fee in writing, usually the same working day.

What you get

• A bespoke contract drafted for how you employ people
• Restrictive covenants drafted at a scope a court will uphold
• Confidentiality and intellectual property provisions that put ownership where it belongs
• The statutory particulars, so the document does the job section 1 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 requires it to do
• Flexibility clauses where you genuinely need them, drafted to survive challenge
• Core policies: disciplinary, grievance, sickness absence, equal opportunities, data protection and, increasingly, AI use
• One round of amendments

What is not included

• Acting for employees
• Employment tribunal representation
• Payroll, pensions auto-enrolment and tax
• Immigration and sponsor licence work
• Day to day HR handling, disciplinaries, grievances and redundancy processes

How long it takes

Five working days for a contract, ten for a handbook, from payment.

How to instruct me

1. Email me. Send me what you need, with any documents, in whatever format you have them.
2. I confirm the scope and the fee. Usually the same working day, in writing. If a call would help before you decide, I will offer one at no charge. Once you confirm, I complete my checks and send my invoice.
3. I start work as soon as payment is received. I will be in touch if I need anything further, and I deliver on the stated turnaround, counted from the day I have everything I need.

Why instruct me directly

You deal with one senior lawyer from first email to final document. The work is done personally, the contact is direct, and the price is published before you ever get in touch.

• Senior attention as standard. I handle your matter throughout. Nothing is delegated to a trainee.
• In-house and private practice experience. I know what a clause does to a business six months later, not just what it says.
• Onboarding that takes one email. Email me, send the documents, get the work. There is no client portal to register with; the checks I need to run happen quickly in the background.
• Stated turnarounds, met. Most work is delivered in three to five working days, stated up front, and priority turnaround is there when the clock is against you.
• Fixed prices, published. You know the number before you commit. I publish them because cost uncertainty is the main reason businesses do not take advice they need.

Who this is for

• You employ people and your paperwork predates the way you now work
• You are hiring your first senior person and want covenants that hold
• You have grown past the point where informal arrangements are safe
• An adviser, buyer or investor has asked to see your employment documentation

Questions I am often asked

How much does an employment contract cost?

£595 for a reusable contract template for a grade of staff, and £995 for a senior or director-level service agreement with restrictive covenants and garden leave, each in five working days. A staff handbook with core policies is £995, also in five working days.

Do you act for employees as well?

No. I act for employers only. That is a deliberate choice: it keeps my position clean, it avoids conflicts, and it means the advice is written from one side of the table rather than hedged across both.

Are our restrictive covenants enforceable?

Probably not, if they were copied from somewhere else. Covenants must go no further than reasonably necessary to protect a legitimate business interest, and a court will not rewrite an unreasonable one into a reasonable one. Twelve months that holds up is worth far more than three years that does not.

It is one of the most common things I fix.

Do we legally need a written contract?

You must give every employee and worker a written statement of particulars on or before their first day. A proper contract does that and a great deal more, including protecting your confidential information and your customer relationships, which the bare statutory statement does not.

Can we change our employees' terms?

Sometimes, and how easily depends almost entirely on what the existing contract says. Businesses that need to change terms and find they have no mechanism to do it end up with a slow, expensive and morale-destroying process. Building the flexibility in at the start costs very little.

Do we need an AI policy for staff?

Increasingly yes, because your staff are already using these tools. See AI contracts and AI use policies.

What if questions come up afterwards?

They usually do. A new hire wants a change, a manager asks what a policy means, or a situation arises that the handbook has to deal with. If it is a point on the document I have just delivered, ask, and I will tell you whether it falls within the fee. For anything new, email me and I will tell you which fixed-fee service fits, or quote a fixed fee if none does.

About me

I am Geoffrey Caesar. I have worked on commercial contracts since 2001, first in industry and then in private practice, so I have sat on both sides of the table: as the in-house lawyer who has to live with the contract, and as the external adviser who drafts it.

• Solicitor of England and Wales, admitted 2008. SRA ID 483394.
• Practising as an SRA-regulated freelance solicitor under regulation 10.2(b) of the SRA Authorisation of Individuals Regulations. Practice SRA number 666497.
• Regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and authorised to provide all legal services, including reserved legal activities.
• Called to the Bar by Gray's Inn in 2005.
• Working on commercial contracts since 2001, in-house and in private practice.
• Acting for businesses across England and Wales.
• Professional indemnity insurance in place with a limit of £1,000,000 for each claim, with defence costs in addition. Details on request.
• I do not hold client money.

Two things you should know about instructing a freelance solicitor rather than a law firm. My professional indemnity insurance is not on the SRA's minimum terms and conditions; alternative arrangements are in place instead, and I will give you the details on request. And you can still apply to the SRA Compensation Fund for losses caused by dishonesty or a failure to account for money. Everything else, including the Code of Conduct, the SRA Principles and the Legal Ombudsman, applies to me exactly as it applies to any other solicitor.

Related services

• Settlement agreements for employers, £595
• Consultancy and contractor agreements, £595

Last reviewed: October 2026. Email geoffrey@caesar.co.uk.