From today, if you work for a company with 250 or more employees you’ll be able to ask for time off work to train or study. If you work for a smaller firm, you’ll get this right in April 2011.

If you’ve ever felt that you’ve had to make a choice between staying in your job or studying, you might be interested in new rights that come into force today. Under an initiative called ‘time to train’, if you work for a company (in England, Scotland or Wales) that employs 250 people or more you’ll have the right to ask for time off to study or train if it will help you and your business' performance. If you work for a smaller firm, you’ll have to wait until April 2011 to get this right.

How will it work?
Just because you have the right to ask for time off to study doesn’t guarantee you’ll get it, but employers will have to ‘seriously consider’ requests if you think it will improve your and your business’ performance. The training can be:

• Accredited: training that will lead to a recognised qualification.
• Unaccredited: training to help you develop particular skills.
• Related to your current or possible future roles: training does not have to be directly related to an area of work you’re currently involved in. It can be something that would help you to progress in a different area of the business.

• Delivered in a variety of locations: the training can be at your workplace, at home or even abroad.
• As long or as short as is needed: there is no limit on the amount of time you can ask for.

SAVVY TIP: Your employer doesn’t have to pay a penny towards the costs of training although they can do so if they wish.

Who is eligible?
Not everyone can take advantage of the new ‘time to train’ initiative – and if your employer already has a process for dealing with requests for time off for study or learning you can continue to use that.

You are eligible if:
• You are an employee: agency workers or freelancers are not eligible.

• You have worked for the employer for 26 weeks: you must have been employed continuously for the last 26 weeks.

SAVVY TIP: If you’re in the armed forces or are aged between 16 and 18 and expected to take part in education or training or of compulsory school age, you can’t request time off in this way.

Request process
If you want to make a ‘time to train’ request, it’s important to know what you and your employer are expected to do.

• Your request must be in writing (an email is fine) and must be dated. Ask your employer if they have a form you can use or if a letter will suffice.

SAVVY TIP: The government's Directgov website has a template letter that you can download (it’s about halfway down the page).

You must include certain information with your request.

• You should state that it’s a request under ‘Section 6D of Employment Rights Act 1996’
• What you want to study or train for
• Where it would take place
• What qualification it would lead to (if any)
• Who would supervise it
• Whether you have applied for time off for training before and, if so, when
• How it would improve your performance at work.

SAVVY TIP: If you don’t include this information, your request can be turned down. However, if it’s turned down for this reason you should be allowed to add in the missing information without having to wait for another 12 months (as normally you can only make one request a year).

Once your application has been made, your employer has 28 days to consider it. After that they must make a decision:

• Agree to the request: and tell you this in writing.

SAVVY TIP:Your employer doesn’t have to agree to your request and they can make changes (such as suggesting another course or delivering the training in house rather than externally as you’d requested).

• Ask for a meeting to discuss it with you: in which case they must tell you their decision within 14 days.

SAVVY TIP: They can only turn down your request for one of around half a dozen different business reasons, including the fact that the training wouldn’t improve your performance at work, the additional costs would be too high or they couldn’t organise other staff to cover your own work. If that’s the case, you have the right to appeal the decision.

Changing your mind
You can change your mind once you’ve put in your application, you can withdraw your request or ask your employer to ignore it.

• If you withdraw your request: you’re unlikely to be able to make another application for under ‘time to train’ for 12 months.

• If you ask your employer to ignore an earlier request: you can make another one within 12 months, however you can only ask your employer to ignore your request if the training has been cancelled or you can’t go on the training due to an emergency.