Starting employment

Starting a new job is an exciting and challenging time. It’s important for employers to use good hiring processes, and for everyone to follow minimum rights and responsibilities.

An employee is a person who has agreed to be employed to work for some form of payment under a contract of service.

Good employment relationships begin with a good hiring process (sometimes called a ‘recruitment’ process). There are a number of steps in hiring a new employee.

Example letters for offering employment to the person selected for a job.

Trial and probationary periods can be used to make sure an employee can do the job. These must be agreed in the employment agreement. A probationary period cannot be applied after a trial period.

Unions support employees in the workplace. They bargain for collective employment agreements with employers and help employees with information and advice about work-related issues.

Employers and employees (including 'casuals') have important rights and responsibilities towards to each other, including young employees, and where employees work alone or work more than one job.

Employers must make sure that their employees can legally work in that job in New Zealand.

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