Help - Employment contract advice required

My son is currently working for an company that sent him on training to become an ECO/Green Deal/Assessor whilst he was employed (on a self employed basis) by them for fulfilling another function. Now they have asked him to sign a contract stating that he will be required to complete 2 years service with them once qualified and if he leaves before his 2 years is up he will have to reimburse some if not all of the costs for training etc. There are other restrictive conditions within the contract. To date they have not offered any other terms relating to this type of work i.e. pay, hours , employment status.

Whilst I appreciate the firms position re training costs etc, surely they should have put this to him and asked him if he agreed before they sent him on the training. His current self employed status doesn't seem that cosher either. We are thinking that if he signs, then any contract re the ECO position will be poorly remunerated because they will have got him by the short and curlies.

Any advice from those with employment contract law will be greatly appreciated.

PS He would have left them by now, but daren't seeing that he is now a father and cannot afford to.

 

Chef Tyke's field of expertise this I think. He's usually happy to advise.

 

Thanks. I have sent him an email.

 

Trades union membership is much maligned nowadays...but being a member usually gives you access to excellent legal advice.

 

I still am in a TU even though I am retired, but unfortunately my son is not.

 

Highly likely that you'll be able to get advice on your son's behalf.

 

it is common practice

 

I know its common practice to have to work 2 yearsafter training but surely that should be informed before doing the training. Surely your boss cant send you on a course and then tell you after that you have to pay it back if you leave. Ive always been told before giving me the opportunity to say no to the training

 

it can only be applied if he signed an agreement form
if not they cannot do it retrospectively

 

Thanks folks. You have reinforced what I believed. Special thanks to Spartacus for reminding me to use my union for advice - they have now got an email.

 

You might also want to take to ACAS for the legalities around it. They are usually really good (although have only used them once when I was made redundant).