The Employment Rights Act 2025 (ERA) is now law in the UK. While many provisions are phased in across 2026 and beyond, expectations on employers already apply today and are reshaping how organisations must handle health, absence and early intervention.
For benefits professionals, this is about readiness. Benefits now determine whether health support is early, accessible and consistent enough to prevent escalation into long-term absence, employee relations issues, performance risk and formal HR processes.
Under the ERA, employer risk is no longer measured by policy existence. It’s measured by what happens when an employee’s health affects performance, attendance or engagement.
Changes in 2026 include:
These reforms place benefits teams squarely at the centre of organisational risk management because benefits systems now determine how early support is accessed, how consistent experiences are across teams, and whether issues escalate into absence, disputes or formal processes.
Benefits teams must recognise that the ERA raises expectations that organisations can demonstrate that support was:
That means benefits architecture must be designed not just to exist, but to work effectively when health issues first emerge.
ERA reforms, particularly SSP from day one, make early intervention essential. Support must reach employees before short-term health issues escalate into long-term absence or performance problems. Generic wellbeing platforms or passive signposting are insufficient.
Large employers face exposure when support varies by team or manager. Benefits must provide a reliable, repeatable pathway for all employees, regardless of role or location.
Menopause is now a benchmark for reasonable support. Large employers must publish action plans as part of equality initiatives, demonstrating proactive, consistent support.
SSP reforms make sickness absence more visible and potentially costly. Benefits strategies should integrate absence, return-to-work, and wellbeing pathways to prevent escalation and reduce long-term absence risk.
The ERA increases exposure across pregnancy, parental leave, long-term conditions, neurodiversity, and mental health. Benefits programmes should be broad in scope but deep in expertise, guiding employees to the right support early.
Managers are under scrutiny for how they handle health and absence. Benefits must provide clear tools, access routes, and escalation criteria to ensure outcomes are consistent and defensible.
Peppy helps benefits teams move from policy to practical execution. It provides infrastructure for early, expert-led support across the moments where risk most often arises.
Early access to clinical support: Employees get direct access to specialist clinicians for menopause, fertility, pregnancy and postnatal health, mental health, neurodiversity and long-term conditions, before absence intensifies.
Consistent support pathways at scale: One integrated support experience for the whole workforce reduces reliance on variable manager judgement and inconsistent local provision.
Condition-specific expertise: Support is tailored by condition and stage of life, not generic wellbeing content.
Manager support frameworks: Actionable guidance and training for managers reduces risk and improves consistency of operational responses.
These outcomes align with ERA expectations on accessibility, consistency, timing and evidence of “reasonable steps.”
ERA 2025 is clear: employer risk now lies in execution. Benefits teams that build accessible, consistent, and specialist-led support systems will help organisations:
As large employers plan 2026 benefits strategy, the question is: Can you confidently show that health support is early, consistent and expert-led at scale?
If not, that’s where exposure lies and where Peppy can help.