Employment Contracts in Ireland

Written by Richard O'Shea, Solicitor TEP · Mary Molloy Solicitors, established 1981 · Last reviewed 21 August 2026

Employers: the statutory floor

Irish law mandates written terms, on a clock: core terms within five days of starting (following the transparent and predictable working conditions rules) and the fuller statement under the Terms of Employment (Information) Act within a month. Probation is now generally capped at six months (extendable in limited circumstances), zero-hours arrangements are heavily restricted, and banded-hours rights let employees claim contracts reflecting hours actually worked. Non-compliance is not theoretical — it surfaces in WRC claims attached to whatever the real dispute is, as an aggravating decoration you handed the claimant.

Beyond compliance: what the employer's draft should do

• Confidentiality and IP assignment — inventions and works created in employment, drafted to actually capture them
• Notice and garden leave — the tools that make exits manageable
• Restrictive covenants — cascaded and role-proportionate, or they're unenforceable ornament
• Deductions, lay-off and short-time clauses — the flexibility you'll wish you had in a downturn must be in the contract before it
• Policies incorporated by reference — handbook amendable, contract not amendable unilaterally: a boundary many drafts blur into future disputes

Employees: what to check before signing

The title and salary distracted you; read the rest. Probation and its extension. Notice both ways. Where "your duties may change as the company requires" reaches. The mobility clause that can move you. Whether bonus is contractual or discretionary — the word "discretionary" is doing heavy lifting. The covenants that follow you out: a six-month non-compete agreed carelessly at signing becomes very real when the next offer arrives. Senior hires and anyone with equity should treat the contract as the negotiation it is — see also settlement agreements for the other end of the story.

The status boundary

"Contractor" arrangements that function as employment are reclassified by reference to reality, not labels — the Karshan framework governs (see consultancy agreements). Employers structuring roles and workers accepting them should both know which side of the line the arrangement truly sits on, because tax, PRSI and employment rights all follow it.