The Dealer “Free-Ads” Paper
“The Dealer “Free-Ads” Paper was established in 1995, to provide an extremely low cost, convenient and effective method of bringing buyers and sellers together within their local communities.
The paper serves a number of counties in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. Initially set up in Co Donegal, The Dealer “Free-Ads” Paper, in late July 2008, opened a new office in the heart of Derry’s city centre to serve the counties of Derry, Tyrone, Fermanagh and rural Antrim. This office currently has a team of ten working on both employed and self-employed terms.
The business in Northern Ireland operates as a franchise, owned by me, John Jordan, and Lesley Wilson, and as part of the development of the business we felt it vitally important to totally embrace all employment legislation and approach this in a proactive manner.
The services of the Labour Relations Agency were first brought to our attention when we attended the North West Marketing’s ‘Start Your Own Business’ course. One of the LRA’s local officers gave an information seminar on the LRA’s function and activities, highlighting how the LRA could help small business start-ups.
We attended the LRA’s Workshop on Contracts of Employment, Terms and Conditions, Grievance and Disciplinary Procedures, where all the key points were outlined and discussed carefully and thoroughly.
The Workshop was excellent and very practical in nature, where live examples were explained and discussed at length. In addition, draft contracts of employment were devised in conjunction with the LRA officer during and after the workshop. This proved invaluable, ensuring each Contract of Employment was as complete as possible. Each draft was thoroughly checked by the officer and fully completed to ensure all legislation needs were met.
All in all, the LRA provided an excellent service in a very approachable, pragmatic, sensible and practical manner. The Dealer “Free Ads” Paper NI cannot praise the Agency highly enough for the personal and professional attention in all our dealings. They provide a superb service that is available to all small start-up firms and we cannot recommend this highly enough. We have found the LRA to be very informative, helpful and attentive to the needs of The Dealer “Free-Ads” Paper as a small start-up business and completely professional in all our dealings.”
John Jordan
