Four documents, all published since November 2025, changed what good looks like for menstrual health at work. Here they are in plain English, with links to the originals.
An international standard, guidance from the professional body for HR, a report from a committee of MPs, and a government strategy. None of them is a law. None of them will tell you what to say when someone on your team is struggling. But between them, for the first time, there's an agreed answer to the question "what are we actually supposed to be doing?"
Occupational health and safety management. Menstruation and menopause in the workplace. Guidance.
Published
7 September 2026
Status
Guidance, not certifiable
Access
Free to read online
Applies to
Any size, any sector
This is the first international standard on menstruation and menopause at work, and it replaces the one a lot of UK employers already reference. BS 30416:2023 has been withdrawn. BSI's own wording is that it "no longer carries the status of a British Standard". It had been downloaded more than 13,000 times across 147 countries and territories, so there are a great many workplace policies out there citing a document that no longer stands.
The new standard keeps the shape of the old one and goes further: more definitions, a wider range of practical suggestions, and a template workplace charter organisations can adapt.
It's a guidance standard, which matters. Unlike ISO 45001, there's nothing here to certify, nothing to audit and nothing to fail, and BSI is explicit that there's no mandatory deadline to move across from the old standard. It sets out what experts from different countries, sectors and disciplines agreed good practice looks like. BSI is making it free to read online, with a downloadable version for a small charge, so cost isn't a reason not to open it.
What it covers
Workplace culture
Policies and procedures
Manager awareness and training
Workplace design
Practical adjustments
Disclosure and privacy
How to measure and evaluate impact
Extra guidance for smaller organisations
The research behind it
68%believe employers have a role in supporting employees experiencing menopause and menstruation-related health issuesBSI survey of 6,494 women across seven countries
7 in 10want their employer to have a clear process and approachBSI survey of 6,494 women across seven countries
6 in 10have never heard their employer proactively talk about menopause supportBSI survey of 6,494 women across seven countries
Why it matters
For years, the honest answer to "what does good look like here?" was that nobody had agreed. Now a group of experts across seven countries has, and it costs nothing to read. So a People team building a case internally has something solid to point at instead of a feeling. Two practical things follow. If your policy cites BS 30416, that reference needs updating. And it's worth noticing what sits inside the new standard, because manager awareness and training isn't a footnote in it. It's named in the standard's own description of what it covers.
Menstruation and menstrual health in the workplace
Guide for people professionals.
Published
28 November 2025
Status
Professional guidance
Access
Free, some parts for members
Applies to
UK employers
This one comes from the professional body for HR and people professionals in the UK, which is part of why it's worth paying attention to. It covers definitions, the case for offering support, and how to build a culture where menstruation isn't an awkward subject nobody quite knows how to raise.
The CIPD's position is that employers should work urgently to normalise menstruation at work, on the grounds that it offers people dignity, reduces embarrassment, and legitimises absence that's happening anyway under another name.
The numbers they use
49%of women say they never tell their manager if their absence is related to their menstrual cycleCIPD research, cited in the guide
67%of employers said there is no support availableCIPD research, cited in the guide
32%of men think it's unprofessional to talk about periods at workSurvey of UK office workers first reported in November 2019, cited in the guide
Over halfof those with lived experience of endometriosis felt unable to take the time off they neededManchester Metropolitan University with Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust, cited in the guide
Why it matters
Put the first two numbers next to each other and you have the whole problem in one line. Two-thirds of employers say there's nothing in place. Half of women say they never mention it. Those two facts hold each other up. Nobody asks because there's nothing to ask for, and nothing gets built because nobody's asking. The absence is already happening. It's just being recorded as something else.
A cross-party committee of MPs took evidence on how menstrual health is handled for girls and young women, and reported in March 2026 with 26 recommendations to government and NHS England. The government published its response on 26 May 2026 and agreed with the committee's overarching findings. This report sits upstream of the strategy below, which is partly an answer to it.
It's the only document on this page that isn't about workplaces at all. It's about school toilets, GP appointments, waiting lists and being believed. Which is exactly why I think it belongs here.
One detail worth knowing if you hire graduates or school leavers. From September 2026, secondary schools in England are required to teach menstrual and gynaecological health, and the list is specific: what an average period is, premenstrual syndrome, heavy menstrual bleeding, endometriosis, PCOS, and when to seek help. The people joining your organisation in a few years will have been taught the names for what's happening to them. It's reasonable to expect they'll assume their employer knows them too.
What the committee found
80%almost 80% of women aged 25 and younger disagreed with the statement "healthcare practitioners took my symptoms seriously"Endometriosis UK survey, August 2025, cited in the committee's report
53%of women and girls have been shamed in relation to their period symptoms, and almost 1 in 5 say a teacher was responsibleWellbeing of Women surveys, cited in the committee's report
84%of respondents were prescribed hormonal medication to manage their period pain, and in half of those cases it was prescribed without any discussion of what might be causing the painEndometriosis UK 2024 diagnostic survey, cited in the committee's report
577,000women on gynaecology referral to treatment pathways as of December 2025, 42.7% of them waiting longer than the 18-week targetNHS data, December 2025, cited in the committee's report
Why it matters
The young women in this report are arriving in your organisation next September. Some of them have spent years being told they're too young for endometriosis, or that this is simply what periods are like, and a fair number have learned that saying something out loud gets you nowhere. That's what they bring with them into their first job. It's also what your open door is up against, because nobody arrives at work as a blank page.
The government's refreshed plan for women's health, published six weeks after the committee report above. Most of it is about the health service rather than the workplace, but it puts menstrual health near the centre rather than at the edges. It describes prolonged heavy or painful periods as an early warning that something is wrong, a "missed vital sign", which is a striking way for a government document to put it.
What it commits to
£1m for menstrual health education for girls
Clinical pathways including heavy periods redesigned within three years
A specialist centre in each region for group-based women's health pathways
Menstrual problems as 2 of the first 9 NHS Online pathways, 2027
An equity guide for ICBs on heavy periods and menopause
The numbers in it
9 yrs 4 mthsaverage time from first seeing a doctor with symptoms to an official endometriosis diagnosis in the UKQuoted in the strategy
250+ staffnew requirements on employers of this size to publish an action plan including support for employees experiencing menopause, starting in 2027, subject to secondary legislationCommitment set out in the strategy
Why it matters
The NHS commitments here are real, and they're slow. Three years to redesign a pathway. Nine years and four months to a diagnosis. Those years don't happen in a waiting room, they happen at work. Whatever the health service does next, the woman managing endometriosis is in your Tuesday meeting now, and she has been for a while. That's the honest reason this is a workplace subject and not only a health one.
Read them together and they point at the same handful of things. Culture. Managers. Whether people feel able to say what's actually going on. A standards body, a professional body, a committee of MPs and a government department arrived at that from four completely different directions, which is usually a sign something's true.
Here's what none of them do, though. Not one of them tells a manager what to say when someone sits down and starts to explain why they've been struggling for months. They tell you what to have in place. They can't tell you how to be in the room.
Policy is paper. The room is where it becomes real.
That gap is the work I do. If you're reading all this and trying to work out what it means for your organisation, I'm always happy to talk it through.
I'm a trainer, not a lawyer, and nothing on this page is legal advice or compliance sign-off. It's a plain summary of published guidance with links to the originals, so you can read them and make your own call. Checked 18 September 2026, and I'll update it as the guidance changes.