With effect from 6 April 2014, the maximum unfair dismissal compensatory award will increase from £74,200 to £76,574. Should employers lose sleep? Not really – the 29 July 2013 cap of a year’s pay still applies to those who earn less than £76,574 per year which means the change will only affect claims made by […]
From 6 April 2012, the maximum costs order which a tribunal may make in favour of a legally represented Claimant or Respondent will increase to £20,000.00 from the current £10,000.00. This gives the Tribunal authority to award much larger amounts of costs without the case leaving the Tribunal system. Before 6 April 2012, costs could only […]
Bouheniche v D.W.P is a salutary reminder that an employee may win all or part of his claim and be awarded compensation (here about £7k) but still have a costs award made against him if he has acted unreasonably in conducting the claim. The costs award was £2k based on claiming in his ET1 that […]
The EAT case of Hardie Grant London Ltd v Miss J Aspden is a reminder that notwithstanding the cap on unfair dismissal awards being £68,400 the most that will end up pocketed and in the bank is in the region of £53,000. This case clarifies that grossing up of awards must take place before, not […]
In 1998 Dench v Flynn held that a temporary new job doesn’t necessarily break the chain of causation and cut off future losses from the date of securing the new job. This case at the EAT illustrates the importance of the word necessarily and that the Tribunal does still have discretion to hold that losses stop from securing […]
Costs in the Employment Tribunals are the exception not the rule. However Tribunals can award costs where a party has conducted itself unreasonably. Case law to date has held, for example, that lying in evidence at the Tribunal amounts to unreasonable conduct (Daleside, Dunedin) . This firm successful obtained a costs order for £5k against […]
The Tribunal Service has published its 2008-2009 statistics which show the number of Tribunal claims in each jurisdiction, average award sizes and number and size of costs award. The biggest costs award was £25k, although costs are still rare (about 0.2% of all cases) and the average costs award was £2,470. The full statistics can […]
Michael Rubinstein Publishing publish a handy booklet called Equal Opportunities Review. In June’s edition they have a summary of 2008 discrimination cases heard by Tribunals. This is very useful as it allows practitioners to remind their clients, both Claimant and Respondent that large Tribunal awards for discrimination are outliers ie they are statistically possible but […]
Nadine Nassar received inappropriate and suggestive text messages from her employer. After she rejected his advances in March 2008 she was subsequently sacked from her £136,000 per year job. Ms Nassar brought a claim for unfair dismissal, as she was out of time for a sex discrimination claim, and the Employment Tribunal upheld her claim awarding her £64,000 […]
