Dismissal From Employment, Basic Facts!



Posted: Sunday, March 29, 2009

by Meera Yagnik
Temple Court Chambers

Did you know that you only have 3 months to lodge a claim in the employment tribunal if you have been dismissed from your employment in the UK . Yes, that's right; if you do not lodge a claim within 3 months you will lose the right to pursue any employment rights that you may have had at the tribunal. Harsh as it may seem this is the reality. Most people having been dismissed rarely seek legal advice until it is simply too late. So please make sure that you put in a claim form as soon as you have been dismissed if you feel the right procedures where not followed by your employers, or if you feel you may have any discrimination related claims.

Once the tribunal accepts a claim against you or your organisation, the tribunal will send you a copy of the claim form ET1 and a blank response ET3.

If you are the employer or organisation the claim is against. You will have 28 days to respond to the ET3, that is whether or not you intend to resist or defend the claim and you will be required to state your reasons for doing so. Remember if you do not send adequate defences you will lose your right to defend the claim and the court can order a default judgment against you.

If your responses are accepted a copy of the forms and defences will be sent to ACAS so that they are able to provide conciliation services in order to attempt to settle the claim before a court hearing. An interesting development to this is that after 6 th April 2009 ACAS has an ongoing duty to offer conciliation up until the tribunal hearing, prior to this date there are fixed time periods.

The role of Acas should not be minimised. Acas can assist you by explaining what the legal issues are in the claim, explain the tribunal procedures, can act as a neutral observer and sounding board and most importantly can explore whether an acceptable, legally binding settlement can be achieved and avoiding the need for a tribunal hearing.

This is important as conciliation is confidential, it can help maintain employment relationships and it eliminates the risk of you losing the case. Another important aspect is that Acas can also offer pre tribunal conciliation to prevent a claim reaching the tribunal.

Acas Arbitration is available for claims of unfair dismissal and flexible working, here an independent arbitrator hears the case and delivers a legally binding decision in favour of one party, this is a voluntary process and each party has to individually sign up to this process. This is important as there is no cross examination, and there are limited grounds to review the arbitrators decision.

Finally you could go down the route of a compromise agreement; this is like a contract offering the employee compensation for not bringing, or for withdrawing a tribunal claim. There are certain legal requirements that nee to be met for a compromise agreement to be legally binding, so please instruct a solicitor if you go down this route, otherwise you run the risk that the agreement you reach may not waive any right to litigation.

Remember that any time before the hearing, the claimant can withdraw their claim or you can agree a settlement.

If the claim does not settle, and, it progresses to a full hearing, you will need to agree a tribunal bundle, i.e. what documents either of you will use at the tribunal, tell the tribunal how many witnesses you will call, prepare witness statements from yourself and other witnesses, prepare any evidence to minimise any awards received by the claimant.

Finally for breach of contract claims you have 42 days to lodge a counter notice.

If there are any issues that cannot be solved between the parties you can ask the tribunal for a pre hearing review, such as time limits, whether there the claimant is disabled within the disability discrimination act.

You have 42 days to appeal to the employment appeal tribunal against the tribunal's judgment, time starts running from the date you received the judgement. These time limits are strictly applied so beware. You will also need to enclose a copy of the claim, response, judgement and grounds of appeal.

Meera provides advice and representation on all Contractual Disputes, Defamation, Employment Law, Intellectual Property (patents, copyright, trade mark and privacy), and Family law matters and is part of Barrister Web www.barristerweb.com.

Meera Yagnik completed her pupillage at 5 St Andrews Hill Chambers of Simon Draycott QC, London.

Meera is presently a barrister (Door Tenant) at Temple Court Chambers specializing in all commercial and employment law related matters.She has extensive litigation experience before the Commercial Courts,Employment Tribunal and Appeal Tribunal. She also lectures on a part time basis for the ICSA Corporate Secretaryship qualification.She has also provided lectures at solicitors offices on Corporate Governance under the Companies Act 2006 and Employment matters.

Meera has also provided advice and assistance to various insurance, local authorities and solicitors firms on Employment, Human Resources and Commercial matters.

This Article has been viewed 201 times. (Not updated in real-time.)
No comments yet.
We want your comments! If you can read this, you don't have javascript enabled, so you can't use this comment system. Please enable javascript.