Employment Tribunal Help

jobbingmusician

Yes, go for it, I'll have a look - no guarantees, mind (except that I'll keep things confidential)

mosdee

Hello everyone, I thought I would update you about my situation.
I have not had a response from my appeal hearing which I had 9 days ago today. Should I write to my former employer and ask for a response?

Like I said in my other post, I have a case discussion management early next month.
Thank you everyone who has viewed or contributed towards my post.

jobbingmusician

Hi mosdee

I would not encourage your employer to reply. Although it must be an awful feeling to be waiting, the more they fail to reply, the more they are demonstrably not acting as good employers. Having said this, however, I would think that 10 working days (2 full weeks) might be considered a reasonable timescale, so I wouldn't feel they have been desparately late yet.

Sorry I won't have time to reply to PMs in detail for a few days, possibly.

mosdee

jobbingmusician wrote: »

Hi mosdee

I would not encourage your employer to reply. Although it must be an awful feeling to be waiting, the more they fail to reply, the more they are demonstrably not acting as good employers. Having said this, however, I would think that 10 working days (2 full weeks) might be considered a reasonable timescale, so I wouldn't feel they have been desparately late yet.

Sorry I won't have time to reply to PMs in detail for a few days, possibly.

Thank you very much jobbingmusician for your help and advise. I will put together what you "fixed" for me. I will drop you a message, you can reply whenever you get time. Your help has been beyond my expectations.

mosdee

Hello everyone,
My case management discussion is
due next week.
Any advice will be appreciated.

jobbingmusician

OK, it's me again. I have posted here rather than through PM as this answer is of general interest.

I asked a friend who is an employment solicitor. Her reply was

Usually a CMD is set to a) clarify the issues; b) give directions (for example about exchange of witness statements and documents); and c) set the hearing date. Your friend should go along with a very clear idea about what her case is, the number of any witnesses she will be calling other than herself, and any dates she (and her witnesses) can't attend a hearing. It's not very complicated - honest.

Any more comments about case management discussions? Anyone?

Burny_Sweetwater_Glasgow

Hi Mosdee,
The musician has given you excellent advice, you concentrate on demonstrating how they have failed to follow the correct procedures. Brief example of the importance of this is from the employers view - employee caught red handed taking money from the till, dismissed on the spot - guilty yes - unfairly dismissed YES in the eyes of any tribunal although there would probably be a 'Polkey' reduction in any award because even if the correct procedure had been followed the outcome would probably have been the same and the employee had contributed to the reason for dismissal. But unfair dismissal all the same.
What I would suggest is that you try to formalise your statement by completing a timeline of events, this will help you focus your thoughts more easily. Ensure you have all the right dates and times, noting dates of letters and responses and meetings and telephone calls. At each event make notes of what happened, what was said don't digress and stick to what you know are facts that can be substantiated. Concentrate on procedural errors and make a point of highlighting them in any discussions/telephone conversations/case conferences. I know that you feel you have been badly treated on many occassions and want to tell everyone/tribunal about them but remember they can only deal in facts that can be proved. So your best chance is to have the timeline to keep you on track along with all the evidence you have (paperwork, copies of their letters and your letters). You also need to remember that you have gone to the tribunal claiming unfair dismissal for failure to follow the minimum statutory procedures correctly and not with the issue that they did not deal with your previous grievance correctly. Its worth mentioning certainly but stick to the facts that can be substantiated which will really be any correspondence that you have on the matter unless of course you can have the union rep act as a witness on your behalf.

Unfortunatley they are no real time scales laid down for responses it only says within a reasonable period but I do not think that 55 days would be seen to be reasonable! The letter they gave you at the second meeting to say that you had been suspended should have been sent shortly after you were suspended giving you reasons as to why you had been suspended and notification that an investigation would be completed before you would be required to attend the next meeting. Once a date had been set I would have thought that it would have been right for them to send you the report on the investigation so that you had the opportunity to formulate your responses to the report. At the appeal hearing consideration of the reasons for your appeal against the dismissal should have been the only consideration during the meeting and no questions should have been put to you which you had already given answers to previously that led to their decision to dismiss.

I believe from what you have said on this thread that they have failed to follow the correct procedures. Get the timeline done with the notes on each event, focus on procedural errors and use this to keep you on track and let them see that you will prove that they have treated you badly.

Re lawyers -if you can get one through legal aid then go for it other than that just represent yourself- no win no fee, be wary of these unless someone trustworthy personally recommends one to you. Costs for representation can be extrememly expensive and any award you get will be reduced by their fees as tribunals do not award costs.

Hopefully if your points of procedural errors can be substantiated your employers will more than likely look for some sort of settlement before it goes to tribunal and if they do make an offer please come back to the forum to ask people if it should be accepted unless of course you have then got a laywer acting on your behalf.

Best of luck, think positive, act positive you can do this:beer:

mosdee

Burny_Sweetwater_Glasgow wrote: »

Hi Mosdee,
The musician has given you excellent advice, you concentrate on demonstrating how they have failed to follow the correct procedures. Brief example of the importance of this is from the employers view - employee caught red handed taking money from the till, dismissed on the spot - guilty yes - unfairly dismissed YES in the eyes of any tribunal although there would probably be a 'Polkey' reduction in any award because even if the correct procedure had been followed the outcome would probably have been the same and the employee had contributed to the reason for dismissal. But unfair dismissal all the same.
What I would suggest is that you try to formalise your statement by completing a timeline of events, this will help you focus your thoughts more easily. Ensure you have all the right dates and times, noting dates of letters and responses and meetings and telephone calls. At each event make notes of what happened, what was said don't digress and stick to what you know are facts that can be substantiated. Concentrate on procedural errors and make a point of highlighting them in any discussions/telephone conversations/case conferences. I know that you feel you have been badly treated on many occassions and want to tell everyone/tribunal about them but remember they can only deal in facts that can be proved. So your best chance is to have the timeline to keep you on track along with all the evidence you have (paperwork, copies of their letters and your letters). You also need to remember that you have gone to the tribunal claiming unfair dismissal for failure to follow the minimum statutory procedures correctly and not with the issue that they did not deal with your previous grievance correctly. Its worth mentioning certainly but stick to the facts that can be substantiated which will really be any correspondence that you have on the matter unless of course you can have the union rep act as a witness on your behalf.

Unfortunatley they are no real time scales laid down for responses it only says within a reasonable period but I do not think that 55 days would be seen to be reasonable! The letter they gave you at the second meeting to say that you had been suspended should have been sent shortly after you were suspended giving you reasons as to why you had been suspended and notification that an investigation would be completed before you would be required to attend the next meeting. Once a date had been set I would have thought that it would have been right for them to send you the report on the investigation so that you had the opportunity to formulate your responses to the report. At the appeal hearing consideration of the reasons for your appeal against the dismissal should have been the only consideration during the meeting and no questions should have been put to you which you had already given answers to previously that led to their decision to dismiss.

I believe from what you have said on this thread that they have failed to follow the correct procedures. Get the timeline done with the notes on each event, focus on procedural errors and use this to keep you on track and let them see that you will prove that they have treated you badly.

Re lawyers -if you can get one through legal aid then go for it other than that just represent yourself- no win no fee, be wary of these unless someone trustworthy personally recommends one to you. Costs for representation can be extrememly expensive and any award you get will be reduced by their fees as tribunals do not award costs.

Hopefully if your points of procedural errors can be substantiated your employers will more than likely look for some sort of settlement before it goes to tribunal and if they do make an offer please come back to the forum to ask people if it should be accepted unless of course you have then got a laywer acting on your behalf.

Best of luck, think positive, act positive you can do this:beer:

Thank you for your advice Sweetwater Glasgow. I have had great assistance from jobbingmusician on this issue.

I have one major problem. My employer acted like they were following the right procedure, but what they actually did proved they did not.

- held meetings after 5 weeks of alleged events
- refused to provide me with evidence to the accusations
- was not made aware of investigation prior to meeting
- Letter did not clarify investigation about me
- did not warn me if the 1st meeting would possibly result into suspension
- No written notice of reason for suspension
- Interview notes not signed on the days of interviews and no copies provided then (notes were provided after investigation)
- Copies of recording devices not provided
- Inappropriate behavior by interviewer
- Unreasonable delays throughout investigation
- rejected by grievance
- Lied about posting letters to me (not sure how to bring this point out)
- no clear and strong evidence to support the allegations

Are those points above strong enough? Some put some light please

The other issue is I attended all the meetings on my own. I joined the union after the allegations whereby union refused to represent me.

Fellow staff members were too scared to go with me (I believe they were scared of unfair treatment from employer).

Burny_Sweetwater_Glasgow

Hi Mosdee,

Using your list you need to put them in date order, and put your paperwork, letters etc in the same order.

I have copied this from one of you previous postings

This is back ground prior to the issue that you are taking to the tribunal but you should have your letters and notes of the dates for each event.
The issues I raised were about my contract before the allegations. I wrote 3 letters but I never had a response. I phoned the manager to request for a response. I had 2 meetings with him but never had a full response. He made promises but later changed his mind. He warned me that if I raised a grievance and got to the second stage then I would lose my job. He said that in the presence of a union rep who had been invited by the manager him self.

Nearly 3 months later Need to state exact dates, I was given a letter inviting me for a meeting produce this as supporting evidence. There were no details of the allegation in that letter. During that meeting I asked about missing transaction. Like I said It was more than 5 weeks back. It was then that I was suspended with pay. I was not provided with a letter to clarify their reasons for my suspension. However I was accused of stealing during that meeting.

On the second interview (Was there a letter for this meeting, date required for when it was sent and when you received it and note of the timescale between receipt and date of meeting, produce letter as evidence, did it state that it was for a disciplinary meeting, did it give you the reasons for the meeting and were you provided with any evidence by them to substantiate there reasons)they gave me a letter of suspension dated the day I had my first interview. I was taken through the same interview process. I was asked to go back for a third interview (Was this request in writing if so then the same applies as I just stated). During the third interview they gave me a pack of minutes which were not accurate with what they refered to as their evidence and a letter(produce this letter as evidence and state that you did not receive this or the evidence prior to the meeting therefore unable to answer their charge) charging me for gross misconduct. I was invited (Again was this in writing dates and letter required as evidence) for a displinary hearing. Displinary hearing was going to be the fourth meeting with them.

This is just an example of what you need to do to present your case, dates, letters, contents of letters are very important if you want to show that they have not followed the minimum statutory procedures.

Why not have your timeline going down the edge of a page showing the dates and a note of how many days elapsed between each meeting or indeed how many days notice you received of the next meeting (if it was in writing) and your notes going across the page and that should help you get everything in the correct order so that you can easily see when and what happened and your notes will highlight the areas relating to procedural errors. Remember you are asking for the tribunal to decide if the procedures were correctly adhered to and for this they need everything to be accurately stated.
Hope this helps.

mosdee

Burny_Sweetwater_Glasgow wrote: »

Hi Mosdee,

Using your list you need to put them in date order, and put your paperwork, letters etc in the same order.

I have copied this from one of you previous postings

This is back ground prior to the issue that you are taking to the tribunal but you should have your letters and notes of the dates for each event.
The issues I raised were about my contract before the allegations. I wrote 3 letters but I never had a response. I phoned the manager to request for a response. I had 2 meetings with him but never had a full response. He made promises but later changed his mind. He warned me that if I raised a grievance and got to the second stage then I would lose my job. He said that in the presence of a union rep who had been invited by the manager him self.

Nearly 3 months later Need to state exact dates, I was given a letter inviting me for a meeting produce this as supporting evidence. There were no details of the allegation in that letter. During that meeting I asked about missing transaction. Like I said It was more than 5 weeks back. It was then that I was suspended with pay. I was not provided with a letter to clarify their reasons for my suspension. However I was accused of stealing during that meeting.

On the second interview (Was there a letter for this meeting, date required for when it was sent and when you received it and note of the timescale between receipt and date of meeting, produce letter as evidence, did it state that it was for a disciplinary meeting, did it give you the reasons for the meeting and were you provided with any evidence by them to substantiate there reasons)they gave me a letter of suspension dated the day I had my first interview. I was taken through the same interview process. I was asked to go back for a third interview (Was this request in writing if so then the same applies as I just stated). During the third interview they gave me a pack of minutes which were not accurate with what they refered to as their evidence and a letter(produce this letter as evidence and state that you did not receive this or the evidence prior to the meeting therefore unable to answer their charge) charging me for gross misconduct. I was invited (Again was this in writing dates and letter required as evidence) for a displinary hearing. Displinary hearing was going to be the fourth meeting with them.

This is just an example of what you need to do to present your case, dates, letters, contents of letters are very important if you want to show that they have not followed the minimum statutory procedures.

Why not have your timeline going down the edge of a page showing the dates and a note of how many days elapsed between each meeting or indeed how many days notice you received of the next meeting (if it was in writing) and your notes going across the page and that should help you get everything in the correct order so that you can easily see when and what happened and your notes will highlight the areas relating to procedural errors. Remember you are asking for the tribunal to decide if the procedures were correctly adhered to and for this they need everything to be accurately stated.
Hope this helps.

Thank you Burny Sweetwater Glasgow for your advice.
Do I need to do that for the case management discussion?
Would you know what this statement below mean:

give any other directions which may be necessary for the fair and expeditious disposal of the case?

I don't know what to say about that when I go for the case management discussion. Please put some light on that if you can