Help! OH just dismissed, eligible for JSA?

sarymclary

Hi,

Very briefly, my OH has been dismissed today, after a disciplinary meeting for gross misconduct.

He tried to reason with his employers that the issue regarding the work on his electronic device (PDA) was wrongly completed. Basically, work was duplicated daily, for customers he had already been to, and he had marked this work as 'done'. Hi employers are, in our opinion, being very heavy handed, and claiming that he has 'fraudulently completed company documents', as they have mistaken this work as having been 'done again' each time. So, rather than recognising that the same job appearing every 3 days for a customer service (when they should be a minimum of once a month) was OTT, they have apparently billed the customer each time. There was no facility on the electronic device to mark the work as duplicated on the system, so OH couldn't do much more about it. The decision was made to dismiss OH, but he is going to appeal, because he feels the decision is wrong, he worked really hard for them for 3 years, and feels that because he had not training to use the electronic device, he had merely done what was necessary to show electronically that his work was being duplicated, and that he had already done it.

This is a company with over 100 work tribunals pending against them, I might add, and an entire online blog dedicated to stories from both customers and workers about their bad tactics.

My main question is:
can my OH put in a claim for JSA, and if so, would it be successful, based on the strong reason for him losing his job? I am a SAHM, and we have 4 children living at home, all in f/t education. We currently rent through the local council. OH's income was approx. £18k, and we received child tax credits for the children at the moment of £113.

I've used entitledto.com before, but have no idea how to put this info on, and whether OH has to wait a qualifying period until he can claim?

Any help and advice is greatly appreciated, as obviously this has come as a devastating blow to our family.

montyrebel

usually if you get sacked there is a restriction put on it, usually barred for 26 weeks

healy

Yes your other half can put in a claim for JSA and if there is a sanction it can be between 2 and 26 weeks. From what you have said it sounds like it was not his fault and if he explains this from the outset it may help. If they do impose a sanction they will want details from him and will write to the employer to hear their side of things.

zzzLazyDaisy

Please don't take this as gospel, as I have been out of the game for a while. But when I was in practice as an employment lawyer, if a dismissed employee had a tribunal claim pending, they usually were not sanctioned.

Things might have changed, so if any of the more experienced posters know different, I'll be happy to edit this post.

Daisy

sarymclary

Thank you for the replies so far. OH is on the phone to the helpline now to find out more.....

moggylover

Cannot offer any help or advice but did not want to read and run! So very sorry to hear about the problem and I do hope that the appeal goes well!

My ex was dismissed from the Post Office some 20 years ago in circumstances where doing what his direct manager had asked of him had meant that he was working an overtime shift (for which they could not get any other cover) but missing some of his own shifts and was therefore seen as "absent" by the management further up the line. We won the appeal and compensation (although no way would he have returned there in view of the extreme nastiness involved and the lies by his direct manager to save his own bacon) but I cannot, for the life of me, remember whether he was able to sign on before the tribunal decision or not:o.

Chin up and I am sure that there will be lots of helpful advice from those with more experience of the subject than I have.

SuziQ

I think you should contact ACAS for free advice and support on this-they are excellent and could even support him through tribunal. I think he will have problems regarding lack of training on using the PDA however,as it is generally accepted to be your own responsibility to be trained to use something,or refuse to use it-and things must have been put in writing by him that he has had no training prior to the incident leading to dismissal. I do hope he did that and this can be sorted out-they sound like the employesr from hell!

ETS-Could you sign on for benefit-support in the meantime-hopefully one of the really knowledgeable people on here can answer that for you.

dookar

zzzLazyDaisy wrote: »

Please don't take this as gospel, as I have been out of the game for a while. But when I was in practice as an employment lawyer, if a dismissed employee had a tribunal claim pending, they usually were not sanctioned.

Things might have changed, so if any of the more experienced posters know different, I'll be happy to edit this post.

Daisy

The decision making authorities are not required to await the decision of any other authority, but they certainly can if it is necessary to their decision making process.

To the OP, depending on a few factors it does indeed sound as though your OH could be sanctioned

MX5huggy

The important thing OP is that the claim is made now, if you don't claim for 26weeks believing there will be a sanction then claim the sanction (if any) will start from when the claim is made.

bigbill

To stop any threat of any sanction you (Not him) should claim Jobseekers.

dookar

MX5huggy wrote: »

The important thing OP is that the claim is made now, if you don't claim for 26weeks believing there will be a sanction then claim the sanction (if any) will start from when the claim is made.

No it won't, the period between the employment ending and the claim beginning is a self imposed sanction and will be deducted from the actual sanction.

So waiting for 26 weeks will nullify the maximum possible sanction.

Not that I am recommending this, of course, no one can say how long any sanction would be.