Dismissed - Help!

jettnett

Horace wrote: »

If you are now bringing disability discrimination into the mix - did you ever ask for reasonable adjustments to me be made? If not then you cannot reasonably expect the employer to make them for you. What you should have done was approach Access to Work who would have made arrangements to come in and view your workstation and the work that you do and would have made recommendations to your employer and more importantly would have paid in full (certainly within the first 6 weeks of employment and thereafter would have expected the employer to contribute) as to what reasonable adjustments would need to be made and what type of equipment (if any) to be purchased.

If you are incapable of doing the job then it is fair that you are dismissed on capability grounds - you are not being treated any differently to anyone else in your situation.

Please do not make assumptions that my illness is physical, it is in fact mental.

They dismissed me on the grounds of poor performance despite never informing me and knowing full well my illness would have contributed to said lack of performance.

As far as I was concerned I was doing well in my position so please do not judge me.

I have asked for advice and would appreciate it if you refrain from posting if you have none to give.

SarEl

Jarndyce wrote: »

Bit harsh isn't it? The OP said that "They were made aware that I had had the condition for a few months prior to seeking medical help".

The OP can clarify, but if she had the condition for say 3 or 4 months and made her employer aware of it at that time, and then sought medical help, I don't understand why you're suggesting she couldn't have done that within the 7 months? Sorry if I've misunderstood your point, or something contained in another post which contadicts that.

However the OP would clearly have to demonstrate a link between her dismissal and her apparent disability, or show that she had sought reasonable adjustments on account of her disability which the employer had not made. Or, she would need to show that she had been treated less favourably than a non-disabled person with similar performance issues would have been treated.

Oh, and I'm with SarEl on ACAS. They shouldn't be giving 'legal advice' anyway, only explaining procedures and letting people know if they've got a potentially valid claim, but they certainly shouldn't be advising on merits.

Happy to clarify. My question is that the employer could not have been aware of a disability which the OP had not sought medical help with. If I tell my employer that I think I have a disability the first thing they will want to know is the diagnosis, and "I haven't sought medical help yet" isn't going to cut it. If it was severe enough to be both long-lasting and have an impact on normal day to day activities, then I would have thought that the OP would have sought medical help immediately, rather than some months after notifying the employer of a condition which, on the face of what the OP has said, was not even serious enough to seek medical help for a few months more.

I therefore do not see that this information is relevant. The legal definition of a disability under the Equality Act is very specific, and nothing the OP has said would indicate that they have met those conditions with a formal diagnosis of a confirmed disability within the timescales they outline. Mentioning something to the employer for which you do not seek medical help with until much later wouldn't constitute notification of a disability, and would make a disability of such severity to meet the conditions of the act but which didn't need medical help, highly unlikely. If it wasn't serious enough to seek medical help with, then what importance should the employer put on it?

DCFC79

SarEl wrote: »

Ha. And if you find anyone at ACAS who actually gives you the right advice then there will be celebrations across the country. ACAS are not a relibale source of legal advice. As evidenced on this site over and over again.

i actually thought acas would have given me a definite answer to a question i had but no definite answer was forth coming so i wont be using acas again, whether it was my question i asked that they didnt know about

SarEl

jettnett wrote: »

Please do not make assumptions that my illness is physical, it is in fact mental.

They dismissed me on the grounds of poor performance despite never informing me and knowing full well my illness would have contributed to said lack of performance.

As far as I was concerned I was doing well in my position so please do not judge me.

I have asked for advice and would appreciate it if you refrain from posting if you have none to give.

I do not see that anybody has made any assumptions. The advice was accurate and applicable to mental illness too. How could they possibly "know" that your poor performance was a result of a mental illness when you had not sought medical help for it and had not asked them to make any reasonable adjustments. You say that the poor performance was a result of your illness, but at the same time that it was as a result of the failings of others, not you.

Nobody is being nasty to you - they are asking you valid questions which do not add up. If you think this is nastiness then you clearly haven't been in a tribunal, because every word you utter or write in evidence will be dissected and tripped up.

And mental illness is not automatically covered under the Equality Act - it depends on the circumstances such as what it is, how long you have had it, the severity etc.

jettnett

SarEl wrote: »

I do not see that anybody has made any assumptions. The advice was accurate and applicable to mental illness too. How could they possibly "know" that your poor performance was a result of a mental illness when you had not sought medical help for it and had not asked them to make any reasonable adjustments. You say that the poor performance was a result of your illness, but at the same time that it was as a result of the failings of others, not you.

Nobody is being nasty to you - they are asking you valid questions which do not add up. If you think this is nastiness then you clearly haven't been in a tribunal, because every word you utter or write in evidence will be dissected and tripped up.

And mental illness is not automatically covered under the Equality Act - it depends on the circumstances such as what it is, how long you have had it, the severity etc.

Sorry to go off on one, its a bit frustrating.

The goals that were set that were achievable I achieved, the ones I did not were non achievable.

They have dismissed me as far as I can see due to my illness being a long term issue so decided to play the performance card so to speak due to my length of service.

Emmzi

were you diagnosed before or after you took the job?

were you asked to fill out a health questionnaire?

jettnett

Emmzi wrote: »

were you diagnosed before or after you took the job?

were you asked to fill out a health questionnaire?

After I took the job and no to the questionnaire.

t0rt0ise

To be classed as a disability it has to have lasted or be reasonably expected to last longer than a year. You might have trouble in showing that. Depression for example can very well lift after a few months and wouldn't count as a disability straight away.

suicidebob

jettnett wrote: »

The goals that were set that were achievable I achieved, the ones I did not were non achievable.

You did say earlier your disability contributed to your poor performance.

SarEl

jettnett wrote: »

Sorry to go off on one, its a bit frustrating.

The goals that were set that were achievable I achieved, the ones I did not were non achievable.

They have dismissed me as far as I can see due to my illness being a long term issue so decided to play the performance card so to speak due to my length of service.

I really don't want to upset you but:

(a) Everyone says that the goals they achieved were theirs and the ones they didn't were someone elses fault. Not that it matters - on this argument you have no claim at all - 7 months, no rights to speak of.

and

(b) "As far as you can see" doesn't cut a disability discrimination claim which you will, in the first inmstance, have to prove. I still do not understand, and you are not answering my question, how is this a long term issue that impacts on your ability to perform on a day to day basis, but which did not require any medical help?

People are really trying to help you out here, but you need to get your story straight and answer the questions, because if you think we are nit-picking, we really aren't anything compared to what you will face if you try a claim for disability discrimination. The tribunal isn't going to give a rat's **** about whether the goals were achievable or not, or why you didn't achieve them. They are going to want you to prove that disability discrimination may have occured and your employer is going to be saying that it didn't and this was solely on the grounds of performance and therefore not the jurisdiction of the tribunal because you have less than 12 montsh service.