17 yr old dismissed despite not being at fault

Cavemanu

+1 Tommy! - sorry my post sent before I saw your response....

I appreciate that this might be a bit of a left field suggestion but if your DSD was unaware of this obscene graphic and it was drawn to her attention in the workplace that there might be cause for complaint for her having to witness that imagery. i.e that she was at work and had no choice to view or not to view it, if you know what I mean, which is, in itself a form of workplace bullying / harrassment?

There is not enough info here for me to understand whether it is possible that the prankster showed her the image directly, or that the prankster enabled the graphic to be shown others but not her (not sure whether this nasty prank implicated her specifically in this imagery?) or whether the manager showed her/described it to her when she got into trouble over this?

Also, was the graphic displayed on a workplace computer, or was it on pranksters own mobilephone? Or did the prankster, by any chance send something from her computer, purporting to be from her, when she was away from her desk?

The reason I mention this is that in a former workplace, we once had an IT security problem where all staff were being bombarded with spam email of an obscene nature (words &graphics). It particularly upset one of my team, who approached me about it in tears, so we made a complaint about having to see this vile stuff against our wills whilst trying to do our jobs!

As a result of our complaint, emphasising how it impacted on our ability to do our work, the issue got escalated, sorted out pretty quickly and we received an apology from the Board for our distress.

Not sure if this applies in your DSD case, but might be worth establishing what exactly it was that she saw/was shown to her and by whom?

Then once you are crystal clear, consider making a complaint to the board of the charity.

On the other hand, is there any reason (eg hindsight/regret/reasons of embarrassment DSD may be holding back any info from you and your OH about her role, if any, in this?

Maybe if you suggest to her that if she played no part, she may agree for that such complaint to be made. If she is not giving you the entire backdrop, she might be less keen on following this course of action.

It seems very sad for someone to lose their job if they are truly not at fault.

I'm sure others with knowledge of employment law/harrassment/bullying will be along to advise you in a while.

hth

tommytynan123

Cavemanu wrote: »

I appreciate that this might be a bit of a left field suggestion but if your DSD was unaware of this obscene graphic and it was drawn to her attention in the workplace that there might be cause for complaint for her having to witness that imagery. i.e that she was at work and had no choice to view or not to view it, if you know what I mean, which is, in itself a form of workplace bullying / harrassment?

There is not enough info here for me to understand whether it is possible that the prankster showed her the image directly, or that the prankster enabled the graphic to be shown others but not her (not sure whether this nasty prank implicated her specifically in this imagery?) or whether the manager showed her/described it to her when she got into trouble over this?

Also, was the graphic displayed on a workplace computer, or was it on pranksters own mobilephone?

The reason I mention this is that in a former workplace, we once had an IT security problem where all staff were being bombarded with spam email of an obscene nature (words &graphics). It particularly upset one of my team, who approached me about it in tears, so we made a complaint about having to see this vile stuff against our wills whilst trying to do our jobs!

As a result of our complaint, emphasising how it impacted on our ability to do our work, the issue got escalated, sorted out pretty quickly and we received an apology from the Board for our distress.

Not sure if this applies in your DSD case, but might be worth establishing what exactly it was that she saw/was shown to her and by whom?

Then once you are crystal clear, consider making a complaint to the board of the charity.

On the other hand, is there any reason (eg hindsight/regret/reasons of embarrassment DSD may be holding back any info from you and your OH about her role, if any, in this?

Maybe if you suggest to her that if she played no part, she may agree for that such complaint to be made. If she is not giving you the entire backdrop, she might be less keen on following this course of action.

It seems very sad for someone to lose their job if they are truly not at fault.

I'm sure others with knowledge of employment law/harrassment/bullying will be along to advise you in a while.

hth

Some good points there. Q - how did the management know it was there in the 1st place ????

Nicki

daska wrote: »

There really isn't anything else that's pertinent. The rest just gives an understanding of the atmosphere there. Suffice to say that the fact the both DSD and the lad responsible are more highly qualified has lead to resentment, especially on the part of staff (including relations of the people who decided to sack her) who have lost shifts because the manager, quite reasonably, wants to retain his most highly qualified staff. The manager is, however, not willing to risk his own job to defend them.

Unfortunately it's a specialised job and there aren't many opportunities locally.

I'm a bit confused to be honest at what on earth the qualification could be which puts a 17 year old school leaver so far ahead of experienced older members of staff. Most jobs for 17 year olds are entry level jobs, and very few 17 year olds have any qualifications which could possibly describe them as "highly qualified".

I do wonder whether the DSD has a NVQ or something in a relevant field, and has gone into the workforce with an attitude that this makes her better at what she is doing than older members of staff who don't have the qualification (or have it at a lower level) but have bags of hands on experience, and has as a result put noses well out of joint, to the extent that an excuse has been found to let her go. Possibly also aided in her beliefs by a manager giving her more shifts than the others because NMW for a 17 year old is less than for an older worker?

The DSD has very limited remedies due to the short period she has been employed, but what has happened might stand her in good stead if she has fallen foul of office politics and this can in any way be attributed to how she has presented herself at work.

Acc72

Very good post from Nicki ^^^^

daska

I understand the confusion but yes, again, she is more highly qualified than most of the others. It's really not relevant except that it helps to understand the politics. The lad involved isn't related to anyone there. It wasn't an electronic image but she inadvertently put it on public view while she was working and she wasn't aware of it until it was brought to her attention. There is no possible interpretation that doesn't make her the intended target. Please don't press me to put more detail, if I specify the exact nature the thread will become easily identifiable to people who know her!

Uncertain

I'm sorry but I really don't see you getting far with this. Even if she had been employed long enough to have protection against unfair dismissal any award or settlement would be minimal.

With a zero hour contract there is no obligation to give her work so any wrongful dismissal (notice pay etc) claims becomes pointless.

You may be able to cause them some minor trouble if any aspects of her employment breached regulations. Equally this may in turn lead to some disciplinary action against the manager who breached those regulations although you can't force this.

You can also complain about the person responsible for the prank but again you can't make the firm take any particular action.

If the behaviour amounted to a crime (and I very much doubt it did) you could go to the police.

Finally she could of course be so traumatised that a personal injury claim is justified. Seems thin to say the least! Maybe some "no win no fee" cowboy would take it on!

Alternatively you could just put it behind yourselves and move on - which is probably the best advice.

Sorry!

colino

As you don't want to add any details a straightforward answer is - a Charity with limited resources (and paper-thin management) find two immature teenagers wasting their time and get shown the door. That's where it begins and ends.

daska

Thank you everyone. All your responses have confirmed our initial thoughts that there is really no recourse available. It is desperately unfair on her but, at the same time, we can see a silver lining. It is a useful lesson for her to have learned at a relatively tender age - that life isn't always fair and sometimes you just have to make the best of things. DSD is popular with a lot of the staff and, as demonstrated by the fact that some of them have been in touch expressing their disbelief at the way she has been treated and other examples of this person's unprofessional targeting of staff they don't like, it does appear to be personal.

In retrospect i wonder if this could turn out to be quite an expensive mistake for them. They will need to recruit replacement staff and their reason for not covering shifts legally earlier on was the scarcity of applicants with the necessary qualification.

t0rt0ise

Of course if they picked on her because she's a girl and left the boy alone, it sounds discriminatory, they may need to be reminded that that is illegal.

daska

Apparently he has now been sacked by phone, by the same person. he wasn't allowed to give his account of what happened, presumably because this would exonerate DSD. I know he comes out of this looking bad but he is a genuinely lovely lad, just immature (as one might expect from someone his age). We've left a message asking him to write a statement. I don't think he'll have a problem with doing this. I feel rather sorry for him because he is obviously mortified that he's messed things up for her as well and himself and isn't being allowed to do anything to put it right.

We've now heard that this person made a comment to a friend of ours not long back that they had 'encouraged' a lot of people they didn't get on with to 'move on'. Lots of puzzle pieces fitting into place.