Gross misconduct, my word against theirs

JohnJones80

Hi guys, an update on this.

One of the witnesses I named provided a statement. In his statements he gave a glowing review of myself, stating that during the time he witnessed me testing I did so perfectly. The other was not interviewed as he was on holiday during the week of my suspension and would not be back in time for my disciplinary.

I had my disciplinary, and despite this I was dismissed for Gross Misconduct. It was said by the manager that although this witness believe I did not make any error, he did not state that he was certain I did not. Therefore he was treating his statements as 'none committal'.

I was told that although I was being summary dismissed (gross misconduct), I was being paid my notice (8 weeks). Which I found very strange..

I appealed the decision on the following grounds:

1 - He did not investigate thoroughly enough, if he wanted the truth he could have waited for that one person to return from holidays
2 - He dismissed the witness statement
3 - That the witness was not asked whether he was 'certain', only what he saw, that it was unfair to state that he did not say he was certain when he was not asked this
4 - No investigation meeting was held with me before the disciplinary
5 - That the same person did both the investigation stage and chaired the disciplinary
6 - That it was unfair that this person chaired the disciplinary as they have a close working relationship with the person accusing me
7 - No notes were taken during the disciplinary hearing, no third person etc

Further to this I requested minutes from the meeting, two months later they have not sent me these.

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In response to my appeal, the CEO decided that I was dismissed unfairly. He said there was insignificant evidence to even discipline me at all, even to a lesser extent. He stated that the dismissal will be overturned on their record and he wrote me a reference. However, he stated that he did not feel I was entitled to compensation as:

1 - They had already paid me 8 weeks notice.
2 - That as I got a job right away, he does not feel I have lost out financially.

He followed on by saying that as far as the company is concerned the matter is now over.

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Should I just let this go now? I have not lost out financially as I did get a new job with my old company's main competitor the day after I was dismissed. And they did strangely pay me my notice period, so I have been getting two incomes for two months.

But I am just very angry about the fact they dismissed me over this, and it was so ridiculous even the CEO agrees with me, and I heard that appeals very rarely succeed! They still did not interview the second person, and I've heard through the grapevine that this person is dismayed he has not been interviewed as he is 100% confident I did my work perfectly.

ElefantEd

Yes, just move on. You've got the outcome you wanted ie there isn't a dismissal on your record. You've even got extra cash as they've paid you for the notice period even though you had another job. Realistically this is the best possible outcome - you won't get any compensation; and interviewing the second person couldn't make you any more than the 100% innocent that the CEO has already stated. If you are still angry this is understandable, but will get you nowhere. It may comfort you to realise that the manager at fault will undoubtably be in the CEOs bad books!

Savvy_Sue

I agree, you've got nowhere to go with this. I suspect you're wanting to take it to an Employment Tribunal, but you've had no financial loss so nothing to gain from it.

mdl9980

My wife has been dismissed from her care work of nearly 5 years. She was a senior care assistant and one of her colligues is saying she abused one of the residents when getting her out of bed. This colligue who is saying this helped her get the resident up but she denies that she helped, and it is her word against my wifes. It wasn't till 3 weeks later that this was reported all because it was a rumer going round and the manager happen to hear it. They totally believed this other colligue over my wife, even though the colligue had not written a statement at the time my wife was suspended. My wife stating its not true and she only ever does her job to her best ability but they would not believe her. This was all based on hearsay and gossip. My wife is Nigerian and has visa that runs out soon and she has suffering discrimination fron her manager so i think they wanted her out because of racist discrimination because totally unfair. She had no paper work saying why she was suspended first then suddenly dismissed after a meeting.now it is hard for to get a job because her reputation is damaged.

Les79

mdl9980 wrote: »

My wife has been dismissed from her care work of nearly 5 years. She was a senior care assistant and one of her colligues is saying she abused one of the residents when getting her out of bed. This colligue who is saying this helped her get the resident up but she denies that she helped, and it is her word against my wifes. It wasn't till 3 weeks later that this was reported all because it was a rumer going round and the manager happen to hear it. They totally believed this other colligue over my wife, even though the colligue had not written a statement at the time my wife was suspended. My wife stating its not true and she only ever does her job to her best ability but they would not believe her. This was all based on hearsay and gossip. My wife is Nigerian and has visa that runs out soon and she has suffering discrimination fron her manager so i think they wanted her out because of racist discrimination because totally unfair. She had no paper work saying why she was suspended first then suddenly dismissed after a meeting.now it is hard for to get a job because her reputation is damaged.

Start your own thread mate


When you post on an existing thread like this, some people ignore it because they think it has already been answered (because there are a lot of replies).