This is a story about how not
to go about dismissing an employee even when an employer thinks they are
justified in giving someone their marching orders.
Niall Kass from Perthshire,
Scotland was a driver for Gillies & Mackay Ltd. One day while he was out
driving in the company vehicle he was stopped by the police and had to pay a fine
as his MOT was out of date. He was upset about this and posted a comment on
facebook criticising his employers for not looking after the MOT properly.
This all happened on a Friday.
One of the bosses saw the post on facebook and they asked him to delete the
post. On Saturday another boss called him to a meeting on Monday morning. By Monday
morning the post had been removed by Mr. Kass but his employers had already
decided that his behaviour amounted to serious misconduct and fired him. Mr.
Kass appealed the decision within the company but they upheld the decision to
dismiss him.
When the matter came to the
employment appeals tribunal they had no difficulty in deciding that the
dismissal was unfair. The company accepted that they did not follow proper
procedures. However, the tribunal did reduce the amount of the award made to
Mr. Kass by 20% on the basis that he had contributed to his own dismissal.
If the company had followed fair
procedures would they have been successful in dismissing Mr. Kass? Probably not
fully successful in this case, but if the facebook post had been more critical
or abusive towards the employer, or if it had not been removed within a matter
of days then there could easily have been a very different result.
It’s really important not only to
have procedures in place, but also to follow them! If you’re not sure how to
handle a troublesome employee, or if you think you’re being treated unfairly by
your boss, give us a call.
Maria O’ Donovan
028 21177
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