December 22, 2010
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has recently ruled in the case of Weston Recovery Services v Fisher that an employer was not liable for unfair dismissal for summarily dismissing an employee for serious misconduct that did not amount to gross misconduct.
Summary dismissal occurs when an employer terminates the employment immediately, without giving the employee notice or pay in lieu of notice.
The Employment Tribunal had originally found the employer liable for unfair dismissal for immediately sacking Mr Fisher following a disciplinary hearing, for returning a mini bus belonging to the business that he had borrowed, in a damaged and hazardous condition.
However, the Appeal Tribunal reversed this decision, stating that Mr Fisher’s summary dismissal was within the range of reasonable responses available to the employer. Even though Mr Fisher’s conduct was not sufficient to constitute a repudiatory breach of the contract of employment, automatically entitling the employer to summarily dismiss him, if the employer felt this course of action to be necessary having followed the correct procedures, then the dismissal would not be unfair.
The dismissal was, however, found to be wrongful and the employer was ordered to pay to Mr Fisher, damages for breach of his employment contract, by terminating it without notice or payment in lieu of notice.
This case illustrates the difference between actions for unfair and wrongful dismissal and the necessity for employers to evaluate whether an employee or worker’s conduct has been serious enough to have fundamentally breached his/her employment contract before taking action. If in doubt, legal advice should be sought.
