Today My partner was dismissed!*😩

[Daz990]

My partner has been dismissed today (With 4 weeks notice) for Gross negligence with the reason that she cannot be trusted to carry out her job.

She works in an accounts department and recently they have been the victim of professional scammers. The value lost through the scam was £50k across 2 x transactions.

The scam was carried out by someone hacking a suppliers email account and requesting a change of bank details for future payments. Which ultimately my partner made the changes on the company system and said money was paid to what later became apparent was a scammers account and not the actual suppliers.

Key points are:

There is no company process or procedure for carrying out a change of bank details.
Any payment has '2 factor sign off' therefore my partner 'creates' the payment but her line manager is then meant to check all details and if happy confirm it.

I have a detailed timeline of events that we put together for her to support a grievance she raised about the treatment of her and the handling of the incident overall - Would it be worth me posting it? (It's quite hefty).

My partner has immediately secured another (Higher paid) Job who are fully aware of what has happened so I suppose that is a silver lining.

Any help would be appreciated she has been at the company 18 months. would this exclude any claim for unfair dismissal? any other avenues?

[ULA]

Sorry to hear about your partner's situation.

Unfortunately with less than 2 years service, unless she can prove discrimination based on the 9 protected characterisitcs of age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership, and pregnancy and maternity, she cannot bring a claim for unfair dismissal. There are a few other grounds were dismissal with less than 2 years service may be an automatice unfair dismissal but from what you have said, this situation would not be covered by them.

As you say there is a silver lining and I suggest her focus should be on her new job. I wish her all the best.

If you do have any further questions just come back to this thread.

[Daz990]

ULA Thanks for your swift response. it's so frustrating that they can get away with putting her through this with no recourse because 2yrs has not been served.

It just doesn't sit right

[ULA]

I do get it and understand the frustration but that this is the current position with regard to employment legislation.

[echat11]

Ultimately the company is to blame, everyone knows 'scammers' exist, they should have 'mechanisms' in place to counter 'scamming' activity. For it to happen those 'mechanisms' weren't in place. I bet there have been 'wholesale' changes since the incident took place. The supplier should shoulder take some of the responsibility as there systems weren't up to the task. But I agree with ULA.

[Daz990]

Yep, well I guess we just need to take it on the chin and move on - Yes wholesale changes already happened after my partner pointed out their flaws. her reward for suggesting new process - P45

Thanks all for your replies - Very useful Forum!

[Guest]

Sorry to hear about your partner's situation.

Unfortunately with less than 2 years service, unless she can prove discrimination based on the 9 protected characterisitcs of age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership, and pregnancy and maternity, she cannot bring a claim for unfair dismissal. There are a few other grounds were dismissal with less than 2 years service may be an automatice unfair dismissal but from what you have said, this situation would not be covered by them.

As you say there is a silver lining and I suggest her focus should be on her new job. I wish her all the best.

If you do have any further questions just come back to this thread.

Does it have to be a claim for unfair dismissal? She was dismissed for "gross negligence" which from the information gleaned thus far, it was not. Is there any other route for recourse that may be open, perhaps through the civil courts? Or is it really a 'take it on the chin' situation, completely without recourse?

[ULA]

tx264 unfortunately the person's length of service means there is nothing that can be done via an Employment Tribunal and there is no action via the Civil court that i can think of.