Employment contract shared with colleague by boss

[OliverJames]

Evening Beagles,

I am currently on my notice to leave my company but don't leave until June 28th. As part of my notice, my line manager has sent a polite email outlining my obligations outlined in my contract in relation to my restrictions after I leave. He has attached a copy of my full contract (unredacted) and for some reason copied in a colleague of mine who has absolutely no right (in my eyes) to access this information (salary, bonus, personal information). Is there anything i can do about this? He should be facing a constructive dismissal case as a minimum, but this is icing on the cake! I am fuming, but maybe you can tell me i have no reason to be?

I am leaving on bad terms with him, but have an unblemished record with the company.

Please let me know where I stand on this!

Love as always!

OJ

[ULA]

If the person copied in was not someone who should have been party to such information for example, HR, another or more senior manager or director etc. then potentially this is a breach of personal information an example of which is sending personal data (which this is) to an incorrect recipient. Potentially this should be reported to the ICO (Information Commissioner's Office) however, what action they would decide to take for this may be nothing more than a "this was not good and make sure you put procedures in place that this does not happen again".

I guess you need to weigh up the fact that you are leaving and some of the information on salary/bonus after you leave becomes history and it would be the extent of the other personal information disclosed and how you feel about this. As you say although you are leaving on bad terms you have an unblemished record.

Yes it is a potential breach of your personal data but going forward into your new job how detrimental to you will this breach be have been?

[OliverJames]

Good morning ULA and thank you so much for responding. I have calmed down a bit now since receiving the email, but my general issue has been the bullying from my line manager, who wrote this email and copied in a colleague who has absolutely no right to see my personal files (not HR, just a member of my team).

I am leaving on bad terms with the manager, not the business. He has been managing me out of the business for a while using improvement plans but when I saw this email it felt like a threat "remember your clauses when you leave the business because we are watching you" type of thing. I obviously have no intention of breaching my contract terms (6 months until I can approach colleagues or clients etc...) but he wanted to make sure I know he's watching.

I plan to bring a constructive dismissal case anyway and this just pushed me over the edge yesterday to make that decision final, and although you say that this event doesn't mean much in the bigger scheme of things, it shows the nature of the man which I hope shines through in the tribunal.

Any advice is of course welcome, and thank you again for your valuable contribution!!

[ULA]

What grounds do you believe that you have for a constructive unfair dismissal claim other than this final issue?

Have you raised any grievance/s about the issue/s?

When you resigned did you make it clear the reasons why and that you believed that this led you with no alternative but to resign.

[OliverJames]

I was moved on to an unachievable performance improvement plan with very short timeframes and moved through the process in a matter of weeks with no support. Alongside this, there was some public humiliation on teams calls. I was signed off sick by the doctor for stress, but too scared to put it in. In the end, after sleepless nights i decided enough was enough and handed in my notice.

[ULA]

Constructive unfair dismissal which is the legal terms is defined as where an employer has committed a serious breach of contract, entitling the employee to resign in response to the employer’s conduct.

It can be difficult to prove constructive dismissal. The onus will be on you to prove a fundamental (rather than minor) breach of contract by the employer. You must also show that your decision to terminate your employment was in response to the breach and not, for example, because you had been offered a more attractive job. An employment tribunal will also need to satisfy itself that you did not delay too long in handing in your ntoice and in addition, it will usually expect that you have tried to resolve the complaint through the grievance procedure before resigning.

It does not mean that you cannot try to bring such claim, if you genuinely believe and can prove that you terminated your employment by means of constructive unfair dismissal but you will have to have strong evidence to support such a claim.

[OliverJames]

Thanks again, ULA

Agreed it can be difficult to prove, but in this instance, I believe I have sufficient evidence of bullying associated with the PIP to warrant it.

Firstly they set entirely unrealistic objectives within the PIP. No one within the organisation has come close to the targets they set me, and surprise-surprise...I was also unable to hit them. 2 weeks after being put on the initial report I was moved from stage 1 to stage 2 (each stage is a step closer to dismissal). I appealed the decision to move stages which they had no option to accept but demanded that I carry on with the same targets they set with regular humiliation carried out via wider team calls, even though not all of the team needed to achieve the same targets.

Between Jan & March 3 colleagues left due to this manager's behavior towards them. I highlighted that the way they had treated me had eroded my trust and confidence in the business, but this was ignored by both themselves and the associated HR manager who was managing the PIP.

I made every effort possible to move teams, but other than paying lip service, they made no effort whatsoever to support or manage the process resulting in me getting signed off sick by the doctor. Unfortunately, I was too scared about losing my job that I wasn't confident enough to give them my sick note and carried on working. After several weeks of now being ignored and getting more and more frustrated with being unable to move teams, I was so angry with the situation that I resigned. I made it clear in my resignation letter that I was left with no alternative other than to leave the business after almost a decade of loyal service.

I have not left it too long to bring a case to them and believe that I have followed the right process so far, and them sharing my, albeit dated, contract with a colleague copied into the email was actually done to threaten and bully me further as it only stands to outline the clauses I will be bound by when I eventually leave the organisation (i am still within my notice period).

Hope that additional context helps build a better picture.

OJ

[ULA]

Are you still at work or are you now off sick?

Has your resignation been acknowledged and have they responded to your statement that you felt you had been "left with not alternative other than to leave the business"?

[OliverJames]

I am working out my notice. Although the doctor signed me off, I never actually used it because I was too worried about losing my job when I returned, but it then got too much so I just resigned anyway.

They didn't respond to that point, just thanked me for my resignation (acknowledged it) and requested I work all my notice and take the required holiday.

I didn't have another job lined up as I didn't really want to leave. I am currently looking for a role to ensure i have something when my contract ends at the end of next month.

[ULA]

As I am sure you are aware if you do want to bring a constructive unfair dismissal claim you will need to do this within 3 months less a day of the date of your employment ending.

To make a claim you first need to go through Early Conciliation (EC) via ACAS and if a settlement is not reached, then once you have a certificate number, you can proceed to completing an ET1 form and commencing an Employment Tribunal claim.