Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

[kevjampip]

My former employers dismissed me on 27/03/13 without giving me a reason,(they state i had ordered a bt phone line and broadband at my home address but in someone else's name ( someone who is not employed by the company) they said the documents fell out of my locker which is untrue as my locker was locked, anyway they sacked me on the spot, i was not given any prior notice to this meeting, was not offered the chance to have someone with me, my appeal letter was ignored, now they have got a member of staff to say and go and witness at tribunal that i asked them to accompany me to the meeting. how can i prove otherwise and during a disciplinary meeting im sure there has to be a note taker present, there was no notes took and i have still not recieved anything in writing regarding reasons for dismissial they however are saying theu wrote to me on the 01/04/13

ANY ADVICE GRATEFUL AS TRIBUNAL STARTS IN 2 DAYS TIME

[Eloise01]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

There is no legal requirement to have a notetaker at a disciplinary. If someone says that they accompanied you to a hearing, then it is your word against theirs, and the tribunal will have to decide what they believe. I note that you deny that the papers fell out of your locker because the locker was locked - but not that you deny the allegation. Did you order a phone line and broadband at your home address (and presumably, did you charge it to your employer, because I cannot see what the problem is otherwise)? And how long had you worked there when you were dismissed?

[kevjampip]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

I worked for the company for 3 years and the order was for my home address however the name was in the name of a self employed driver who rents equipment from the company . Nothing was done against the company. The name on the order was done in error and was noticed straight away by me and i cancelled the order.

[kevjampip]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

I was dismissed on the 27th march.

[basa48]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

I worked for the company for 3 years and the order was for my home address however the name was in the name of a self employed driver who rents equipment from the company . Nothing was done against the company. The name on the order was done in error and was noticed straight away by me and i cancelled the order.

I don't understand why an order for services at your home and not in the name of a company employee would result in dismissal, unless the billing address was the company.

In any event the service provider should have a date record of when you cancelled. Hopefully this will prove you cancelled before any action by your employer.

[Eloise01]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

I worked for the company for 3 years and the order was for my home address however the name was in the name of a self employed driver who rents equipment from the company . Nothing was done against the company. The name on the order was done in error and was noticed straight away by me and i cancelled the order.

I'm sorry but I really don't understand this explanation, and if I don't understand it, then there are good odds a tribunal will not either.

Why was there an order for a phone line and broadband at your personal home address?

How did the name of a self-employed driver get on that order - someone must have put it there?

Why was the order locked in your locker?

If the order was locked in your locker - how did the employer find out about it in the first place?

Why, exactly, were you dismissed? What was the allegation against you?

You need to understand that whilst their version of events may be questionable from the point of view of a tribunal. the version you are providing here is also highly questionable. There is a member of staff who is saying under oath that they accompanied you to a dismissal hearing and that what you are saying is a fabrication. That may be questioned by the tribunal if you are denying it - but it is a compelling piece of evidence, whereas your evidence appears to be "evidence in absence" - you claim to have not had a disciplinary meeting (which you cannot prove), and that you were not informed of the right to be accompanied (which you cannot prove), and denied an appeal (which you cannot prove). Bearing in mind that even if everything you are saying is true, it is a matter of some ease to produce letters that show there was a disciplinary letter, etc. etc.

So in my opinion, the tribunal are going to have to take quite a lot on the balance of probabilities - and the crux to such deliberations is how credible they find your explanation for what you have supposedly done wrong. Right now I am finding it hard to explain how someone mistakenly puts someone elses name on an order for something at their home address, and if that order was nothing to do with business, why the order was even on the employers premises to be found.

[Inca]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

I'm so pleased I'm not the only one who is completely confuddled here

[CleverClogs]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

To me, it looks like it might have been the OP's idea of a joke which went horribly wrong.

That's the only way that this makes any sense...

[wales01man]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

Inca Confused am i
Is this thread a windup?

[Inca]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

I have absolutely no idea..stumped I am!! If OP is genuine (and we always err on the side of caution don't we)...then he/she needs to answer the questions posed in the order they have been asked,then maybe some salient advice can be given.
Other than that :noidea:

[kevjampip]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

no this is not a wind up, to explain fully i placed an order for a bt line for my home address but i done this on the 9th march from the work computer as wee work on our own and are allowed to go onto the internet to pass the time, when i made the order i noticed it had autofilled in a driver (who does not work for the company only rents equipment from the company) name as i was working on other documents at the time and did not know it had copied and pasted the name, no print outs of the order were ever took by me, then on wed 27th march a person who i work with texted me and asked me to phone the office, the boss asked me to call into the office, but would not tell me what it was about, when i got to the office, it was only me and him in the managers office no one else was present, he said i had committed fraud and the bt order confirmation fell out of my locker when they moved the lockers (the lockers had not been moved), i was not asked to give an explination i was outright accussed of commiting fraud and then sacked on the spot, the next dAY i sent a letter of appeal to the company to which they ignored (i can prove i sent this) now they are trying to say they did not sack me on the spot but suspended me and then dismissed me 5 days later. not once have they followed any of ACAS code of practice and now they are getting an employee to say that i asked her to accompany me to the meeting on 27th march which is not true

[Eloise01]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

I am afraid that there is little I can offer then - if there were no print outs, then how did they know any of this happened? It is going to be down to the tribunal to determine the truth of this. But good luck with it.

[kevjampip]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

they obtained a print out from the computer history, the reasons they wanted to get rid of me was because I was about to start a claim against them for unauthorised deductions from my wages ( which I have concrete proof of and also a regulation 72 claim for the inland revenue) im very confident I will win my case the only thing that is bothering me is that he is getting someone to lie for him to state that I asked them to accompany me to the meeting, as this is a shareholders company they cant afford to lose at a tribunal,

[CleverClogs]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

they obtained a print out from the computer history,

In other words, they went looking for some apparent misdeed rather than merely chancing upon evidence that allegedly fell from your locker? It does seem rather fortuitous that they should have found (and printed out?) the form allegedly discovered.

the reasons they wanted to get rid of me was because I was about to start a claim against them for unauthorised deductions from my wages (of which I have concrete proof)

I dare say my opinion may be incorrect but I do believe that, however substantial your evidence might be, you could be wiser to avoid such an allegation.

and also a regulation 72 claim for the inland revenue)

As Regulation 72 (link) may absolve an employer from liability if they had not deducted enough tax, I really do not begin to understand how you might claim anything under that regulation.

im very confident I will win my case

I believe that you should not order the champagne just yet.

[Eloise01]

Re: Help needed urgently applies to employment tribunal (scotland)

they obtained a print out from the computer history, the reasons they wanted to get rid of me was because I was about to start a claim against them for unauthorised deductions from my wages ( which I have concrete proof of and also a regulation 72 claim for the inland revenue) im very confident I will win my case the only thing that is bothering me is that he is getting someone to lie for him to state that I asked them to accompany me to the meeting, as this is a shareholders company they cant afford to lose at a tribunal,

(a) If they obtained a print out from the history of their computers, which you say they did, there was no need to claim that it was found in / fell out of your locker. They have an absolute right to "search" their own computers, so why would they need to lie about this?

(b) It does not matter why an employer goes looking for something - if they find it then you are accountable for it.

(c) I do not understand why, if the employer was involved in a conspiracy to get rid of you, they did not do it better! It would have been a matter of relative ease to hold a disciplinary and dismiss you for the alleged actions. Why wouldn't they have done so if this is a preconceived plan?

(d) I still do not understand your explanation about forms auto-filling with other peoples names and being saved in histories

(e) You fail to understand that you allege that he is getting someone to lie about accompanying you to the meeting. He says that this is true, and so does the other employee.

(f) Being a shareholders company is irrelevant - winning or losing a tribunal is nothing to do with them.


Anyway, I suppose you should consider yourself fortunate that you are lucky enough to live in an area of the country that has no lengthy waiting lists for unfair dismissal claims. Given that you were not dismissed until the end of March, and then submitted an appeal, obtaining a hearing before the end of June is an exceptional timescale - most people have to wait several weeks before they even get a hearing date, and it is often several months before the hearing happens, during which time there will be CMD's, possibly PHR's, timetables for disclosures and then exchanging bundles. At least your hearing has been scheduled very quickly instead of the several months most people have to wait.