I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

[Hellothanks]

Hello, my Hearing for unfair dismissal/discrimination is due for late Feb. However, to my shock, I received an email from my former employer's rep on Friday saying they would like to settle and offered me 2000. I replied by saying their offer was belittling and insulting and asked for 5000. their rep replied by saying 3000, i replied by saying 40000 plus my ET fee 250, they replied saying they accepted the amount. Having not received my reply to them agreeing to 4000 plus 250, they then sent me repeat emails saying I needed to give my final confirmation same day. I actually wanted little time to think to decide if I have actually settled for too less or not but under pressure and thinking they will withdraw offer of settlement if i didn't give my final confirmation same day i emailed confirming.

I thought that since I still had the paper i.e. cot3 to sign I am yet not legally bound for my words. However, as soon as I send the email of confirmation, i received email from Acas saying the agreement was legally binding and no one can change their mind. This all happened same day and Acas had been copied into our email exchanges.

However, now that I have had the time to think through i feel I have actually belittled myself by settling for 4000 because this has been going on for nearby 9 months now (it all started in March 14 leading upto the termination of my employment in May 14). employer declined my appeal, then acas conciliation was also of no use, and only 4 weeks remaining till the Hearing they offered settlement and I in haste settled for 4000. I have suffered a lot of stress and hardship in the period because I had encountered some very unpleasant experiences with my employer, so I feel I should have asked for more and stuck it. but at that time it felt like they were giving me a chance! when in fact it was them who were desperate for me to back off!

Please can people share their thoughts - am I wrong feeling that way? Can I still say that I actually want to pursue and realise I can’t abandon it for 4000? Or the fact Acas emailed saying it’s 'legally binding and no one can change mind' is set in stone even though I am yet to sign the cot3?

Please do share your thoughts as I feel I have missed a golden opportunity to get that beast CEO back but instead done her a favour by settling for so less. I am actually feeling ashamed to take the 4000 now.

Thank you

[des8]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

deleted

[Amethyst]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Have you had an indication of what you might be awarded if you won at the ET ?

It's a bit difficult to assess what you settled for without any detail of the claim at the ET.

Otherwise we go through this kind of thing a fair bit, negotiation before court, or ET, is like that, it's do you take it now OR risk losing at the hearing and getting nothing or maybe even costs against you, or do you take it now and risk missing out on winning in court/ET and having a bigger payout. It depends how strong you feel your case is (unemotionally) and whether you really want to have your day in court/ET. It is quite natural after settling to wonder if you have done the right thing and if you should have stuck it out and risked winning or losing. It's like stick or twist really and you'll never know what would have happened had you gone the other way.

I think you did well, they came in with £2k and you got them to double it and add your costs on. You said you would have accepted £5k - you're only £750 off that, so if £5k is what you thought you would get at ET then is that £750 worth the stress of the ET.

I don't know a lot about ET's btw, so just some thoughts about negotiating before a hearing.

http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=2635 - COT3 info for others.

[Hellothanks]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Hello Amethyst, thanks a lot for sharing your thoughts and time. My loss after i mitigated my 'future loss' in recent times was over 7000 but i think the CEO was desperate for me to back off so I could have taken at least 5k or even 6k easily. But with reference to 'fair', at that moment it felt like 'nice of them to offer settlement , may be i should ask for even less' forgetting how many times i had asked for settlements and everything that i went through, so that's why easily went down to 4k. I mean she caused me stress for 9 months I feel it was stupid of me to have been this generous, i cant explain it.

Have you had an indication of what you might be awarded if you won at the ET ?

It's a bit difficult to assess what you settled for without any detail of the claim at the ET.

Otherwise we go through this kind of thing a fair bit, negotiation before court, or ET, is like that, it's do you take it now OR risk losing at the hearing and getting nothing or maybe even costs against you, or do you take it now and risk missing out on winning in court/ET and having a bigger payout. It depends how strong you feel your case is (unemotionally) and whether you really want to have your day in court/ET. It is quite natural after settling to wonder if you have done the right thing and if you should have stuck it out and risked winning or losing. It's like stick or twist really and you'll never know what would have happened had you gone the other way.

I think you did well, they came in with £2k and you got them to double it and add your costs on. You said you would have accepted £5k - you're only £750 off that, so if £5k is what you thought you would get at ET then is that £750 worth the stress of the ET.

I don't know a lot about ET's btw, so just some thoughts about negotiating before a hearing.

http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=2635 - COT3 info for others.

[des8]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Following the withdrawal of my earlier post, I've looked into your problem further, and I think you MAY have a case for withdrawal.
I'm not really into employment problems so I'm hoping others will post and clarify .
ACAS guidelines for reaching a settlement are:
Reaching a settlement agreement

For the settlement agreement to be legally binding the following conditions must be met.

• [*=left]The agreement must be in writing.
  [*=left]The agreement must relate to a particular complaint or proceedings.
  [*=left]The employee must have received advice from a relevant independent adviser, such as a lawyer or a certified and authorised member of a trade union.
  [*=left]The independent adviser must have a current contract of insurance or professional indemnity covering the risk of a claim by the employee in respect of loss arising from the advice.
  [*=left]The agreement must identify the adviser.
  [*=left]The agreement must state that the applicable statutory conditions regulating the settlement agreement have been met.

Employees should be given a reasonable amount of time to consider the proposed conditions of the agreement; the Acas Code of Practice on settlement agreements specifies a minimum of 10 calendar days unless the parties agree otherwise.
Settlement agreements are voluntary and parties do not have to agree to them or enter into discussion about them. There can be a process of negotiation during which both sides make proposals and counter proposals until an agreement is reached or both parties decide no agreement can be reached.>unquote

The relevant parts are the need for independent adviser.
ACAS are considered as independent for this purpose, but were they actually involved in passing the offer to you?
If they weren't I wonder if you could argue that at the relevant time you had no advice.
COT3 form is not a legal requirement following ACAS conciliation.

The second part is the observation that you need 10 days to consider the agreement.
It seems that you were pressurized into accepting without this consideration period.

Now I don't know if my meanderings are correct, but I do wonder know if it is worth trying to continue the action in the hope of increasing the settlement in view of the stress etc.

[Hellothanks]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Hello des8, you must be a wonderful person to have gone out of your way to get this. thank you so much! This sounds great, I am trying to speak to my acas conciliator, so will mention these stuffs. Where did you get these from? a link? If you could please kindly let me know I could use it as evidence to back up my arguments.

Acas did not bring the offer to me my former employers rep, emailed the offer to me and copied in acas conciliator throughout our communication.

Thanks a lot again for time and help.

Following the withdrawal of my earlier post, I've looked into your problem further, and I think you MAY have a case for withdrawal.
I'm not really into employment problems so I'm hoping others will post and clarify .
ACAS guidelines for reaching a settlement are:
Reaching a settlement agreement

For the settlement agreement to be legally binding the following conditions must be met.

• [*=left]The agreement must be in writing.
  [*=left]The agreement must relate to a particular complaint or proceedings.
  [*=left]The employee must have received advice from a relevant independent adviser, such as a lawyer or a certified and authorised member of a trade union.
  [*=left]The independent adviser must have a current contract of insurance or professional indemnity covering the risk of a claim by the employee in respect of loss arising from the advice.
  [*=left]The agreement must identify the adviser.
  [*=left]The agreement must state that the applicable statutory conditions regulating the settlement agreement have been met.

Employees should be given a reasonable amount of time to consider the proposed conditions of the agreement; the Acas Code of Practice on settlement agreements specifies a minimum of 10 calendar days unless the parties agree otherwise.
Settlement agreements are voluntary and parties do not have to agree to them or enter into discussion about them. There can be a process of negotiation during which both sides make proposals and counter proposals until an agreement is reached or both parties decide no agreement can be reached.>unquote

The relevant parts are the need for independent adviser.
ACAS are considered as independent for this purpose, but were they actually involved in passing the offer to you?
If they weren't I wonder if you could argue that at the relevant time you had no advice.
COT3 form is not a legal requirement following ACAS conciliation.

The second part is the observation that you need 10 days to consider the agreement.
It seems that you were pressurized into accepting without this consideration period.

Now I don't know if my meanderings are correct, but I do wonder know if it is worth trying to continue the action in the hope of increasing the settlement in view of the stress etc.

[des8]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

[QUOTE=Hellothanks;511408]Hello des8, you must be a wonderful person to have gone out of your way to get this.]

No, just an old git with too much time on his hands!

Here's the link to the ACAS site: http://www.acas.org.uk/settlementagreements

Do be warned it is easy to find snippets that support your view on any contentious subject, and it is quite likely there are arguments to the contrary.
That is why I was hoping others more knowledgeable than I would post on your thread.
And as Ame said, although you may with hindsight be questioning your acceptance of the offer as too hasty, you have already done well.
Be careful not to jeopardize what you have achieved.

[Hellothanks]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Hello des8, just spoke to Acas, cot3 agreements and settlement agreements are apparently different so I can't go back unfortunately.

I really hope some people out there benefit from my mistake. When employer offers you settlement negotiation, you're at a strong position!! - take time and ask for nearly the amount you could get at ET not 2k or 3k below!! like i did!!

re: your last message, no, that's not true - you could have chosen to spend your time other ways than help me. you need more that just 'time' to be able to do that. thank you
[QUOTE=des8;511421]

Hello des8, you must be a wonderful person to have gone out of your way to get this.]

No, just an old git with too much time on his hands!

Here's the link to the ACAS site: http://www.acas.org.uk/settlementagreements

Do be warned it is easy to find snippets that support your view on any contentious subject, and it is quite likely there are arguments to the contrary.
That is why I was hoping others more knowledgeable than I would post on your thread.
And as Ame said, although you may with hindsight be questioning your acceptance of the offer as too hasty, you have already done well.
Be careful not to jeopardize what you have achieved.

[des8]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

I think you are wise to accept the position.
Whilst COT 3 agreements are different, the section I was emphasising was that the negotiations for a COT3 settlement must be carried out via ACAS.
In your case as the final part (ie offer and acceptance) was not done via ACAS, I was wondering if to that extent this might not be a valid COT3 agreement.
I'm not sure, and I was hoping for other input that might have clarified the position.
Anyway, well done and now time to get on with life.

[krypton]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Hello des8, just spoke to Acas, cot3 agreements and settlement agreements are apparently different so I can't go back unfortunately.

I really hope some people out there benefit from my mistake. When employer offers you settlement negotiation, you're at a strong position!! - take time and ask for nearly the amount you could get at ET not 2k or 3k below!! like i did!!

If the offer was without prejudice then nothing is agreed until it is out in the open, agreed and signed for.

However, if the ACAS conciliator was involved and you agreed the settlement offer in their presence then that is indeed legally binding. A COT3 will follow.

It is also incorrect to say that you are in 'strong' position if you are made a settlement offer. This is patently untrue.

The other party will consider their legal costs in continuing to defend the claim and work out inclusive of risks what is the most economical method of closing/settling the case. Ultimately it is a risk/cost based assessment as the outcome from a tribunal if you are successful is financial recompense by the employer.

As for settlement amounts the ET recompense is generally based on financial compensation for loss of office. If you have met the unfair dismissal criteria the awards are limited and will be the max of either 1 years gross salary or £76,574. You can realistically be awarded 6 months pay if you have a strong case. You can also ask for more.

If your dismissal was unfair as well as victimisation being involved then the 1 years Gross Salary or £76,574 limits can be removed by the ET thereby increasing the limits at their discretion.

[krypton]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

As for your settlement, you seemed happy to accept £5,000?

The average award for a successful unfair dismissal is usually between £9-11k. The award can of course be higher or lower dependent on each particular case.

Generally speaking if your case is accepted by the ET then it is very rare that they order costs against you win or lose. The employer usually has to cop that.

However, going to a tribunal even if you win has massive negatives. It is incredibly difficult to find employment in your chosen field subsequently.

£2k would not even cover their basic legal preparation costs let alone representation so I think they got you very, very cheaply indeed. In fact it would probably not even cover management cost time.

Without prejudice settlements are very much the norm discussion as settlement is what the whole principle of an ET sets out to achieve. It is very much why ACAS Conciliation now is part of the process. They want the two parties to settle amongst themselves and not trouble the Tribunal. Very few cases reach a hearing at an ET.

Perhaps you also now wanted the end of it and save you the stress? The question is why go so far down this route if you can't handle the stress.

It is also basic negotiation for a party to offer a low ball offer than make none at all. The counter party will always start off very low, that's common sense. It's then up to you to negotiate that offer upwards.

What is done is done now but all this goes back to my earlier questions.... what is it you are/were trying to achieve and did you set out for £5k to begin with? Seven months of your time and job issues for £4,250?

[Hellothanks]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Thanks for sharing thoughts and time, krypton. And thanks for correcting me - guess it could get people too existed and demanding with no avail sometimes!

Yes, the offer said 'without prejudice', however, Acas were copied in so I guess that leaves me with no loop-hopes.

Thank you.

If the offer was without prejudice then nothing is agreed until it is out in the open, agreed and signed for.

However, if the ACAS conciliator was involved and you agreed the settlement offer in their presence then that is indeed legally binding. A COT3 will follow.

It is also incorrect to say that you are in 'strong' position if you are made a settlement offer. This is patently untrue.

The other party will consider their legal costs in continuing to defend the claim and work out inclusive of risks what is the most economical method of closing/settling the case. Ultimately it is a risk/cost based assessment as the outcome from a tribunal if you are successful is financial recompense by the employer.

As for settlement amounts the ET recompense is generally based on financial compensation for loss of office. If you have met the unfair dismissal criteria the awards are limited and will be the max of either 1 years gross salary or £76,574. You can realistically be awarded 6 months pay if you have a strong case. You can also ask for more.

If your dismissal was unfair as well as victimisation being involved then the 1 years Gross Salary or £76,574 limits can be removed by the ET thereby increasing the limits at their discretion.

[krypton]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

Yes, the offer said 'without prejudice', however, Acas were copied in so I guess that leaves me with no loop-hopes.

It's not about loop holes.

It's about you accepting the offer? Once you do so in front of the conciliator it is binding. That is what you did and have done. You accepted the offer in front of them and then thought about it afterwards. You cannot unwind once you agree in their presence.

Sometimes it's far better and indeed wiser to keep your counsel. Just because they made you an offer that doesn't mean you have to accept.

What's done is done and if you are happy with £4250 for all your time and effort then that is all that matters.

[Hellothanks]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

5000 because my loss after i mitigated my future loss was over 7000 so i thought I will be reasonable esp as the way they put it across to me was as if they were doing me a favour, but i now realise it was part of their skill.

I am not sure what you mean in the last paragraph - are you saying I have settled for too less indeed ? I know I have and that's what's eating me inside, the least I could have done was tried and been insistence than giving in so easily. I was so unprepared because I never thought CEO would consider settlement, so was taken by complete shock.

And, yes, i think they got me really cheap!!! That's why I hope some people can learn from my mistake and all the advice, thoughts that people like yourself are sharing now.

re: your question about stress, I do understand what you mean and they're wise words, its that i am finding it difficult to concentrate with my word stuffs and caseloads. So, yes, I gave into my weakness too i guess.

As for your settlement, you seemed happy to accept £5,000?

The average award for a successful unfair dismissal is usually between £9-11k. The award can of course be higher or lower dependent on each particular case.

Generally speaking if your case is accepted by the ET then it is very rare that they order costs against you win or lose. The employer usually has to cop that.

However, going to a tribunal even if you win has massive negatives. It is incredibly difficult to find employment in your chosen field subsequently.

£2k would not even cover their basic legal preparation costs let alone representation so I think they got you very, very cheaply indeed. In fact it would probably not even cover management cost time.

Without prejudice settlements are very much the norm discussion as settlement is what the whole principle of an ET sets out to achieve. It is very much why ACAS Conciliation now is part of the process. They want the two parties to settle amongst themselves and not trouble the Tribunal. Very few cases reach a hearing at an ET.

Perhaps you also now wanted the end of it and save you the stress? The question is why go so far down this route if you can't handle the stress.

It is also basic negotiation for a party to offer a low ball offer than make none at all. The counter party will always start off very low, that's common sense. It's then up to you to negotiate that offer upwards.

What is done is done now but all this goes back to my earlier questions.... what is it you are/were trying to achieve and did you set out for £5k to begin with? Seven months of your time and job issues for £4,250?

[krypton]

Re: I've have settled for too less! Is there anyway i can mend my mistake!

5000 because my loss after i mitigated my future loss was over 7000 so i thought I will be reasonable esp as the way they put it across to me was as if they were doing me a favour, but i now realise it was part of their skill.

I am not sure what you mean in the last paragraph - are you saying I have settled for too less indeed ? I know I have and that's what's eating me inside, the least I could have done was tried and been insistence than giving in so easily. I was so unprepared because I never thought CEO would consider settlement, so was taken by complete shock.

And, yes, i think they got me really cheap!!! That's why I hope some people can learn from my mistake and all the advice, thoughts that people like yourself are sharing now.

re: your question about stress, I do understand what you mean and they're wise words, its that i am finding it difficult to concentrate with my word stuffs and caseloads. So, yes, I gave into my weakness too i guess.

I'm sorry but I am having trouble with your train of thought.

You would be correct to mitigate your losses past and future. That is the basis for your claim and what an ET can assess to award you.

If you were surprised the other party made you an offer or you hadn't given the thought of settling the case then that unfortunately indicates you were poorly prepared in your understanding.

It all goes back to the question what it is you set out to achieve by going to ET. You have accepted an offer and now seem to be regretting doing so. It's not entirely a sensible mindset I'm afraid.

It is also precisely the reason once you agree with the ACAS conciliator there is no going back. There is no tolerance for this kind of mindset in the process. If you agree (even verbally) in front of them it's binding.

What they offered you barely covers their legal costs (or even a fraction of perhaps) let alone any potential awards on top. Could you have got more? Yes probably if your case had legs and you had been better prepared. It's a risk based settlement process.

So in order to try answer your question , could you have got more than £2k? Yes, probably very easily. The other party would have bit your hand off at £4k and probably for even more. I think they will be very pleased its over and at £4k they'll be over the moon.

It's done now, so be happy and move on in life.