Carol Soulsby v DPD Group UK Limited — 2025

The tribunal found there was a genuine redundancy situation at the Stoke site. It accepted that the respondent had applied its mind to the redundancy pool and that using a one-establishment approach for the Stoke closure was within the range of reasonable responses. It did not find that failing to pool the claimant with the customer service manager at Smethwick was substantively unreasonable.

The unfair dismissal claim succeeded on procedural grounds. The tribunal found the respondent did not consult adequately about the pooling rationale, did not provide further information requested by the claimant, and did not give adequate time for meaningful consultation before dismissal. It also found the appeal did not properly clarify or deal with the claimant's point about selection criteria applying to customer service managers at Stoke and Smethwick.

The tribunal applied a four-week Polkey-type assessment, finding that a reasonable employer would have consulted adequately for a further four weeks but would still have dismissed the claimant fairly after that period. The direct age discrimination claim was dismissed: the tribunal found the claimant was moved to Stoke because of her managerial capability and to improve performance, rejected the allegation of an orchestrated removal, and found the redundancy, pooling approach and appeal handling were not because of age.