Case 1403100/2020 · Employment Tribunal

(1) Miss C Gardner (2) Miss J Thompson v Towergate Underwriting Group Limited — 2021

Case reference: 1403100/2020
Decision date: 27 May 2021
Jurisdiction: England & Wales
Judge: Employment Judge J Bax Representation
Venue: Bristol

Indexed: 21 May 2026

Parties

2 named

Claimant

(1) Miss C Gardner (2) Miss J Thompson

Respondent

Towergate Underwriting Group Limited

Key findings

Tribunal's reasoning

At the Bristol Employment Tribunal on 25 May 2021, Employment Judge J Bax dealt with preliminary issues in the linked claims brought by Miss C Gardner and Miss J Thompson against Towergate Underwriting Group Limited. The judgment records oral reasons only, with written reasons to follow only if requested.

Miss Gardner's unfair dismissal claim was presented out of time. The tribunal found it was reasonably practicable for her to have presented the claim in time, so it had no jurisdiction and the claim was struck out.

In the same decision, the tribunal recorded that the last allegation in Miss Gardner's Equality Act 2010 claims was out of time, but that it was just and equitable to extend time. Those Equality Act claims were allowed to proceed to a final hearing, subject to the Respondent being able to argue at that hearing that other allegations were not part of conduct extending over a period and were therefore out of time.

Miss Thompson's unfair dismissal claim was dismissed upon her withdrawal. The tribunal also found that she had not entered ACAS early conciliation before presenting her claim and that none of the regulation 3 exemptions applied, so it had no jurisdiction to hear her claims and they were struck out.

Claims and outcomes

4 findings recorded

This case has mixed outcomes under at least one legal claim type. A tribunal can uphold some allegations and dismiss others under the same legal head, so rows below may represent separate issues or allegation groups from the judgment.

Claim type	Issue or finding	Outcome	Protected characteristic	Award
Unfair dismissal	Presented out of time; the tribunal found it was reasonably practicable for the First Claimant to have presented the claim in time, so it had no jurisdiction to hear it.	Struck out	—	—
Other	The tribunal recorded that the last allegation in the First Claimant's Equality Act 2010 claims was out of time, but time was extended on a just and equitable basis and those claims were allowed to proceed to a final hearing. The judgment does not identify the protected characteristic in the text provided.	Other	—	—
Unfair dismissal	The Second Claimant's unfair dismissal claim was dismissed following her withdrawal of the claim.	Withdrawn	—	—
Other	The tribunal found that the Second Claimant had not entered ACAS early conciliation before presenting her claim and that none of the regulation 3 exemptions applied, so it had no jurisdiction and her claims were struck out. The judgment does not identify the underlying claim type in this paragraph.	Struck out	—	—

Legal tests applied

4 references

Official outcome judgment PDF

Gov.uk primary record

The official judgment PDF on gov.uk contains the tribunal's outcome, reasoning, and any remedy details. Where this page does not yet show extracted outcomes for every claim, use the PDF as the authoritative source.

Open official judgment PDF on gov.uk

Published on gov.uk under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

How we got this data

Case essentials (reference, date, judge, venue, country, claim categories) are extracted from the structured metadata gov.uk publishes alongside each decision. Parties and monetary figures are extracted from the judgment PDF text. Key findings and per-claim outcomes require a second extraction pass that is not yet complete for this case — until then, the primary source linked above is the authoritative record. See full methodology.

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