Miss J Hale v Call Centre Ops Ltd (In Creditors Voluntary Liquidation) — 2019

The respondent did not attend the hearing, and the tribunal proceeded in its absence under rule 47. Employment Judge Harfield accepted the claimant’s evidence that her employer remained Call Centre Ops Ltd throughout, despite the respondent’s denial that it employed her after 30 April 2018 and the appearance of an affiliated company on her payslips. The tribunal found there was not sufficient evidence of any change of employer and held that the respondent was the claimant’s employer for the relevant period.

On the financial claim, the tribunal found that the respondent had failed to pay two agreed staff referral fees of £150 each, totalling £300, and had also failed to pay one week’s pay of £300. The tribunal was satisfied that these sums had been withheld and that this amounted to an unauthorised deduction from wages. It ordered the respondent to pay the claimant £600 gross, with the claimant responsible for any tax and employee national insurance due.

The tribunal considered holiday pay but concluded that nothing further was due in respect of accrued and untaken leave. Although the claimant said her holiday year ran from April to April and that she had only 1.2 days’ holiday accrued and untaken as at September 2018, the tribunal held on reflection that she had already taken more holiday than a proportional allocation of the holiday year would allow. No separate holiday pay award was therefore made.