Mr J Wainwright v Asda Stores Limited — 2025

The claimant was dismissed summarily after the respondent concluded that he had misused personal information by giving customers colleagues' names and showing a public Facebook profile picture. The tribunal found that the principal reason for dismissal was conduct, namely the respondent's belief that the claimant had maliciously misused personal information to get colleagues into trouble.

The tribunal found the unfair dismissal complaint well-founded. It held that the respondent had a genuine belief in misconduct, but that the belief in gross misconduct was not held on reasonable grounds because significant matters were not investigated or put to the claimant, including the allegation that he acted maliciously and discreetly. The tribunal also found procedural unfairness, including failures under the ACAS Code, failure to properly consider mitigation, and failure to properly consider the appeal against the severity of the sanction. It found that summary dismissal was outside the range of reasonable responses.

For remedy issues decided at this stage, the tribunal found a 25% chance that the claimant would have been fairly dismissed in any event, a 15% ACAS uplift, and 50% reductions to the basic and compensatory awards for the claimant's blameworthy conduct. On wrongful dismissal, the tribunal found that the claimant had breached data protection and the respondent's policies, but had not acted maliciously and his conduct was not sufficiently serious to amount to a repudiatory breach justifying dismissal without notice.