Mrs G Sakaliniene v Collette Ann Howarth — 2020

The tribunal substituted Collette Ann Howarth as respondent because the claimant's documents showed that she, not 'Karen's Bistro', was the employer. No response had been filed and neither party attended the hearing, so the judge proceeded under rule 21 in the interests of justice and the overriding objective.

The claimant had worked as a coffee shop assistant from 20 January 2015 to 21 January 2020. The tribunal accepted wage slips showing a normal fortnightly wage of £288, from which it calculated an hourly rate of £9. The claimant claimed £356 for 21 days' holiday pay and £900 for unpaid overtime.

The unpaid overtime/unlawful deduction claim succeeded. The judge treated the reference to 106 hours as a typo and proceeded on the basis that the claim related to 100 hours of overtime. In the absence of any response from the respondent, the tribunal accepted that the overtime had been worked and not paid, and found that the underpayment was likely to have arisen through a series of deductions. It therefore awarded £900.

The holiday pay claim was dismissed. The tribunal said it could not determine the amount due because the claimant's calculation of £16.95 per day did not make clear how it related to her 16-hour working week, and the tribunal did not know how many hours she worked per day. On that basis it was impossible to calculate a daily rate of pay, so no holiday pay award was made.