Mr D Donnor v William Hill Organization Limited — 2019

This was a costs ruling before Employment Judge JM Wade at Leeds on 30 August 2019. The tribunal said the full chronology and reasons had been given in an extempore judgment. It found that the claimant had not known of the January hearing, had acted unreasonably in not sufficiently checking spam emails, and had applied for later adjournments with less than seven days' notice. On that basis, the thresholds for making a costs order were met.

The tribunal nevertheless declined to grant the respondent's application for costs. In exercising its discretion, it took into account that the claimant gave honest evidence, was apologetic, and had until very recently been a litigant in person. It also noted that he remained an employee of the respondent and that the respondent had itself incurred thrown-away costs only for the first hearing, with no evidence of such costs for the later two postponements.

The judge also referred to the claimant's medical position following a car accident, including a medical report prepared for civil proceedings, and accepted that his approach of waiting until two or three days before a hearing to see whether he would be well enough to take part was reasonable at the time given his knowledge then. The tribunal added that if the same circumstances arose again, and with the claimant now aware of the position, discretion would likely be exercised differently.