Case 2200035/2021 · Employment Tribunal
Ms L Wood v BDSA Limited — 2021
- Case reference
- 2200035/2021
- Decision date
- 7 July 2021
- Jurisdiction
- England & Wales
- Judge
- Employment Judge Nicklin Sitting
Parties
2 namedClaimant
Ms L Wood
Respondent
Key findings
Tribunal's reasoningMs L Wood brought a claim for breach of contract and/or unlawful deductions from wages in respect of 8 weeks' unpaid notice pay. The tribunal found that on 26 March 2020 the parties agreed in writing to vary her contractual notice period from 4 weeks to 12 weeks. Mr Broom, then a director of the respondent, had authority to bind the company, and the 12-week version signed that day superseded the earlier 4-week contract.
The tribunal held that when the respondent terminated Ms Wood's employment on 5 October 2020 after giving only 4 weeks' notice, it breached the varied contract and deprived her of the further 8 weeks' notice to which she was entitled. It rejected the claimant's proposed calculation of £6,416.64 and accepted the respondent's calculation of £5,923.07 gross, subject to tax and National Insurance deductions.
In the alternative, the tribunal held that the same 8 weeks' notice pay was properly payable under the contract and that the failure to pay it was an unauthorised deduction under section 13 of the Employment Rights Act 1996. The later reconsideration application was refused on 27 August 2021 because the judge concluded there was no reasonable prospect of the reserved judgment being varied or revoked.
Claims and outcomes
2 findings recorded| Claim type | Issue or finding | Outcome | Protected characteristic | Award |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Breach of contract | The tribunal found that the parties varied the contractual notice period from 4 weeks to 12 weeks on 26 March 2020, and that the respondent ended employment on 5 October 2020 without giving the additional 8 weeks' notice. The award was not split between the alternative claims. | Upheld | — | — |
| Unlawful deduction from wages | Alternative basis only; the tribunal held that the 8 weeks' notice pay was properly payable under the varied contract and that the failure to pay it was an unauthorised deduction under section 13 ERA 1996. | Upheld | — | — |
Remedy
Monetary award- Total award
- £5,923
- across all upheld claims
- Compensatory award
- £5,923
- compensatory remedy recorded
Legal tests applied
5 references- Article 3 of the Employment Tribunals Extension of Jurisdiction (England and Wales) Order 1994
- section 13 ERA 1996
- balance of probabilities
- Rule 72(1) Employment Tribunals Rules of Procedure
- no reasonable prospect of the original decision being varied or revoked
Official outcome judgment PDF
Gov.uk primary recordThe 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.
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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