Mr D Pelter v Buro Four Project Services Ltd Heard remotely via CVP — 2021

Mr D Pelter brought claims of direct age discrimination and indirect age discrimination about the respondent's permanent health insurance arrangements. The tribunal held that, when the PHI scheme was entered into, the benefit fell within paragraph 14(1) of Schedule 9 Equality Act 2010 because the terminal age was 65, while the claimant's retirement age was 60 and his state pension age was 65 at that time. It found that the scheme was available to employees regardless of protected characteristics and that the terminal age was not unlawful at the point of entry.

The tribunal found that the claimant's PHI payments stopped on 7 March 2020, his 65th birthday, because that was the terminal age under the UNUM policy. It held that the relevant act was UNUM's refusal to pay beyond that date, not the respondent's conduct, and accepted the respondent's evidence that the claimant could not be moved to a more favourable scheme while already in receipt of PHI because he was a known liability and not an actively working risk. The tribunal preferred Smith v Gartner to Witham v Capita and, in the alternative, accepted that requiring the respondent to fund the extra payments would affect the money available for bonuses and other benefits, fairness of distribution, and competitiveness.

For indirect discrimination, the tribunal identified the PCP as provision of PHI on the terms of the relevant scheme, dependent on the entry date. It held that the PCP fell within paragraph 14(1) of Schedule 9, and if that was wrong, it was not persuaded that older people were more likely to be in claim at the critical time. The tribunal found that any disadvantage arose from the claimant's status as a person claiming benefits, not from age itself. It also held that the claims were out of time and that it would not be just and equitable to extend time.