In person For the v Respondent — 2021

This was an open preliminary hearing by CVP on 26 January 2021 before Employment Judge D A Pearl. The claimant was unrepresented and the respondent was represented by counsel. The tribunal proceeded on the basis that the claimant's account could be assumed to be true, so no oral evidence was taken. The only claim identified was constructive unfair dismissal, and the tribunal addressed whether it had jurisdiction to hear it.

The claimant said in her resignation email of 11 March 2020 that she was resigning from her role as Financial Controller at FCB Inferno, effective 10 March 2020, and that based on her notice her last day would be 9 June 2020. The contract required three months' written notice. The respondent later wrote on 1 June 2020 confirming that the termination date would be Tuesday 9 June 2020, and the P45 also gave 9 June as the leaving date.

The claimant argued that she had made a mistake in the notice period because of anxiety and stress, and that the last day should have been 10 June 2020, which would have given her two years' service. The tribunal rejected that argument. It held that she had given notice determining the contract of employment, specified her last date of employment, and that the respondent accepted that notice before that date arrived. On those facts, she did not have two years' qualifying service.

The tribunal therefore found that the claimant lacked qualifying service and that there was no jurisdiction to entertain the claim. It also noted, but did not need to decide, a suggestion that the short notice might amount to repudiatory breach of contract; the judge said that point was academic in light of the respondent's acceptance of the resignation.