Mr K Roberts v Nextgenaccess Limited — 2021

Mr Roberts co-founded Nextgenaccess Limited and later became Technical Director and a board-level founder after Amber’s investment. The tribunal found that relations within the senior management team deteriorated over a series of incidents in late 2019 and early 2020, including disputes about sales, board communications, the handling of a section 72 notice, the claimant’s approach to colleagues, and the final domain/password issue in June 2020. The respondent relied on conduct and, alternatively, some other substantial reason based on an irretrievable breakdown in working relations.

The tribunal accepted that Mr Weller, as the dismissing manager, genuinely believed the claimant had behaved in ways that undermined colleagues and failed to comply with reasonable instructions. It found that belief was reasonably held on the evidence, including the contemporaneous emails from Mr Weller, Mr Alexander, Mr Terry, Mr Carter and others, and concluded that the dismissal reason was conduct and/or SOSR arising from an irretrievable breakdown in the relationship. The tribunal also held that dismissal fell within the band of reasonable responses.

The claim succeeded because the dismissal procedure was unfair. The tribunal held that a fair process should have involved an independent investigator, a decision-maker and an appeal officer, and that the claimant should have been told the whole case he had to meet. It was unfair for Mr Weller and Mr Marshall, both involved in the underlying disputes, effectively to conduct the disciplinary process, and the claimant was not given a properly independent appeal. The tribunal rejected the argument that this was a case where procedure could be dispensed with as futile.

On remedy-related findings, the tribunal assessed a Polkey reduction at 80% because a fair process was highly likely, though not certain, to have led to dismissal anyway. It also found contributory fault and reduced both the basic and compensatory awards by 75%, concluding that the claimant’s conduct had contributed to the dismissal. Separately, it held that the respondent unreasonably failed to comply with the ACAS Code and applied a 20% uplift. No final monetary award was set out in this judgment; remedy was left to be determined separately.