Alfonso Navarro v Affinity18 Limited — 2021

Alfonso Navarro, Marianella Fuentes and Nieves Navarro Fuentes worked for businesses controlled by Martin Finnerty without written contracts. The tribunal found that the work moved from Chromos to Affinity18 Ltd from 1 October 2018, that payments had previously come via White Bear Media Ltd, and that C1 was a credible witness. It accepted that C1 worked full time for MF, was integrated into the business and was an employee for the purposes of s.230 Employment Rights Act 1996, while C2 and C3 were workers rather than employees.

On dismissal, the tribunal preferred C1's evidence that MF stopped responding and that the working relationship ended when the Respondent ceased providing work. It held that this amounted to a dismissal and that there was no valid reason for it, so C1 succeeded in unfair dismissal and received a basic award of £1,129.86. His wrongful dismissal claim also succeeded: the tribunal found no notice had been given and awarded £753.24 as damages for breach of contract. C2 and C3's unfair dismissal and wrongful dismissal claims were dismissed because they were not employees.

On holiday pay, the tribunal found that the claimants did not receive paid annual leave and instead only sometimes received holiday pay in lieu. Applying the 5.6 week entitlement under the Working Time Regulations 1998, it awarded £3,564.22 to C1, £1,064.40 to C2 and £1,450.27 to C3, while declining any further award for earlier years because it had no payslips for those periods. It also found unauthorised deductions from wages for payslip discrepancies and awarded C1 £907.50 and C2 £390.61 after comparing payslips, bank transfers and the additional joint-account transfers.

The pension contribution complaints were dismissed. The tribunal found no properly completed opt-out notices, but held that complaints about failure to auto-enrol belonged with the Pensions Regulator rather than the Employment Tribunal, and C1's employee-contribution point failed because there was no deduction from wages. It also made a separate award to C1 under s.38 Employment Act 2002 for failure to provide written particulars of employment, bringing the stated totals to £7,861.30 for C1, £1,455.01 for C2 and £1,450.27 for C3.