Mr R J Robalino v The NLP Academy Limited OPEN PRELIMINARY HEARING — 2022

Mr Robalino brought claims of unfair dismissal, unlawful deductions from wages, failure to provide pay in lieu of notice, a redundancy payment, and other payments. The tribunal recorded an agreed effective date of termination of 10 January 2020, so the ordinary three-month time limit expired on 9 April 2020. Early Conciliation was not started until 9 June 2020 and the ET1 was not presented until 12 July 2020, which was approximately three months late.

The tribunal applied s.111 Employment Rights Act 1996 and referred to Wall's Meat Co Ltd v Khan and Porter v Bandridge Ltd. It found that it was reasonably practicable for the claim to have been brought in time. The claimant said that COVID-19 lockdowns in Spain and England, his girlfriend's pregnancy, and later alleged settlement discussions explained the delay, but the tribunal gave little weight to the settlement point because it was raised only in cross-examination and was unsupported by evidence.

The tribunal also found that the claimant was IT-literate, had lived and worked in the UK for about two years, and could have completed the ET1 in a couple of hours. It held that the first lockdown only began in late March 2020, so it did not explain delay before then, and there was no medical evidence about his girlfriend's health. On his own evidence, he had decided by late February 2020 that he was going to bring a claim, but he still did not file it by 9 April 2020. All claims were therefore dismissed for want of jurisdiction, and previous orders, including the unless order of 24 June 2021, were set aside.