Miss Donna Haughton v Tjx UK — 2021

Miss Donna Haughton worked for TJX UK from 25 April 2010 and became a Store Manager before moving to Crawley on 18 April 2018. Employment Judge Sage found that her mid-year review on 24 August 2018 had been prewritten by Mr Young, did not reflect a proper two-way discussion, and did not record any meaningful discussion of KPIs. The tribunal preferred the claimant's evidence on that point and found that the review process did not follow the respondent's own performance policy.

The tribunal found that Mr Young repeatedly raised concerns about the claimant's performance and repeatedly told her that she might be placed on a PIP. It also found that he made enquiries of staff and other managers about her domestic abuse and personal circumstances, including contacting or speaking with Ms Knight, Mr E, Ms B, Ms I and Mr T, and that on at least two occasions he breached confidentiality. The tribunal concluded that these enquiries were not shown to be part of a genuine support process and that his communications with others focused on whether her personal circumstances affected performance.

The tribunal also found that Mr Young managed the claimant in a consistently negative way, gave her long task lists despite accepting that the store was short staffed, and failed to give her praise or encouragement in the way he did with other employees. It found that the end of year review on 28 January 2019 had also been prewritten and initially omitted KPI figures, although the amended version showed that the store had performed well on objective measures. The tribunal accepted that the respondent's capability case was not supported by the objective performance data and that the claimant's performance history before Mr Young had been good.

On the final issue, the tribunal held that the cumulative conduct breached the implied term of trust and confidence, applying Western Excavating, Malik, Omilaju and Kaur. It accepted that the final store visit on 24 June 2019 was the final straw and that the claimant resigned on 2 July 2019 in response to that breach. The tribunal therefore held that she had been constructively dismissed and that the dismissal was unfair. No remedy was assessed in this judgment; the parties were invited to try to resolve the matter and, failing that, the case would proceed to a remedy hearing on reinstatement or re-engagement.