Miss N Browne-Marke v NR Solicitors Limited — 2021

The tribunal found that Miss N Browne-Marke started work as a paralegal in January 2019, that she was told she would be offered a training contract after satisfactory performance, and that the respondent did not provide her with an individual contract or compliant written particulars. It also found that wage payments were intermittent and erratic, that the respondent had underpaid her on a number of occasions, and that leave taken between 10 December 2019 and 7 January 2020 was authorised rather than unauthorised.

For dismissal, the tribunal accepted the claimant's evidence that she contacted Ms Baker on 9 and 10 March 2020, attended the office on 12 March, and then sent an email on 19 March 2020 asking about the shortfall in her wages. It rejected the respondent's shifting explanations about performance, attendance, files, and financial reasons, and concluded that the reason or principal reason for dismissal was the claimant's complaint about unpaid wages. The dismissal was therefore automatically unfair under s104 ERA 1996 because she had asserted a statutory right not to suffer unauthorised deductions from wages.

On remedy, the tribunal found no basis for a basic award because the claim was brought under s104 and the claimant did not have the service required for an ordinary unfair dismissal basic award. It accepted that she had made reasonable efforts to mitigate her loss, made no Polkey reduction and no contributory conduct reduction, and refused an ACAS uplift because it found the disciplinary code did not apply on the facts as it had found them. The tribunal awarded a compensatory sum of £14,251, recorded a recoupment schedule with a prescribed element of £9,660.58 and balance of £4,590.42, awarded £622 gross for agreed underpaid salary, £1,130.76 gross for 21 days unpaid holiday, and £1,076 for failure to provide written particulars, giving a further gross award of £1,752.76 for the wages and holiday claim.