Mrs O Oluwi v Post Office Ltd — 2021

Mrs O Oluwi brought a claim of unauthorised deductions from wages arising from sick pay and pay for periods of absence between 19 January and 17 February 2021. The tribunal held that the Post Office sick pay policy was incorporated into her contract of employment, even though she said she had not accessed it on the intranet, because it had been in effect before her employment began and had later revisions. Applying section 13 ERA 1996, the tribunal asked what was contractually due and whether any lesser sum had been paid.

The tribunal rejected the claimant’s challenge to a one-day absence on 8 January 2018, accepting the contemporaneous return-to-work form signed by a manager as credible evidence of sickness absence. It also rejected the contention that a 14-day absence from 23 April 2020 to 6 May 2020 should be disregarded as Covid-related; the form recorded throat pain and respiratory difficulties, there was no evidence that the illness was in fact Covid-19, and the guidance in force did not require all Covid-related absence to be disregarded. The tribunal found that the claimant was too sick to work during that period and that it was properly treated as sick leave.

On the January 2021 self-isolation period, the tribunal found that the relevant Covid pay guidance did not require payment where the claimant was already signed off sick and not fit to work from home. It accepted that she had been signed off work from 21 August 2020 until her return on 17 February 2021, and concluded that the respondent was not required to pay her for the self-isolation period or disregard it for sick pay calculations. The tribunal therefore found that the respondent had paid all sums contractually due and that there had been no unauthorised deduction from wages, so the claim was dismissed.