In person For the v Respondent — 2019

The claimant was dismissed on 17 July 2018 without notice and her appeal was dismissed on 11 September 2018. She lodged ACAS early conciliation on 12 October 2018 naming Welbourne Primary School, and later filed again against London Borough of Haringey on 19 October 2018 after realising the wrong respondent had been named. The tribunal held that the mistaken naming of the school was a minor error, relying on Chard v Trowbridge Office Cleaning Services Ltd, and treated the first ACAS contact as the relevant one for early conciliation timing.

For unfair dismissal, the tribunal applied section 111(2) ERA 1996 and the early conciliation provisions in section 207B ERA 1996. It calculated that the relevant deadline to present the tribunal claim was 12 December 2018, but the claim form was not lodged until 11 January 2019. The tribunal found that it was reasonably practicable for the claimant to file in time because she knew the time limits and had advice from her trade union; waiting for a response from the union and respondent, and the holiday period, did not justify an extension.

The tribunal also applied the discrimination limitation test and held that it was not just and equitable to extend time for the disability and race discrimination claims. In reaching that conclusion it considered the delay, the fact that the claimant had not provided sufficient detail of the alleged discriminatory events by the tribunal deadline, the possibility that some matters dated back to 2017, and the resulting prejudice to the respondent. It therefore held that it had no jurisdiction to hear the unfair dismissal, disability discrimination, race discrimination, and other payments claims, and dismissed them all.