In person For the v Mrs C Arora — 2024

Ms J Dholakiya worked for Mrs C Arora t/a Wink Spa Hair & Beauty as a beautician and hairdresser from June 2023 until 4 November 2023. She brought a claim on 11 February 2024 for unpaid wages, said to be the balance of £2,417.96 after she had received £2,337.87 of the £4,755.83 she said she was owed. The tribunal heard from the claimant, Mrs Arora, and two of Mrs Arora’s employees, together with WhatsApp messages, payslips, letters and timesheets.

The tribunal preferred Mrs Arora’s evidence on the payment arrangement. It found that the parties agreed the claimant would be paid through her payslip for 10 hours per week, with additional hours paid cash in hand at £10 per hour. That conclusion was supported by the 7 July 2023 WhatsApp message, the lack of contemporaneous complaint about the payslips, the June and September timesheets, and a letter stating that the claimant had worked 10 hours per week since 3 June 2023. The tribunal found the claimant’s evidence confused and frequently contradictory, and it found that the extra hours were not worked in a self-employed capacity but formed disguised employment.

Applying Patel v Mirza 2017 AC 467 SC, the tribunal held that the arrangement was performed in an illegal way and that the claim could not be enforced. It found that the tax system’s integrity would be undermined if the claim succeeded, that refusing relief was a proportionate response, and that the claimant was more likely than not the instigator of the arrangement. The tribunal also found that the pay arrangement was central to the contract and to the dispute before it, and concluded that allowing enforcement would be an affront to public conscience. The claim was therefore dismissed on grounds of illegality, with no award made.