Mr R J Taylor v Sainsburys Supermarkets Ltd — 2025

The claimant was disabled by ankylosing spondylitis. The tribunal found that the respondent failed to make reasonable adjustments by failing to adapt its absence management policy and by failing to ensure that the claimant only worked his base hours.

The tribunal found discrimination arising from disability in the respondent's use of the absence management policy, the payment of statutory sick pay instead of company sick pay after 19 May 2023, the formal written warning arising from sickness absence, the halving of the claimant's bonus because of that warning, and informing him he had not passed his probationary period as a shift manager. The direct disability discrimination complaints were dismissed.

The tribunal found that the claimant was entitled to company sick pay for 225 hours and that the failure to pay it was an unauthorised deduction from wages. It also found that the proven disability discrimination, failures to make reasonable adjustments and failure to pay company sick pay were sufficiently serious to breach the implied term of mutual trust and confidence, and that the claimant resigned in response without affirming the contract.