Mrs B Mhindurwa v Lovingangels Care Limited — 2021

The tribunal found that Mrs B Mhindurwa was employed as a care assistant under an agreement dated 23 March 2018. It accepted that she later provided live-in care for HR, but when HR went into hospital on 8 February 2020 and then moved to a care home, the respondent no longer had live-in care work for her. The tribunal accepted the respondent's evidence that the remaining work was domiciliary care, which was not workable for the claimant because she lived in Birmingham.

The tribunal held that the claimant was dismissed because of redundancy, not because she had raised concerns about underpayment of wages. However, it found the dismissal unfair. Its reasons were that in July 2020 a reasonable employer would have considered furlough under the Coronavirus Jobs Retention Scheme, the respondent did not properly consider that option, and Mr Pacey's appeal hearing was described as a rubberstamp rather than a genuine appeal process. The remedy hearing was listed for 20 August 2021, so no final compensation figure was fixed in this judgment.

On the pay claims, the tribunal dismissed the complaints about unpaid wages and holiday pay. It accepted that the respondent had already paid £2,210.28 for historic underpayment, and that the claimant had not shown any further outstanding sum or demonstrated that the respondent's calculation of break pay was wrong. It also recorded that holiday pay of £2,233.44 and food allowance of £1,930 had already been paid.

The tribunal also found that the respondent had not provided the claimant with the Employee Handbook during her employment, despite the contract referring to it for disciplinary and grievance procedures. It held that this amounted to a breach of section 1(1) ERA 1996 and that the claimant was entitled to an award under section 38 Employment Act 2002, to be determined at the remedy hearing. The judgment also notes that the claimant was entitled to a redundancy payment of £1,614, but had already been paid £2,485.56.