Ms M Tether (Counsel). For the v Respondent — 2020

This was a preliminary jurisdiction hearing, not a merits hearing. The claimant presented an ET1 on 1 July 2019 without an ACAS Early Conciliation Certificate number. The tribunal accepted that the claim did not fall within any exemption and that section 18A of the Employment Tribunals Act 1996 therefore applied. The claim was rejected under rule 10C(1), and the claimant later obtained an ACAS certificate dated 19 July 2019 after the rejection had already been sent to him on 9 July 2019.

The respondent argued that the later certificate did not cure the earlier defect and that, in any event, the claim was out of time because the relevant limit expired on 11 July 2019. The claimant's counsel did not pursue an argument that the claim should survive. The tribunal referred to EON Control Solutions Ltd v Caspall and held that it had no jurisdiction to hear the claimant's claims, so the claims were rejected.

The judge also noted that there was a second claim, case number 3323491/2019, which appeared to have a similar issue with the ACAS certificate number, but that matter was not before the tribunal on this occasion. No compensation or other remedy was awarded because no substantive claim was determined.