Mr B Meechan v Represented by:- Mr W McPartland – Solicitor British Car Auctions Limited — 2018

The claimant presented his ET1 on 26 January 2018 alleging unfair dismissal and arrears of pay/wages. Because no response had been recorded, a Rule 21 default judgment was issued on 24 March 2018 and sent to the parties on 26 March 2018, with a remedy hearing listed for 15 May 2018. The respondent then applied for reconsideration, explaining that its ET3 had in fact been emailed on 1 March 2018 but had not been processed by the tribunal office, and that its HR administrator had also mistaken the response deadline as 1 March rather than 27 February 2018.

Applying Kwik Save Stores Limited v Swain and Others and considering all relevant factors, including the explanation for delay, the balance of prejudice, the existence of a stateable defence, and the overriding objective, the Employment Judge concluded that if the ET3 had been before her she would not have issued the default judgment. The respondent’s late response was accepted out of time, the earlier default judgment was set aside, and the case was restored to defended case management for a final hearing. The claimant had objected that there was no proper request for extension of time and that the respondent had delayed in making the application, but that objection was not accepted.