Ms Lynne Sloan v Greenleaf Hygiene Solutions (Scotland) Ltd — 2019

Ms Lynne Sloan brought a claim for unpaid wages arising out of her employment with Greenleaf Hygiene Solutions (Scotland) Ltd, which ended on 4 January 2019. The tribunal treated the case as one under section 13 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 and considered the claimant's asserted heads of salary, SSP, accrued holiday, commission, bonus, car hire and legal expenses. It heard evidence from the claimant, Mr John O'Donnell for the respondent, and Lorna Dougall.

The tribunal accepted the respondent's evidence on commission and bonus and held that no further sums were due on those heads. It also held that the car hire and legal expenses items were not wages within the meaning of section 13 ERA 1996. The tribunal found the respondent had wrongly applied SSP waiting-day rules by treating the first five days as unpaid, whereas SSP was not payable only for the first three qualifying days in a period of entitlement.

On holiday pay, the tribunal found that the claimant had already been paid for five days of accrued holiday, but that the respondent's calculations failed to account for Scottish bank holidays on 25 and 26 December 2018 and 1 and 2 January 2019. It accepted that there was no agreement that the claimant should be treated as taking accrued holidays during suspension and held that her sickness absence superseded any entitlement to full pay while suspended pending investigation.

The tribunal calculated that the claimant should have received £780.57 in total for the relevant periods, against payments already made of £515.47, leaving £265.10 outstanding. Judgment was entered for that sum, subject to any lawful deductions for tax and employee National Insurance if required.