Mr James MacMillan v Represented by:-10 Ms M Dalziel – Solicitor Jordan Electrics Limited — 2017

Mr James MacMillan resigned from Jordan Electrics Ltd on 16 June 2017. The respondent did not require him to work his notice and instead proposed pay in lieu. It then withheld £1,694 from his final pay, saying he had left a backlog of electrical certificates and that its handbook entitled it to recover costs arising from the claimant’s "blatant negligence". The tribunal accepted that the claimant was more likely than not to have received the Employee Handbook, but it also found that he had been working long days and evenings on the certificates and that the number of outstanding certificates had not been clearly explained.

The tribunal rejected the respondent’s case that the claimant’s conduct amounted to "blatant negligence" and rejected its loss case. It found there was no clear evidence as to why the backlog had built up, why the number of outstanding certificates appeared to move from 79 to 140 and then to 279, or how any recoverable loss was quantified. The tribunal accepted that Mr Dyet and Mr Cox worked on the certificates after the claimant left, but held that the respondent had only shown that it paid its own employees for work they were already due to be paid for, not that it had proved a quantifiable loss of profits or opportunity.

Applying section 13 of the Employment Rights Act 1996, the tribunal held that the respondent was not entitled to deduct £1,300 from the claimant’s wages and ordered repayment of that gross amount, with the claimant responsible for any tax and national insurance due. It separately recorded that the parties had agreed holiday pay of £394 was outstanding and payable, but no award was made for that element because the tribunal understood it had already been paid.