Miss J Frood v Ms Fiona Burton (formerly T/a The Stag Bar) — 2017

On reconsideration, Employment Judge Garvie revoked the earlier default judgment and allowed the respondent to lodge an ET3 within 28 days. The earlier default award, which had granted £432 notice pay, £432 redundancy pay and a £160 lodging fee, was therefore set aside. The tribunal also directed that, once the response was received, the claim and response would be served on Hawthorn Leisure Ltd, which was to be sisted as a second respondent.

At the hearing, the claimant accepted that her notice pay complaint was out of time. Her employment ended on 19 June 2016, but she did not contact ACAS until 12 October 2016, which meant she could not obtain the benefit of the section 207B time extension. The tribunal therefore treated the notice pay complaint as withdrawn and dismissed it.

The remaining complaint was for a redundancy payment. The tribunal recorded that this had been submitted in time because the relevant time limit was six months, and it did not determine entitlement on that issue at this stage. The respondent said she had been a sole trader trading as The Stag Bar and that there may have been a transfer to Hawthorn Leisure Ltd; the tribunal identified possible preliminary issues of whether there had been a TUPE transfer, when any transfer took effect, and whether, if there was no transfer, the claimant remained employed by the respondent until termination.