Mrs H Baronova v Cakes by Alli-Baba Limited (Company number — 2024

Mrs H Baronova brought a claim for unlawful deduction of wages. No ET3 was lodged within the statutory period, a default judgment issued on 22 November 2023, and the respondent later applied for revocation and for its late response to be accepted. At the CVP hearing on 8 April 2024, Employment Judge McFatridge heard evidence from Ms Stewart for the respondent; the claimant did not give evidence but cross-examined Ms Stewart. The judgment revoked the default judgment, extended time, directed that the ET3 submitted on 5 December 2023 be accepted, and ordered that a further final hearing be fixed to determine the substantive issues.

The judge accepted Ms Stewart's explanation for the late response. He found that the respondent was a small bakery business, that Ms Stewart had been diagnosed with Functional Neurological Disorder in February 2023, and that her symptoms included brain fog and difficulty dealing with numbers. He also accepted that she was under personal stress from her father's illness, temporary housing arrangements, recovery from Covid in the business, and disruption caused by Storm Babette. The judge found that she had read the notice of claim incorrectly, become fixated on the 11 January hearing date, and intended to dispute the claim, but had mistaken that date for the response deadline. The delay was short and she contacted the tribunal promptly after receiving the default judgment.

Applying the overriding objective and considering the reason for the default, the short delay, and the balance of prejudice, the judge held that the interests of justice favoured revocation because the respondent would otherwise be shut out from a defence that, if factually correct, would mean nothing was due to the claimant, while the claimant would lose only time and the benefit of a default judgment. The judgment also corrected the respondent's designation to Cakes by Alli-Baba Limited (company number SC567029) and held that the purported counterclaim was incompetent because the claimant had not brought a breach of contract claim.