Claimant v Caledonia Pension Administration Ltd — 2019

The tribunal accepted that the respondent's business was redundant and focused on two live issues: the claimant's length of service for redundancy pay and whether she was owed pay in lieu of notice. It rejected the respondent's case that the claimant had been employed by another company until September 2015 and found that she was employed by the respondent from 1 April 2014. In reaching that conclusion, the tribunal relied on the March 2014 contract signed by both parties, the claimant's understanding of who employed her, Mr Bates's management of her work, and its finding that her core duties remained pensions administration throughout.

On that basis the tribunal held that the claimant had five complete years' service by the July 2019 dismissal. It found that she was 50 at the date of dismissal and used a weekly gross pay figure of £525 for the statutory redundancy calculation, resulting in redundancy pay of £3,937.50. The judgment records the award as '£3.937.5', but the reasons set out the calculation and amount as £3,937.50.

For the breach of contract claim, the tribunal found that dismissal took effect on 31 July 2019, with notice given on 11 July 2019, so the claimant was entitled to five weeks' notice. It assessed her weekly wage at £436.38, valued the five weeks' notice at £2,181.90, and then applied a broad-brush deduction because she had already been paid to the end of July. The tribunal therefore awarded £872.76 in damages for failure to make a payment in lieu of notice.

The holiday pay claim was dismissed. The claimant accepted that she had taken leave during the relevant leave year but could not say how much leave she had taken between 1 January 2019 and the end of her employment. The tribunal accepted the respondent's evidence that she had taken all leave due and held that, in the absence of evidence showing any outstanding entitlement, no holiday pay award could be made.