Mr Mohamed Ageli v Sabtina Limited — 2025

The claimant was employed from 1 June 1987, latterly as Commercial Manager, and summarily dismissed on 18 March 2024. He brought claims for unfair dismissal, statutory redundancy payment, failure to provide written reasons for dismissal, wrongful dismissal/notice pay, holiday pay, contractual inflation-linked pay adjustment and outstanding expenses. Redundancy, notice and inflation-linked pay claims were dismissed (not pursued or already paid). The hearing took place over three days at Watford before Employment Judge Alliott, with both parties represented.

Applying British Home Stores Ltd v Burchell, the Tribunal found the respondent did not have a genuine belief in gross misconduct, did not conduct a reasonable investigation, and did not have reasonable grounds to conclude misconduct. Procedural failures included no notification of charges or evidence, no disciplinary hearing and no appeal, all in breach of the ACAS Code. The Tribunal found the real reason for dismissal was that the respondent wanted to remove the claimant after his duties had been allocated elsewhere. On Polkey, the Tribunal assessed a 33% chance that the claimant would have been dismissed in any event after a fair procedure of approximately six months, and a matching 33% contributory conduct deduction.

The holiday pay claim was upheld but quantum was left 'TO BE CONFIRMED'. The written reasons for dismissal claim was dismissed. Outstanding expenses of £11,946.96 were accepted as properly incurred but the Judge requested further submissions on whether judgment to a third party would breach the sanctions regime applicable to the respondent. PDF text truncated from 46,317 characters.