Mr Asad Rao v Lloyds Bank plc — 2025

The claimant did not attend the preliminary hearing on 28 February 2025 and did not respond to the Tribunal's same-day request to confirm whether he wished to pursue the claim. The Tribunal later warned him that it proposed to strike out the claims for failure to comply with orders and/or because they were not being actively pursued; he did not respond by the deadline, but shortly after being told a strike out judgment would be issued he emailed to apologise for limited communication and asked for the hearing to be delayed until July or August.

The Tribunal vacated the April hearing and relisted it for 18 August 2025. The claimant did not attend that hearing and did not communicate with the Tribunal, despite a phone message and email from the clerk. The Tribunal recorded that the claimant's only communication since the ET1 was presented was the single email sent on 14 April 2025.

The Tribunal considered strike out as a sanction of last resort and considered making an unless order, but concluded that an unless order would serve no useful purpose. Having regard to the chronology and the overriding objective, it struck out the claimant's complaints in their entirety because he had failed actively to pursue them.