Employment Law Case Study

Client: Professor Alan Bradshaw, Cardiff University

Audience: Business law students

Brief: Describe the "Unfair Dismissal" process

THE SQUARE PEG IN THE ROUND HOLE

Subject: David Grosvenor
Age: 24
Employer: One of the Big Four banks
Place of work: London
Reason for tribunal: Unfair dismissal.

Synopsis:

After being transferred from one of the bank's computer centres to another, David was given the impression that his work in a completely new field was satisfactory.

The following year, without warning, disciplinary procedures were started against him, on the grounds of 'inefficiency'.

David was put on several probation periods, and at the end of each he was officially considered to have improved in every area, but not to the degree of having the charges against him dropped.

After more than two years, he was dismissed, and took the bank to an industrial tribunal. It ruled in favour of the bank.

…

In the late '70s, before every office desk had a PC on it, David saw a future in personal computing. He had an analytical and imaginative mind, and various personal profile tests indicated that his skills lay in programming. He was well-educated, artistic, musical and well-travelled. The only obstacle to his first foothold in the computing field was his background in advertising and graphics.

He found the ideal compromise in the form of the microfiche department of one of the Big Four clearing banks. The position was offered not on the strength of his willingness to learn how to operate the equipment there, but because it was reasoned that his graphics experience could - in this particular area - come in useful.

At the time, David was living in the East End of London with his girlfriend. The implications of round-the-clock shift work were discussed. There were disadvantages, but on the whole they were outweighed by the advantages of additional shift-related payments, which took an inadequate salary to one that was higher than average for the time.

He accepted the bank's offer of employment. During the induction week at the bank's headquarters, he learnt about the bank and its operations, and the basics of computing. He was also given a little blue book that described in detail the agreement between the bank and the unions over disciplinary and dismissal procedures. It was to come in handy later on.

He passed his end-of-course examinations with ease, and completed his probationary period in the despatch department of the microfiche centre, away from the computers he had joined the bank to operate. There, he logged incoming and outgoing computer tapes, and packed up customers' microfiche, ready for delivery.

When David asked when he could move to the operations floor, he was told that there were no vacancies there, but as soon as one became available, he would be transferred there. And that was a promise.

During the next twelve months, several vacancies arose on the operations floor. These were filled by new staff. When David raised the issue at two six-monthly performance reviews, he was given the same promise, namely that he would fill the next available vacancy, and finally start working with the computers.

David carried on logging tapes and despatching microfiche, until he was pleased, apprehensive and also dismayed at the news that the centre he was working in was to be closed down.

He was pleased, because staff were given the option of transferring to one of two alternative centres, where he was sure that he would receive the computer training for which he had waited so patiently. He was apprehensive because one of the conditions of that transfer was that if he hadn't reached the required level of operational skill within six months, he was faced with compulsory redundancy. And he was dismayed because nobody, however much he asked, would give him a definition of 'required operational skill'. He had picked up a certain amount of knowledge through osmosis, but his skill level was nowhere near that of those working on the computer floor.

One of the alternative sites would have halved his travelling time. The other would have doubled it. While discussing the options open to him with the manager brought in to oversee the centre's shutdown, David suggested that it might be a good idea for the staff involved to visit the two centres in question, to give them an idea of what to expect.

That suggestion was turned down.

Another option came up: the possibility of a transfer to the bank's headquarters, where programmers were needed. Shift work was taking its toll on his home life, and relations with his girlfriend had deteriorated to the point where he was seriously considering moving out, but had not decided where. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to kill two birds with one stone.

Together with the supervisor of one of the other shifts, David applied to take a programming aptitude test. They took it in the centre manager's office. During that test, the phone there rang incessantly, even though the manager was known to be off the premises at the time, and it was also known there was an important exam going on in his office. David took the phone off the hook, to allow them both to concentrate, but one of the security staff was instructed to come in and put the receiver back on again. The phone then continued to ring. Neither David - with no real computer experience - nor the shift supervisor - with a great deal of experience - managed to finish the test.

That only left David with the option of accepting either an insulting redundancy payment or a transfer to one of the other two sites. He accepted the offer of a transfer, and requested that it would be to the centre closer to where he lived.

The request was not granted.

Things at the new centre did not start well. Commuting from the East End to Central London was easy. David's little moped was ideal for the run into town, and for weaving through rush-hour traffic. It was less than ideal for the trek from one side of London to the other, though. The North Circular Road is not a moped-friendly way of getting from point A to point B. And the new centre was not served by public transport.

David made a couple of trials runs from home to his new place of work the weekend before he was due to start there, for timing purposes. But he still signed in three minutes late on Day One. Because he hadn't been permitted to look round the centre, and was unaware of the fact that there was a changing-room available, he asked the first person he saw where he could change from the rain-soaked bike clothing he was wearing into his suit. He was directed to the staff toilets and abandoned - by the shift manager on duty at the time. After wandering through the centre, dripping water onto the floor wherever he went, he was directed to the staff lounge, where he was supposed to be …

… and where his absence had been noted. News of his lateness reached the centre manager - ironically, the same person who had been brought in to oversee the closedown of the microfiche centre, and who had turned down David's request for himself and other staff to visit the alternative sites.

It was not an auspicious start.

(Let's fast-forward to the end of this)

The working day was drawing to a close when the tribunal returned to make its judgement. The bank, it said, had followed its disciplinary and dismissal procedures correctly. This, despite the fact that it had thrown the proverbial book at David without the stipulated oral and written warnings. End of story. Thank you, and goodbye.

It wasn't very long before David heard that the similar disciplinary actions taken against Louise and another newcomer to the centre had been suddenly and mysteriously dropped.

The tribunal's written statement, delivered some time afterwards, made no mention of the sudden break in the proceedings when David brought up the matter of being considered 'psychologically disturbed'. Nor could he find any reference to it in the tribunal records that were published later. Officially, it didn't happen.

David went back to college. He had qualified for two government-sponsored training courses: one for programming, and the other for technical writing. He chose the latter, perhaps as a reaction to the bank-like environment of the programming course. He passed all his City&Guilds examinations with credits, and became a freelance technical writer. He was asked, at the end of one assignment, to stay with the company that had hired him. Within six months, he had been promoted to Systems Manager, overseeing mainframe operations, and writing programs.

It has now been seven years since David became Systems Manager for an organisation that welcomes innovation. It would have taken him much longer to get that far if he'd stayed with the bank. If, of course, the bank had ever considered promoting him in the first place. Now, he's happy working with everyone from senior management down to new trainees.

His experience at the bank did leave a bitter taste in his mouth, though. Until last year. By pure chance, he bumped into one of his ex-supervisors, who had been particularly unpleasant to him during those last few months at the new computer centre.

Pleasantries were exchanged, and David asked how things were at the bank, and how his ex-supervisor was getting on there. And, as he'd done while David was there, he grumbled about the management, and grumbled even more about his lack of promotion. In short, the bank hadn't seen his potential, and now his cut-price mortgage had well and truly tied him to the job, he was trapped and could see no way out until it was time for him to retire.

David almost felt sorry for him - for a second or two - until he remembered those final few months, tried not to smile when he offered his sympathies, and then walked away, glad that he was no longer working with such people, or for them.

Life, for David, had suddenly become sweet again.

END