The claimant worked for the respondent which had an agency agreement with a gas provider. Customers would attend the respondent’s premises if interested in getting a gas supply and paperwork would be signed and returned to the gas provider to authorise its supply.

The claimant accepted that on one occasion he signed the name of particular customer on the ‘hire agreement document’ but claimed that this was accepted practice. The customer’s husband raised concerns with the respondent about the claimant signing the document in his wife’s name.

The claimant was informally told at a meeting that he may be dismissed or have disciplinary proceedings brought against him. 4 days later the claimant was told at a meeting that he was dismissed and was handed the dismissal letter. The claimant then unsuccessfully appealed. The tribunal held that there was both procedural and substantive unfairness in the investigation process and the claimant was unfairly dismissed.

Practical lessons

The respondent failed to initially take a note of the complaint, failed to investigate the claimant’s argument that what he did was common practice, failed to take minutes of the disciplinary hearing or appeal hearing and the same managers to who the complaints were made conducted both the disciplinary and appeal hearings. Put simply, the respondent flagrantly ignored all of its statutory disciplinary obligations.

However, the tribunal made particular reference to the requirement of an investigation to properly consider what exactly the claimant’s defence was and actively test it, particularly when the allegations are serious. Here, this could have included testing whether other colleagues had similarly signed customers’ names or what training was provided to staff.

An employer has to at least show that it has taken an employee’s defence seriously and looked at the evidence which may exonerate them. Whilst this places a positive obligation on an employer, failure to properly do so will itself render a dismissal unfair.