A manager at a social care charity has been awarded about £25,000 after an employment tribunal found she had been unfairly dismissed.
The judge increased the compensation due to Tracy Britcher because Hastings and Rother Voluntary Association for the Blind “unreasonably failed to comply” with best practice settling grievances.
Britcher’s claims for both unfair dismissal and wrongful dismissal were upheld by the tribunal after a hearing in December. The judge’s decision was released yesterday.
The tribunal has not published its reasons for reaching this decision, but said that HRVAB must pay Britcher £3,260 as a basic award and a further £21,400 in compensation.
The judge ‘uplifted’ the compensation by 15 per cent because the charity “unreasonably failed to comply with the Acas Code of Practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures”, the tribunal documents say.
HRVAB has raised more than £4m in the past five years to help provide residential and care services for people with visual impairments, according to the charity’s filings with the Charity Commission.
A spokesperson for Martin Searle Solicitors, which represented Britcher at the tribunal, told Civil Society Media that the firm was “particularly pleased that the judge awarded a 15 per cent uplift of her compensatory award in recognition that her former employer failed to have regard to basic standards of fairness set out in the Acas code of practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures.
“Whatever their size and sophistication, employers need to be aware of this framework, which operates as a guide as well as a sanction.”
HRVAB did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication.