The Moore Barlow Employment team acted for an individual with over 20 years’ experience working in the media and advertising industry across the biggest UK media agencies and consultancies.
The background
Whilst working for a global agency during the pandemic, following a period of disruption within management, our client began to experience bullying from one of his new managers.
Having raised his concerns with line management and HR, our client was placed on a performance improvement plan that was manifestly unfair and did not provide him with a reasonable opportunity to improve. Our client was also suffering from poor health that culminated in him being diagnosed with a condition that amounted to a disability that he drew to the attention of the business.
Notwithstanding this, a month after having been placed on the performance improvement plan, our client was told that the business did not think that any additional training or support would be enough to improve his performance and that he would therefore be dismissed.
In a further attempt to intimidate our client, the business went on to assert that our client had unlawfully carried out a serious data breach that may result in them pursuing an injunction against our client. It was clear that they were acting in an intimidatory and heavy-handed manner in an attempt to deter our client from appealing his dismissal.
Our representation of the client
The team acted quickly to help the client take control of the matter by engaging with the employer’s lawyers and providing them with reasonable undertakings in relation to the data that they were referring to such that they had no grounds to continue pursuing an injunction.
The team then took full instructions from the client as to the lack of credibility surrounding the performance concerns in order to enable a detailed appeal against the dismissal to be submitted.
The appeal set out clear grounds as to how the client’s dismissal gave rise not only to an unfair dismissal but also unlawful disability discrimination and a failure to make reasonable adjustments. In addition to a whistleblowing claim, the level of detail contained in the appeal put into question the reasonableness of the dismissal such that, within three working days, the employer had contacted the team with an offer of settlement.
A swift outcome
Happily, for our client, terms of settlement were swiftly agreed under which our client received compensation of more than 10 months’ net pay and a waiver of his restrictive covenants, in addition to payment of all of our legal fees.
A word from our client
Naomi was able to take up my case with practically no notice as it escalated rapidly in a period of COVID lockdown. Naomi’s calm approach and advice was much appreciated, and she was able to bring about a positive result on my behalf quickly. Naomi was highly recommended by a friend and rightly so.
Our client
How Moore Barlow can help you
Find out how the Moore Barlow employment can help you with any employment issues by contacting us today.
