In order to claim you have been unfairly dismissed you need to have been employed for a minimum period of 2 years prior to your employment being terminated. There are some exceptions to the 2 year rule, for example : any dismissal because you are a whistleblower or on the grounds of a protective characteristic are automatically unfair and you do not need to satisfy the 2 year rule. Assuming you can satisfy the 2 year rule, you should next consider the reason for your dismissal. Your employer should have told you what this was. If they have not you can ask them to confirm, in writing, the reason for your dismissal. Your employer has to show that the reason for the termination of your employment was for one of the 5 prescribed reasons; these are : capability, conduct, redundancy, breach of statute and a final catch all of “some other substantial reason.”
If your employer can establish a potentially fair reason for dismissal, an Employment Tribunal will then go on to consider whether the dismissal was fair or unfair having regard to all of the circumstances of the case, including the size and administrative resources of your employer.
There will be a particular scrutiny of the process your employer followed. It is important that in considering this, the Employment Tribunal should not substitute its own view for that of your employer but it should instead decide whether your employer’s actions fall within the range of reasonable responses of a reasonable employer. This affords the Employment Tribunal a degree of flexibility.
Claims for unfair dismissal can only be brought in an employment tribunal and there are very strict time limits for lodging these claims. They must generally be lodged with the Employment Tribunal within three months of the effective date of termination of employment (subject to any extension obtained through the ACAS early conciliation process).
If you want to know whether you have a good claim for unfair dismissal we are able to advise you and we can provide you with a quote once we know how many documents we would need to consider as part of our review.
