Another Nail In The WFH Coffin?

A London employee who was sacked from his job for working from home over the summer at his parents' house in Cornwall has won a claim for unfair dismissal despite being found to have completed no work.

Could he have got away with that in the office? Probably not. So, if there were concerns about his work rate, why was he allowed this? 

Now, the London-based employee has won his case for unfair dismissal after a judge found that the company's investigation into him had not been carried out fairly. The central London tribunal heard that Mr Kitaruth had verbally agreed with Mr Stride that he would work from home, but the line manager insisted that nothing about Mr Kitaruth working out of London had been firmed. Employment judge Tamara Lewis said that Mr Kitaruth had 'misled' his managers by not doing any work, but the tribunal found that the security manager 'genuinely believed he had been given permission' to work from Cornwall and that there was possibly some miscommunication between him and Mr Stride.

Remember, folks, a verbal agreement isn't worth the paper it's not printed on! 

Ms Lewis said if Mr Stride had been interviewed formally before a decision to dismiss Mr Kitaruth was made, it would have shown how informal the arrangements were and that such a system 'always had the potential for misunderstanding'.

But he didn't, and hence, the tribunal has no option but to uphold the verdict. Though it makes its opinion pretty clear: 

However, the tribubal had doubts that Mr Kitaruth 'did any work' and ruled that his total compensation would be deducted by 50 per cent. '[OCS] dismissed [Mr Kitaruth] because it believed he had gone to Cornwall without authorisation from Aug 14 to 17 in 2023, and that not only was this unauthorised working from home, but that the claimant had misled his managers and was not in fact working in that period, and had not completed tasks he had been given in that period', Ms Lewis said.

So he might win but he won't get much.