Complainant

Respondent

Anonymised Parties

A Cook

Nursing Home

Act

Complaint/Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under Section 8 of the Unfair Dismissals Act, 1977

CA-00009540-001

05/02/2017

The Complainant contends that she was constructively dismissed as she had to leave her employment after untrue and unsubstantiated allegations were made against her.

The Complainant was employed as a Cook, working on Sundays, and paid €219 per fortnight.   She worked 8 hours per week.     She had almost ten years’ service in the employment.   The process of unsubstantiated allegations began in June 2016 following an accusation that the Complainant had refused to change the menu according to the request of the head chef.   This allegation was never investigated properly. The Complainant was also accused of not probing food.   She contends she was constantly facing allegations, and her workplace became a place of anxiety and stress.

She was called to a meeting in November 2016. This was not described as a performance review meeting. The Complainant had already drawn the management’s attention to issues in July 2016, but nothing was done about them. As far as the Complainant was concerned, the untrue and unsubstantiated allegations against her were not properly investigated and her side of the story was never considered When management called her to another meeting, she felt she had no option but to resign.

The Complainant resigned her position as Part-time Cook in January 2017 stating that she was unhappy with the work environment. The company accepted her resignation.  

There had been some areas of concern regarding the Complainant’s work performance. Her line manager met with her on two occasions to make her aware of the areas requiring improvement.   The first meeting was in July 2016 and the second occasion was in November 2016 at her annual performance review.   The areas requiring improvement were:

1. To ensure that all required food temperatures are checked and recorded
2. To adhere to any general instructions left by the kitchen manager in the communications book.

The manager scheduled a follow up meeting for 9^th January 2017. At that meeting, the Complainant handed the Director of Nursing a letter of resignation.   The Complainant communicated again with the Director of Nursing following this.   She wrote saying that false allegations had been made against her and copied the Clinical Governance Manager.   On 31^st January 2017 the HR manager replied reiterating that no allegations had been made against the Complainant, and that the line manager had simply attempted to address areas of work performance. The Complainant did not allow her line manager to have any meaningful discussion with her regarding legitimate areas of concern.   After one informal meeting (June) and a performance review (November) she handed in her notice.

It is submitted that the Complainant did not use the company grievance procedure to address her dissatisfaction and as such did not give the company the opportunity to address her issues.  

The Complainant had almost ten years service with the employer. No account appears to have been taken of this and the Respondent simply accepted her resignation. I note the Respondent’s submission that the Complainant ought to have utilised the Grievance procedure.     However, the Complainant did try to raise her issues in her letters dated 31^st July 2016 and 10^th January 2017. She significantly stated that she was willing to meet with the   Director of Nursing and her (the Complainant’s) ‘representative’.   I find that the Respondent acted unreasonably in not facilitating the Complainant to have her grievance properly heard. I uphold the Complainant’s complaint of Unfair (Constructive) Dismissal.   I award the Complainant the sum of €2,000 compensation.