Unfair dismissal

As an employer, you have only six potentially fair reasons for dismissing an employee, as set out in the Employment Rights Act 1996. These are:

• a reason relating to the employee’s capability or qualifications
• conduct
• redundancy
• retirement
• that the employee could not continue working in that position without contravening a statutory provision
• “some other substantial reason” that would justify dismissal.

If you can establish that one of these reasons applies, you must then also show that you acted reasonably in dismissing the employee for that reason.

However, there are many reasons for dismissals designated as “automatically unfair”. These are wide-ranging and include reasons relating to trade union activity, taking or seeking to take maternity, paternity or adoption leave, requesting flexible working arrangements and reasons relating to the national minimum wage.

We can advise you on all aspects of a dismissal to ensure that the reasons for the dismissal are fair and that the dismissal procedures are carried out correctly, to protect you against a potentially costly and time-consuming claim for unfair dismissal.