Dismissal is defined as the act of ending an individual’s employment. Employers have full right to dismiss their employees in case they have a valid and justifiable reason. In such cases, it may also not be necessary to provide notice to the employee! Unfair dismissal, on the other hand, is when the employee gets dismissed in an unreasonable, unjust and harsh manner. If you have been unfairly sacked by your employer without providing any solid and true reasons then instead of brooding over how you’ve been wronged, you should actually take matters into your own hands or take the reins.
The very first step that you can take when you have been unfairly dismissed is to approach your employer’s disciplinary or dismissal procedures and try appealing under that. If this solves the problem for you then you’re lucky, otherwise you will need to appeal to an Industrial Tribunal. Of course, it is always better if you and your employer can resolve the problem otherwise you will need to make a formal complaint for unfair dismissal, which can be a bit tricky.
There are plenty of steps which can be taken by the employer to resolve this problem. The first option would be to conciliate the matter through the Labour Relations Agency. Here, a specialist can be appointed for helping the individual out. The second option that the employer has is to provide an individual arbitration to the employee. In this case, an independent arbitrator is appointed for the purpose of hearing the case of the employee in question and such a professional makes a legally binding decision afterwards.
If you are making a formal complaint for unfair dismissal then you should be mindful of the fact that you need to collect all the required documents in order to furnish as proof. This means that you need to keep copies of the letters you send to them and also the written notes of telephonic conversations and meetings (if required). It is a common misconception that one has to launch the complaint for unfair dismissal only when one is unemployed. This isn’t true and one can always launch such a complaint when one is hunting a new job.
There are plenty of situations which individuals misinterpret as unfair dismissal. Thus, you need to make sure you’re avoiding these common pitfalls. Some of the top conditions that are not dismissals are suspension on full pay, frustration of contract and withdrawal of a job offer. Hence, you should be very sure that what you’re facing is not any one of the above three conditions. Now, there are certain things that need to be kept in mind when making a claim for unfair dismissal. These are namely level of compensation, the basic award by the tribunal, the compensatory award and so on.