Tales from the Tribunal • October 5, 2018
Employment Tribunal Claims: Up, Up, Up
Written by Jennifer Ormond
The fee to bring employment tribunal claims was abolished in July 2017 after the Supreme Court held that they were unlawful and unconstitutional.
A direct comparison between April to June 2017 (when there were fees in place) and April to June 2018 (when there were no fees) has shown the following:
- The number of single claims increased by 165%
- The number of outstanding claims (those that were not resolved within that period) rose by 130%
- The average award for disability discrimination claims was £30,700
These statistics back up what we have seen with our clients. We recently dealt with an employment tribunal claim where the Claimant actually stated in his witness statement that he was only brining the claim because it was free to do so!
Tribunal claims are taking much longer to be listed for hearings, judges are not available and judgments are taking longer to be issued. The problem for employers is that where employees do bring tribunal claims, they become more protracted than previously and generally waste more of their time in seeing them through to completion.
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