A former employee of Guide Pharmacy Annan, Ms D Wasilewska, has been awarded close to £10,000 at an employment tribunal hearing following an “unfair dismissal” by her employer.
The hearing found that Wasilewska was “dismissed without notice” and that her employer “failed to pay” for her holiday entitlement, among other things, according to a determination document published last week (June 19).
It added that “a copy of the claim form” was sent to the pharmacy in February, but when approached for comment, Guide Pharmacy told C+D that it did not receive this.
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The tribunal ordered the Scottish pharmacy to pay Wasilewska a total award of £2,653.98 for being “unfairly dismissed” last November, the document said.
This includes a “basic award” of “two weeks’ pay” at £1,015.50 and a further £1,638.48 as a “compensatory award”, the tribunal ruled.
The pharmacy also made an “unauthorised deduction” of £373.60 from her wages “in respect of statutory sick pay” and paid Wasilewska £5,396.55 less than she was “legally entitled to” from her bonus, it added.
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In light of this, the tribunal ordered the pharmacy to pay an additional £5,770.15 to Wasilewska for this claim.
And the pharmacy was given a further charge of £1,462.32 for “[failing] to pay” Wasilewska’s “holiday entitlement”, the document said.
She was dismissed “in breach of contract” and “without notice”, it added, but “no award [was] made in respect of this claim” as the “loss of wages” in this period were compensated as part of the “unfair dismissal claim”.
Pharmacy seeks legal advice
The pharmacy “was required to enter a response within 28 days” of the claim being sent, but according to the document, “it failed to do so”.
It stressed that “in the absence of any response from [the pharmacy], there was no basis on which the tribunal could conclude that there was a potentially fair reason for dismissal”.
Guide Pharmacy, however, said that it did not receive the claim due to an administrative error, adding that it is seeking legal advice and has applied for the judgement to be reconsidered.
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It comes after the Pharmacists’ Defence Association (PDA) last week warned NHS employers that “restructuring efforts…must be executed fairly” after a member’s employment tribunal win.
The tribunal ruled that an NHS employer “unfairly denied” a senior specialist pharmacist a redundancy payment and awarded the pharmacist “a four-figure sum”, it added.
