In April last year we employed a young person, Mr H. Harwood-Janson, as an apprentice. The employment lasted 6 days before he was dismissed for gross misconduct, namely using abusive language towards Mark.
This then resulted in an employment tribunal on the 27th November. The outcome of this tribunal, which we won, can now be viewed here https://www.gov.uk/employment-tribunal-decisions/mr-h-harwood-janson-v-professional-renaissance-3201686-2019
The judge ruled that Mr Harwood-Janson was unteachable and that we were within our rights to dismiss him due to his conduct. His father, an employee of Rosling King solicitors where his son is now working, asked for this information to be made public.
Although we were relieved to have won our case the stress this has caused is immeasurable and we have made the decision to no longer offer apprenticeships. We have always offered apprenticeships as we like to help youngsters get a foot on the accountancy ladder but we cannot risk this sort of behaviour affecting our business again.
This is something that all clients need to be aware of as there is no award of costs in employment cases. This means that despite winning we were still out of pocket by several thousand pounds of legal and consultancy fees.
To any of our clients taking on an employee please ensure that you have a contract in place on their first day of employment as although legally you don’t have to provide one for 12 weeks, this can cause many problems.
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