"In the courts..."
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* WA Goold (Pearmak Ltd) vs McConnell.
This case emphasises the need for employers to have a procedure for dealing with employee grievances.
It concerns employees who were salesmen paid on the basis of salary plus commission.
In 1992 changes in sales methods resulted in a substantial drop in their earnings.
There was no established procedure for dealing with such matters and their attempts to raise it with management were ineffective.
The employees duly resigned and claimed constructive dismissal. An industrial tribunal held that the employer's failure to provide and implement a grievance procedure was a breach of the employees' contracts of employment which was serious enough to justify their resignation.
The tribunal decided that the employees had been unfairly dismissed.
The Statement of Terms and Conditions which employees are entitled to receive under the Employment Protection (Consolidation) Act 1978 should contain details of the grievance procedure but in this case neither employee had been provided with a Statement.