Urgent advice needed - potential gross misconduct

[Passe]

Looking for urgent advice on this situation.

DP works nights in a warehouse (9 months in, permanent contract)) on a forklift. Thankless backbreaking work where all the workers are treated appallingly.

6 months ago he accidentally clipped a pallet causing an immediate investigation and threats of gross negligence.

Last week, a similar thing happened, he was exhausted and must have taken his eye off the ball for a second.

He has been called to a disciplinary meeting on Friday afternoon (well after his last shift for the week) where he is convinced they are about to fire him. He has previously observed that a Friday afternoon seems to be the preferred date /time for firing as the company will have got a full week's work out of the employee.

If that is the case he thinks he should just resign up front rather than wait to be sacked.

I think that is a really bad thing to do, surely there are several steps to this process and he also says the whole place is a total H&S shambles.
We are also going through a really traumatic time at home with other issues.

What can he do? If he loses his job we will lose our house.

I’ve no legal advice but IF he is going to be sacked he could request resignation instead. Then sign up with an agency for warehouse work.

Can he take someone with him? Unfortunately under two years service allows them to let him go. He might be best negotiating a reference and pilon if he senses they want rid, Resigning may mean a delay in benefits.

Unfortunately most employment rights do not kick in until you have two years of continuous service with your employer.

As he only has 9 months service they can terminate his employment with little / no reason. There is no need for the employer to demonstrate that the dismissal is fair or to go through disciplinary procedures.

If they plan to do this on Friday then they only have to give him his contractual notice period.

If they have a full weeks work out of him, he should get a full weeks pay. If H&S is that bad, he should be reporting them if he gets fired. If he has a forklift licence, he should be able to get a job in any warehouse, even if through a temp agency.

If it were me, I would wait to be pushed rather than jump. Even if he survives, though, get him looking for new jobs and signing with those temping agencies.

So is it better that he is dismissed in terms of benefits? He is scared it will affect his chances of getting more work even if it is temping.

He is so upset they have said all along he is one of their best workers.

Sorry name change fail

I know it feels bad now, but if he has a forklift licence, he will find work.

He should spend the next few days signing up with agencies and answering ads, he could have another job to go to by next week.

Good, reliable fork lift truck drivers are hard to find. There are plenty of agency jobs around especially if he works nights. I would wait until they fire him, they may not if he is good otherwise.

It’s worth checking the benefits situation because he may need it, if only for a short while. Years ago, and probably still now, if you resigned from your job there was a wait period before you could claim anything.

When he "clipped" the pallet, was something damaged?

No - no injuries or damage.

In that case, I'd get him to talk to an employment solicitor. Acas are pretty useless and just speak from text in my experience.

So is the general advice to sit tight and see what happens?

That even if he is fired it hopefully won't impact too much on his ability to get other forklift work?

Zero money for a solicitor.

Was hoping if he discloses the other shit he has going at home it might help? Wish he'd done that in the first place TBH but typical man just ploughs on.

You say he was exhausted when it happened. How many hours had he worked that shift, and had he been allowed his full entitlement to breaks etc?

Will check but don't think breaks are an issue. He's exhausted from not sleeping properly

Unless that is due to a declared disability or lack of breaks during or between shifts I'm not sure his lack of sleep will help. Does he admit it and recognise he needs to address the reason? Was it a h and s breach?

@Passe Hope things work out for you. Forklifts are dangerous things , but as long as he wasn’t arsing about and being irresponsible, damaging people or the stuff being moved, surely they won’t let him go?

You are both panicking unnecessarily.

Is it the case that they only employ people who never make mistakes at all, even when overworked and under pressure in an unpleasant environment?

Do they pay sufficiently that they have thousands of applicants for every opening and they are able to only take the best of the best, those whose skills and perfection of execution are amazing and outstripping all ordinary mortals?

If the answer to these isn't yes, then they probably aren't planning to fire him.

What they will do is put him through a disciplinary process with the intention of making him work harder, concentrate more and complain less, to keep him on the back foot.

I say "probably" because it's also possible they might be wanting to use him as an example to the rest of the crew - if people are relatively easy to replace then sacking someone once a month or so because they made a mistake keeps everyone else on their toes. But if that's their plan he's better off out of there asap.

A simple human error isn't usually "gross misconduct". He'd have to be doing this deliberately, or be too drunk or incompetent to function adequately, before simple human error of this kind becomes gross misconduct. Is there any possibility he is downplaying the seriousness of what he did?

That also applies if you are fired for gross misconduct

What is the potential outcome listed as on his invite to disciplinary?

Accidents are not gross misconduct.They sound like a horrible employer.

He could be let go for this and there’s nothing he can do as most employment rights don’t kick in until 2 years so technically they can let him go for any reason (barring discrimination). I would wait for the meeting and if they are going to sack him he can ask to resign instead. The bigger worry though for me would be he’s probably unlikely to get a good reference.

He's gone to find the letter they gave him last night

He said 5 minutes before being given the letter another employee was reporting to the same manager that their forklift was still not functioning correctly after being repaired.