Employer have said I have resigned - I haven't. Urgent help please!

[Titslikepicassos]

I have a loooong thread in AIBU and received excellent support but things have escalated.

Long story short, I went on maternity leave this time last year. I had issues at work throughout my pregnancy, being shouted at and sidelined and told to move locations. Sorted it all out informally.

In March I asked to return to work early from Mat leave due to financial issues caused by lockdown. At this point my boss attempted to move me again, that didn't work and she then went back on the hours she had given me and it messed up my childcare.

I raised a formal grievance and put a flexible working request in at the same time. The company failed to do anything with my request and the grievance process was mismanaged and a data breach occurred in the middle of it, where my grievance letter was upload to a public file and seen by others.

The grievance was upheld in parts but they again tried to move me to a new location which doesnt work due to childcare issues.

I requested mediation with my boss in order to go back to work as I'm still not back 7 months later.

Today the regional director has said that they won't honour mediation and I have now resigned.

My union rep has disappeared and I received this at 16:00 today so couldn't get hold of ACAS.

Any advice would be very welcome!

I wonder what their solicitor is saying to them. Hope they've laid it on the line just what a clusterfuck they've created

I imagine there has been a fair amount of eye rolling on their solicitor's behalf!

So their solicitor seems preoccupied with mitigation. Not much I can say other than, if they hadn't got rid of me, my children would be key worker children and my baby would be in nursery and all would be well.

But they got rid of me, we lost the nursery place and my big ones have lost the key worker status because I'm unemployed - now I'm homeschooling. Quite difficult to find work in a tanking job market without childcare - though will become much easier when the schools reopen.

Include the loss of childcare and keyworker status in your schedule of loss. What horrible people they are.

Hugs OP, keep going!

Have been following along, gosh this runs and runs doesn't it?
I've had experience of SARs that included an entire blacked out page (why bother?). I know fellow SEN parents have had really horrendous results back from theirs from LEAs too.

While claimants DO have to mitigate their loss, the court is also reasonable in understanding what the current situation is for job hunters and school closures.

They're free to make an offer which deals with their 'lack of mitigation' argument. Just as you're free to reject it, making the points you have above.

They need to be realistic. But it seems you have one of 'those' defendant solicitors. Most of us aren't like that and can't stand those that are!

As you have asked for reinstatement (I think you mentioned you had checked that box too) then it is less appropriate (I believe) for them to pursue mitigation because you were expecting to be reinstated. (I appreciate that you weren't but this was a tactic).

It sounds like their solicitor may not actually be an employment lawyer.

Just catching up..

I've now seen their grounds of resistance - which made me so angry I had to drive up the motorway several times - I then came back and picked holes in it. I could argue every point they made, with email evidence in most cases. They've asked that the pregnancy discrimination is thrown out, which I was expecting, as it is out of time. However, it provides background information and shows an ongoing attempt to force me from my role.

They've also stated that I've got the name of the company wrong and are trying to change it to an arm of the company that was disbanded last year - presumably to avoid negative press in their actual name.

The solicitor is on it and is fairly optimistic that a settlement will be reached but advised that this part is a stressful experience. I wasn't expecting to be flung back into the anger of the early days, but here we are.

@KatherineOfAragon

Last year my DH brought a case to tribunal against a large National company whose manager really brutally bullied and harassed him out of a job role in order to give that role to his brother. I'm not a solicitor but I dealt with all the legal paperwork and it was fucking horrible. It dragged on for over a year! Eventually, they settled out of court. We attended a preliminary tribunal hearing where the judge ordered that the company decide whether to seek to settle out of court in order to avoid a full tribunal. We wanted to avoid a tribunal too, purely because I didn't want to do all the work! Firstly, we said 15k (no loss of earnings as he walked into another job within a fortnight), aiming for around the middle of the middle band of Vento- which they rejected and we expected them to. They countered with 3k! We rejected that and just didn't blink. Didn't respond to any emails demanding we revise the amount we were seeking. After 4 weeks, pretty much on the eve of the deadline given at the preliminary tribunal hearing, they came back with an NDA and 10k. That might be risky but I read a lot about it and it really depends on how much they'd like to avoid what they did being made public.

Sorry your DH went through all that - and you having to deal with it. A good outcome though!

I think my company are desperate to avoid it going public, hence the name issues I mentioned above. I won't blink but I need the solicitor to do the same.

@NoWordForFluffy

While claimants DO have to mitigate their loss, the court is also reasonable in understanding what the current situation is for job hunters and school closures.

They're free to make an offer which deals with their 'lack of mitigation' argument. Just as you're free to reject it, making the points you have above.

They need to be realistic. But it seems you have one of 'those' defendant solicitors. Most of us aren't like that and can't stand those that are!

Thanks @NoWordForFluffy - always helpful to have your insight

Take some pleasure that it seems like they are now very likely shitting themselves.

@SeasonFinale - I hadn't thought about that, thanks. Regarding their solicitor, I've googled her, she is an employment solicitor but a very new one working as the only employment solicitor in larger firm.

@Titslikepicassos, that's where negotiation comes in and we look at the risks (hence your solicitor's comments about what they may advise is a reasonable offer, post-preliminary hearing, which you may not be happy with).

This type of thing will be where you'd expect compromise from both parties, taking into account risk, going forwards. Their risk is you get awarded in full. Your risk is that the Tribunal likes their arguments and awards less. It's a balancing act!

@RandomMess

Take some pleasure that it seems like they are now very likely shitting themselves.

Its what gets me through the day

[quote Titslikepicassos]@SeasonFinale - I hadn't thought about that, thanks. Regarding their solicitor, I've googled her, she is an employment solicitor but a very new one working as the only employment solicitor in larger firm.[/quote]
That can sometimes be a hindrance if they are quite newly qualified as they sometime don't have the experience to make a "commercial" decision and get into nit picking about minor irrelevancies. Hopefully your solicitor can keep her on track.

Still here supporting @Titslikepicassos

Is your husband still working there? How is it for him, any animosity?

@RandomMess

Take some pleasure that it seems like they are now very likely shitting themselves.

This ^ everything is crossed for you xxx

They've also stated that I've got the name of the company wrong and are trying to change it to an arm of the company that was disbanded last year - presumably to avoid negative press in their actual name

It could also be so they can say there is no equity or it is bankrupt for that company name so no pay-out. You need to be very accurate when putting the name or they can slither out of it.

Fingers crossed for you OP. I remember reading your earlier thread and feeling peeved for you. So glad you’re sticking to your guns.

The posters who speculate that the company have now withdrawn from the negotiation process are probably correct in assuming they have a fund to settle such claims. They may assume you are going to walk away.

I was employed by a large organization which did not follow their own procedures. I wont go into details but I got an unexpected letter of dismissal while certain matters were still being negotiated. I appealed and got legal representation from my union. I had a massive paper trail of all the procedures they had breached. In my case there were disability rather than maternity issues. But still a protected characteristic.

Then the bargaining began. I settled out of court for 10K. I later learned my line manager and the HR woman got in real hot water over the errors they had made.

My union were wonderful and fully supportive. You should press for them to get you an employment lawyer and a good settlement.

Still have all fingers crossed for you

Not sure if you have already answered the ridiculous, 'mitigation,' issue, but your response to this is simply that you had previously agreed to mediation, which was being organized by HR at the time of your termination of contract.

Fingers and toes crossed for you.