Disciplinary over Tweets - I need a hand hold

[BelgianFudge]

Does anyone have any experience of facing disciplinary over getting into a twitter spat? Nothing to do with the employer, but someone has sent screenshots to them and disciplinary action has been initiated.

Sorry for scant detail but I'm understandably worried about revealing much.

I’m so sorry. As you say, they were looking for a reason and he handed it to them. What a nightmare for you. I hope he learns from this and reins himself in a bit. I hope he appreciates how supportive you’ve been too.

I’m so sorry. I don’t think he ‘handed them a reason’. What he was doing was perfectly legal. The nice thing about living in a democracy is that you can be salty and strong in political and other opinions in your private life. You can’t do this in say in China, Russia or the ME.

I think is employer is on shaky grounds and realises it, hence the false references to doing it for a work computer or impacting his work. I hope you get a written transcript with your husband’s rebuttal in place.

I’m really sorry about what happened.

He really does appreciate my support. It has been an awful time for all of us.

He's going to request the transcript of the hearing. I'm disgusted with how they have acted.

His Union rep advised him there's no point in appealing because they followed the correct disciplinary process. Seems like there's no way to appeal their failure in duty of care to their employees in failing to Ive him fair warning. And no way to challenge their seemingly disproportionate decision to treat some tweets - which by their own admission 'had the potential to cause reputational damage' but were taken down before they did so - as an act of Gross Misconduct.

Their allegation of harassment was utterly unfair and disproportionate. But the completely ignored DH when he refuted that.

They offered no evidence that DH had done any of it on company time. He didn't deny it, but given that he doesn't even have access to the tweets any more he couldn't check the times to prove or disprove it.

They didn't care. Their mind was made up

I’m sorry.
How was the union rep in the meeting?
Was your DH in a fit state to refute the bits about the tweets impacting the quality of his work and posting from the work computer?

What other evidence did they present? Tweets?

Have you decided what you’re going to do, or is it too soon?

I don’t really understand op. I thought this was a one off. To give him fair warning he would need to have been doing this for an extended period. Otherwise how could they warn him? Plus it’s not their job to baby sit him and his social media usage.

Also he knew the social media policy even though it was wide, and he was publicly slagging off the government when they have the government as a client and he doesn’t even know if it was on company time or not and so didn’t deny it.

If his Twitter account was suspended it means he went really quite far. And if the union rep says it was fair process, then I think he needs to accept that.

I’m sorry I know it’s hard and galling but he needs to learn from it, dust himself off ans take full responsibility not be trying to say it’s unfair.

The rep told DH to just be contrite and she would challenge it. But she didn't do it as well as we had hoped.

He did refute the bits that he could. They had screenshots of his tweets so there's no refuting them - but they were collected last year before they were deleted. So they are no longer in the public domain and haven't been for some time.

Hmmm...I would appeal. Say they haven’t provided evidence of key points and that DH refutes these. Send it in writing.

If you do decide to take it to tribunal, it will help that you appealed the decision.

You can appeal not simply the process, but also the ‘evidence’ they are using, eg from a work computer, impacting his work etc. Ask for evidence and say you wee not given a chance to examine this prior to the hearing and that you have not been given adequate chance to refute.

If you are up to it, try to get a lawyer for advice and initiate tribunal proceedings, your DH might be able to at least get a negotiated settlement if his employers realise he is not going to let it just go away.

And bon courage. This too shall pass and your DH will move on to brighter and happier things with a nicer group of people.

I’m sorry I know it’s hard and galling but he needs to learn from it, dust himself off ans take full responsibility not be trying to say it’s unfair.

I think it's both unfair, and partly justified. He has learned from it and holds full responsibility for his actions.

They are arse holes though - he hasn't had a single word from his line manager since he was suspended.

I know they were told not to contact him during the investigation but a simple "I'm sorry it came to this, rest assured I'll be making sure your belongings are packed up for you. Take care" would go a long way.

Not a word from her.

@BelgianFudge

They are arse holes though - he hasn't had a single word from his line manager since he was suspended.

I know they were told not to contact him during the investigation but a simple "I'm sorry it came to this, rest assured I'll be making sure your belongings are packed up for you. Take care" would go a long way.

Not a word from her.

Op, when someone’s being fired for gross misconduct thr manager can’t message them and say they are sorry it’s come to this.

All they can really say is when do you want your belongings and good luck. This isn’t the same as someone leaving for a new job.

he hasn't had a single word from his line manager since he was suspended.

To be fair, as you acknowledge, they simply can't be in contact while the investigation is in progress.

Now the decision has been made, his LM has to follow a procedure, they will be constrained in any communication they make.

I'm really sorry OP. I feel enormously for you; however, I do think your DH sounds massively immature, and you are doing a lot of looking after him.

I think Bluntness' advice is correct here.

I'm also not convinced he was a great employee bar one isolated misuse of social media; warning bells rang for me throughout & I do agree that they were looking for a reason to let him go, I suspect there's a complicated story there.

I hope this time he can learn from this, move forward & get help if needed.

I hope you'll be ok, most of all.

I see I cross-posted with Bluntness. I agree 💯
I was the LM in this situation. I absolutely couldn't say 'sorry it's come to this' (and, I actually wasn't, in this case, I was mightily relieved). But I was really clear I could have communication, and then could say v little afterwards - the person was being fired, after all. Like Bluntness said, it's not leaving under their own steam for a new job.

have no* communication

He told them he was completely unaware that he had breached their social media policy

In fairness, every company/organisation will tell you that social media policy awareness is the responsibility of the employee to be familiarised with. Not the other way around.

They had been gathering evidence against him for months, they had ample opportunity to warn him that he was breaching their policy

Again, the responsibility is that of the employee to be aware of policy, not the other way around.

Hope your partner has learnt something from this. The outcome, sad for you, is not at all surprising given his conduct.

I'm really sorry this has happened. I hope you are both coping

They had been gathering evidence against him for months, they had ample opportunity to warn him that he was breaching their policy

Op, you originally phrased this as he got into a spat with someone and called him a dickhead and got reported. The above comment indicates that he has been online abusing people for an extended period ans sharing his government hating views.

If that’s the case, he was always going to get fired.

Sorry to hear that your dh lost his job x

Op, you originally phrased this as he got into a spat with someone and called him a dickhead and got reported. The above comment indicates that he has been online abusing people for an extended period ans sharing his government hating views.

Yes, that was what we believed initially. Then they produced evidence of his old deleted tweets where he was critical of the government. He wasn't abusing anyone.

His company alleged that he had expressed extremist views (not true), and that his colleagues could be offended if they held opposing views eg pro-Brexit

I’m going to be really honest here - if someone called me a dickhead in writing for voting leave or wrote ‘people who voted leave are dickheads’ - I would be offended (assuming I voted leave). Fine to say you are disappointed or point out the facts not fine to name call. So if I discovered a work colleague was doing it - I wouldn’t be happy.

I worked with a HT once - I was his deputy who ranted and raved every day about the ‘fucking tories’ ‘fucking Tory voters’ it was daily rants - and yes I did did report him to the trust especially as his office was next to the main car park. Fine to have views but not express them like that

“His company alleged that he had expressed extremist views (not true), and that his colleagues could be offended if they held opposing views eg pro-Brexit”

If you have this in writing, he would have a good case to take to an employment tribunal. He has a right to express his political views privately (as in his own social media account) and an ET would likely take a dim view of an employer dismissing him for his strongly held and expressed political beliefs, because it might offend colleagues.

People get offended all the time, by all sorts of things. It seems the people involved were not the open-minded live and let live sort and felt personally offended (wager they were Brexiteers!) and did an EU on him.

The Union rep had been clear that in their view the correct process has been followed, and an appeal would not be advised.

I think that says a lot.

His company alleged that he had expressed extremist views (not true), and that his colleagues could be offended if they held opposing views eg pro-Brexit

I just do not think this can be the full story. It cannot be the defining reason that gross misconduct was found against OP's DH & he was fired.

Why do you think they had another agenda OP? Why did they want to use this as an excuse to fire her?

• him

@EarringsandLipstick, process is only one of the reasons to appeal. (and I’m not sure if the process was followed here)

From ACAS:
an employee should appeal if they believe that a disciplinary decision is wrong or unjust. Consequently, employers must take a broad approach in allowing employees the right of appeal.

Potential grounds of appeal could include that:

new evidence has come to light that should be investigated;
the sanction imposed was too severe or disproportionate to the misconduct;
the sanction was inconsistent with one imposed for similar misconduct committed by another employee;
there was unfairness or bias among the original decision-makers; or
the employer has not taken into account a previously exemplary disciplinary record.
Procedural failings could also form potential grounds for appeal, for example where the employer failed to follow its own disciplinary policy, or did not give the employee enough information about the allegations of misconduct for them to be able to prepare for the disciplinary hearing

@Lookingforwardto2021

Absolutely.

As I said though, the Union rep saw no grounds for appeal.

In my experience of Union reps, they will appeal on any grounds that can they identify. The fact that the rep didn't suggest it at all would strongly indicate they think there is zero chance.