Bed bound employee not allowed to work from home awarded £31k

A property agent who was not allowed to work from home after becoming bed bound has been awarded £31,000 compensation.

Jennifer Cafferky  Associate Solicitor in our employment team, reports on this recent case.

Pauline Pilawa started working for the estate agency, Properties on the Market in July 2019.

At the time, she was suffering with endometriosis following surgery to remove an ovarian cyst.

Her condition meant she had difficulties with even basic activities. After starting work at the agency, her condition worsened, and she became largely bed bound. However, she could work comfortably from her bed.

She had informed the agency of her condition when being interviewed for the job and explained that there would be times when she would need to take days off because of the pain. The agency accepted this.

However, she then discovered that her manager had made comments about her taking time off sick.

She emailed him saying: “They are not holidays off as you said yesterday. Most of the days I am in pain, but I am still at work. I have already discussed this issue…in my interview two years ago.”

The manager replied: “I didn’t make fun of you. Your performance is very bad…so I remind you not to take any days off.”

The agency then withdrew permission for her to work from home and she was later dismissed.

Pilawa brought claims of unfair dismissal and disability discrimination to the Employment Tribunal, which ruled in her favour.

It held that the agency decided to dismiss her because she requested to work from home.

Employment Judge Butler said “Even if the respondent had established a potentially fair reason for dismissal, it took no attempts to investigate/consult with the claimant and failed to follow any procedure whatsoever. Accordingly, the decision to dismiss would have fallen outside the band of reasonable responses.”

If you would like more information about the issues raised in this article or any aspect of employment law, please contact Jennifer on 01228 516666 or click here to send her an email.