A FORKLIFT DRIVER who was sacked for hitting doors with his vehicle has been awarded €15,000.

This relates to a case that has appeared before an Employment Appeals Tribunal hearing in Monaghan.

The man involved received two previous warnings, one for an unauthorised absence and the other for failing to completely unload an order, before his dismissal.

The respondent in the case, Conor Cahill, represented himself and was employed with Castlecool Limited, the appellant, between March 2011 and November 2012.

What was he sacked for?

The first incident leading up to the respondent being dismissed involved an unauthorised absence.

In evidence given by his employer, it is said that he intended to take Friday 1 June off and potentially would need to take Thursday 31 May off as well for a family wedding. The respondent did not later confirm that he would be taking the Thursday off, and when the date came around said that he would be taking it off regardless, despite his employer’s disapproval.

He was suspended for three days without pay for this incident.

The second incident came when the respondent failed to completely unload a load of burgers that came in to the facility. The respondent unloaded 24 out of 26 pallets, leaving two on the truck.

The final difficulty, according to the employer, was when the respondent hit fridge doors on two consecutive days, something that was considered a health and safety hazard.

At the dismissal meeting for the respondent, the witness who saw him hitting the doors with the forklift was not present.

In response to what his employer had to say, the respondent said that in hitting the door he had not been reckless.

He stated that his issue with his employer was the pay structure that was in place, in that it did not account for overtime worked. He also said there had been unreasonable delays in putting him onto a higher pay scale.

How did the Tribunal come to their decision?

It was decided by the Tribunal there were “deficiencies in the appellant’s procedures” and that they should have been more stringent in the dismissal process.

As such they decided to uphold an earlier decision made by the Right’s Commissioner and award the sum of €15,000.

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