ULSTER BANK did not inform two customers that there were irregularities with a €2 million bond they had purchased because the bank was “terrified” the couple would ask for the money back, the Employment Appeals Tribunal was told yesterday.
The claim was made by Conor Bowman, representing former Ulster Bank senior financial planning manager Martina McGreevy in a constructive dismissal case.
The bank rejected Ms McGreevy’s claim of constructive dismissal, saying she had not gone through the grievance process. Ms McGreevy resigned on March 25th last year, telling the bank it had placed her in an “impossible position”.
Her resignation came on the eve of a disciplinary hearing. A number of allegations had been made against her, including the unauthorised sale of the €2 million bond, falsification of bank records, and submission of falsified reports which stated she had met with customers when she had not.
Mr Bowman said the bank had “trumped up” the charges against Ms McGreevy to justify sacking her without making a redundancy payment. He said the bank had trawled through the paperwork of Ms McGreevy and others to find instances where they had failed to “dot their ‘I’s and cross their ‘T’s so that they could use it as an excuse to cull their workforce”.
He said her actions were standard practice, and the bank was aware of such practice. Ulster Bank’s Michael McKavanagh, who would have been the decision-maker at the hearing, rejected the suggestion the bank was trying to avoid redundancy payments. He said the bank opened a voluntary redundancy scheme last year with “quite a generous package”.
The issue over the €2 million bond first arose at the opening of the case in March. Ms McGreevy said the couple from Cavan wished to make a major investment, but she had moved to a different section and asked that another colleague deal with it.
She said the bank insisted that she handle it, and told her someone else would do the paperwork. The couple invested €1 million each in bonds in 2007. The bank later accused Ms McGreevy of the unauthorised sale of the bond because she was not a financial planning manager at the time.
Mr Bowman said the couple had never been told about the controversy over the bond. This was because “the possible ramifications for the bank were catastrophic”. The bank was “terrified” the couple would seek the return of their money or would sue the bank in the middle of the recession, he claimed.
Ms McGreevy told the tribunal she resigned because she was “thwarted at every opportunity” when she sought to call certain witnesses to the planned disciplinary hearing. She had sought 10 witnesses, including two customers and a financial planning manager. The bank agreed with seven witnesses but questioned the relevance of the manager and the customers. Mr Bowman said it was clear the witnesses would have damaged the bank’s case, as they would corroborate her evidence.
Rosemary Mallon, for Ulster Bank, said the bank had facilitated most of Ms McGreevy’s requests, and she could have made submissions highlighting the relevance of the other witnesses if she wished.
She said the claimant was premature in resigning. Had she gone through the disciplinary process and been dismissed, she could have appealed internally. If that failed she could have appealed it to an independent person.
Mr McKavanagh refuted any suggestion he had made up his mind before the hearing. He said he regretted Ms McGreevy did not enter the disciplinary process. Asked whether the bank could have handled the matter better, he said the content of some letters was unhelpful.
The hearing finished yesterday. A ruling will issue at a later date.
