A WOMAN who was fired after it was found she was planning to set up a rival insurance brokerage and claimed she could take thousands of euro worth of business from her employer has been awarded the minimum payment of €1,500 by the Employment Appeals Tribunal.
The tribunal said that if fair procedures had been followed by the company, "it is possible that dismissal would not have been found to be unfair". However, it said, "the employer did not do so".
The tribunal found that Carly Bailey, Prospect Bay, Brackley Lake, Ballyconnell, Co Cavan, was unfairly dismissed by Joseph G Brady Insurance, Main Street, Elphin, Co Roscommon.
A director of the brokerage told the tribunal she was working on Ms Bailey's computer in August 2006 when she found an e-mail addressed to a firm of underwriters inquiring about whom Ms Bailey needed to contact about getting an underwriting agency. "She was horrified to discover that the claimant had sent e-mails to a competitor," said a determination issued yesterday by the tribunal.
Ms Bailey and a work colleague had been planning to set up a rival company. Other e-mails were discovered, including one in which Ms Bailey said the business they could take from her employer "could amount to thousands".
The tribunal said the underlying facts surrounding Ms Bailey's dismissal were substantially accepted by both sides. Ms Bailey accepted that, with a co-employee, she had researched and taken steps towards establishing a competing brokerage in an adjoining town.
She admitted that "calls had been made to various insurance companies by her co-worker inquiring about the availability of agencies, premises had been sought and accountants had been consulted".
The determination said it was clear that a "large volume of the preparation had been carried out at work using the employer's computers and e-mail facilities".
It said Ms Bailey "admitted that she had not been acting in an above-board manner and that she communicated about the business plans to her co-worker via e-mails at work to avoid anyone hearing of the plans".
The tribunal noted that, in a professional undertaking such as an insurance brokerage, a large value was placed on confidential client information.
The actions of Ms Bailey in using the company's time and equipment "in a secretive fashion and deliberately and consciously concealing this" had badly damaged trust.
"The conduct of the claimant went beyond mere planning to set up a business, which even while done on the employer's time would not justify summary dismissal, to such an extent as to create reasonable grounds for the employer to fear that the claimant would abuse confidential information in doing so," the tribunal said.
It said it was mandatory for the employer to follow fair procedures and the company's failure to follow fair procedures "renders the dismissal unfair".
Ms Bailey contributed "to a very large extent to her own dismissal" and, in the circumstances, the tribunal found that compensation was the most appropriate remedy. It awarded €1,000 compensation and a €500 minimum notice payment.