
EAT holds that future discrimination claims may be waived in a settlement agreement
In Clifford v IBM UK Ltd the EAT upheld a decision to strike out a discrimination claim, holding that a waiver of future discrimination claims contained in
In Clifford v IBM UK Ltd the EAT upheld a decision to strike out a discrimination claim, holding that a waiver of future discrimination claims contained in
In Clifford v IBM UK Ltd an Employment Tribunal Judge has ruled that a waiver of future claims contained in a settlement agreement was effective,
In the recent case of Scheldebouw BV v Evanson, the EAT upheld an Employment Tribunal’s decision that a settlement offer made by an employer in
In Garrod v Riverstone Management Ltd the EAT has held that a settlement offer made to an employee after she had complained about discrimination, but before she had started legal proceedings, was genuinely without prejudice and not unambiguously improper.
Employers should take note of a recent EAT decision that employees cannot waive the right to pursue claims which are unknown at the time of signing a settlement agreement.
If an employee breaches a confidentiality clause contained in a COT3 agreement or, more commonly, a Settlement Agreement, what are the employer’s options? The answer is that it will depend on the importance of the clause or the severity of the employee’s breach.
It’s hard to believe that the #MeToo movement took off little more than two years ago. Not only has the movement empowered victims to speak up against harassment and encouraged employers to reflect on their approach to dealing with such allegations.
Tottenham Hotspur did not need to pay employer’s National Insurance contributions in respect of the payments it made to Peter Crouch and Wilson Palacios when they transferred to Stoke City.
Anyone who has ever been party to a settlement agreement will most likely be aware that an employee gets the first £30,000 of any termination payment tax-free, with any excess subjected to income tax as normal. The current position is that, even for the portion of a termination payment which exceeds the threshold and is taxable, National Insurance Contributions (NICs) are not payable.
The ACAS guide on settlement agreements recommends that employers allow employees a minimum of 10 calendar days to consider a settlement agreement and to receive legal advice. That is a lot longer than many employers would want to give staff, so the question is can this guidance be ignored?
The High Court found that a settlement letter from an employer to an employee and the employee’s subsequent letter of acceptance amounted to a binding settlement agreement. This automatically prevented any further negotiations. If the employer had intended the settlement letter to be a springboard to further discussions, it should have headed the settlement offer ‘subject to contract’.
In Barden v Commodities Research Unit, Mr Barden was the former CEO of Commodities Research Unit. On his retirement, he was paid a sum under a settlement agreement. The agreement simply stated that Commodities Research were to ‘pay £1,350,000’ to Mr Barden. It fell silent on whether the sum would be paid net or gross. The High Court ruled that the sum should be paid net of tax (that is, after deduction of tax). To do so otherwise would be commercially absurd.
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