Modified grievance procedure

Case 4: The facts

Elaine Pratt left her job as a cleaner after 20 years and wrote to her employer, a local council, claiming equal pay with male colleagues who did work of equal value but received additional payments. The council wrote to ask her whether she wanted to follow the standard or the "modified" grievance procedure, one of which had to be followed in order to meet the requirements of the statutory procedures and allow her to bring her tribunal claim. Pratt opted for the modified procedure.

While the standard grievance procedure only requires the employee to "set out the grievance in writing", with the "basis for the grievance" being provided at the next stage prior to a meeting, the modified procedure requires the employee to set out in writing both the grievance and the basis for it.

The ruling

"Setting out the basis of the grievance", the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) said, meant that Pratt had to provide enough information about her complaint to allow the council to respond. As she had not identified the colleagues with whom she was comparing her pay, or the nature of their additional payments, the council could not deal with her complaint unless it requested additional information - although she had provided that information when the council asked for it.

Consequently, the EAT held that Pratt had not complied with the modified procedure and could not pursue her equal pay claim, even though her letter would have constituted a grievance for the purpose of the standard procedure.

City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council v Pratt UKEAT/0391/06