Mr R Sridharan v Medicines Online Ltd and Mr P J Brennan: 2307520/2024

EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNALS

Case No 2307520/2024

Between

Mr R SridharanClaimant

Medicines Online Ltd and Mr P J BrennanRespondent

Before

Employment Judge Ramsden

Date 21 January 2026

JUDGMENT

[1]The Claimant’s application for reconsideration of the judgment given in this matter by EJ Wright on 16 January 2025 is refused, and the decision in that judgment is confirmed, save that the Second Respondent is removed as a respondent to that claim, and therefore that judgment. BACKGROUND

[2]The Claimant started working for the First Respondent on 8 November 2023 as a Laboratory Samples Processing and QC Technician.

[3]The First Claimant’s employment with the First Respondent ended on 10 August 2024.

[4]After a period of Early Conciliation which began on 23 and ended on 25 September 2024 (in respect of each of the Respondents), the First Claimant presented a Claim Form to the Tribunal on 7 October 2024. In that Claim Form, he ‘ticked the boxes’ to indicate that he was bringing complaints of unpaid holiday pay and arrears of pay. The narrative on the Claim Form referred to: a) The First Respondent withholding portions of the First Claimant’s salary as “training liabilities”; b) The Second Respondent having harassed, bullied and threatened the First Claimant, for which he was claiming psychological damage; and 1 of 8 c) The Second Respondent making covert recordings of the First Claim, for which he was seeking damages.

[5]There was no mention in the Claim Form narrative of any unpaid holiday pay.

[6]The Tribunal sent the Respondents notification of the First Claim, and stated in clear terms that any Response to it must be received by the Tribunal by no later than 6 November 2024. No such Response was received by that date.

[7]On 11 December 2024 the representative of the Respondents applied for an extension of time to present their Response to the First Claim, citing the Second Respondent’s diabetes, and noting that the Respondents’ representative had only been appointed by them on 27 November 2024. No medical evidence of diabetes was provided, and no reason was given for the delay between 27 November and 11 December 2024. For those reasons, REJ Khalil refused the Respondents’ application on 8 January 2025.

[8]On 16 January 2025, EJ Wright issued judgment in respect of the First Claimant’s complaint of unpaid wages pursuant to Rule 22 of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024 (the ET Rules). That judgment Ordered “the respondent” to pay the First Claimant the sum of £2,669.80 gross.

[9]That judgment was sent to the Parties by the Tribunal on 30 January 2025. APPLICATION

[10]On 13 February 2025, the Claimant applied for reconsideration of EJ Wright’s decision on 16 January 2025. The application was stated to be under Rule 70 of the Employment Tribunals (Constitution and Rules of Procedure) Regulations 2013, but in effect it was under Rule 69 of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024 (the ET Rules) made under those regulations.

[11]The Claimant’s reasons for applying for reconsideration of that decision are that: a) The reason his holiday pay complaint was not addressed in the judgment was because of the Claimant’s inability to calculate that pay; and b) The Claimant’s harassment complaint was not addressed in the judgment because the Claimant believed he could explain it in detail at a hearing scheduled for 20 February 2025, which was cancelled, and therefore it is in the interests of justice that the judgment be reconsidered and findings be made in respect of those matters. 2 of 8 LAW Reconsideration

[12]The Rules on reconsideration are set out in Rules 68 to 71 of the ET Rules.

[13]Rule 68 describes the principled approach that should be taken to such applications by tribunals: “Principles(1) The Tribunal may, either on its own initiative (which may reflect a request from the Employment Appeal Tribunal) or on the application of a party, reconsider any judgment where it is necessary in the interests of justice to do so.

(2) A judgment on reconsideration may be confirmed, varied or revoked.

(3) If the judgment under reconsideration is revoked the Tribunal may take the decision again. In doing so, the Tribunal is not required to come to the same conclusion.”

[14]The requirement that tribunals should only reconsider decisions if it is “necessary in the interests of justice to do so” has been considered by a number of cases. One recent example is the decision of the EAT in Ebury Partners UK Ltd v Acton Davies

[2023] IRLR 486

, where Shanks J held: “The employment tribunal can only reconsider a decision if it is necessary to do so ‘in the interests of justice’... A central aspect of the interests of justice is that there should be finality in litigation. It is therefore unusual for a litigant to be allowed a ‘second bite of the cherry’ and the jurisdiction to reconsider should be exercised with caution. In general, while it may be appropriate to reconsider a decision where there has been some procedural mishap such that a party had been denied a fair and proper opportunity to present his case, the jurisdiction should not be invoked to correct a supposed error made by the tribunal after the parties have had a fair opportunity to present their cases on the relevant issue. This is particularly the case where the error alleged is one of law which is more appropriately corrected by the EAT”.

[15]Rule 69 sets out the conditions on which a party may make an application for reconsideration: “Application Except where it is made in the course of a hearing, an application for reconsideration must be made in writing setting out why reconsideration is necessary and must be sent to the Tribunal within 14 days of the later of-(a) the date on which the written record of the judgment sought to be reconsidered was sent to the parties, or 3 of 8

(b) the date that the written reasons were sent, if these were sent separately.”

[16]Rule 70 deals with the process the tribunal must follow regarding an application made under Rule 69: “Process for reconsideration(1) The Tribunal must consider any application made under rule 69 (application for reconsideration).

(2) If the Tribunal considers that there is no reasonable prospect of the judgment being varied or revoked… the application must be refused and the Tribunal must inform the parties of the refusal.

(3) If the application has not been refused under paragraph (2), the Tribunal must send a notice to the parties specifying the period by which any written representations in respect of the application must be received by the Tribunal, and seeking the views of the parties on whether the application can be determined without a hearing. The notice may also set out the Tribunal’s provisional views on the application…”. Whether an averred complaint has been pleaded

[17]The scope of a claimant’s claim is as specified in their Claim Form and any accompanying Grounds of Complaint, unless an amendment to that claim is permitted by the tribunal (Chapman v Simon

[1994] IRLR 124

[18]Langstaff J in the case of Chandhok v Tirkey

[2015] ICR 527

wrote: “The claim, as set out in the ET1, is not something just to set the ball rolling, as an initial document necessary to comply with time limits but which is otherwise free to be augmented by whatever the parties choose to add or subtract merely upon their say so. Instead, it serves not only a useful but a necessary function. It sets out the essential case. It is that to which a Respondent is required to respond. A Respondent is not required to answer a witness statement, nor a document, but the claims made – meaning, under the Rules of Procedure 2013, the claim as set out in the ET1. … the parties must set out the essence of their respective cases on paper in respectively the ET1 and the answer to it. If it were not so, then there would be no obvious principle by which reference to any further document (witness statement, or the like) could be restricted. Such restriction is needed to keep litigation within sensible bounds, and to ensure that a degree of informality does not become unbridled licence. The ET1 and ET3 have an important function in ensuring that a claim is brought, and responded to, within stringent time limits. If a “claim” or a “case” is to be understood as being far wider than that which is set out in the ET1 or ET3, it would be open to a litigant after the expiry of any relevant time limit to assert that the case now put had all along been made, because it was “their case”, and in order to argue that the time limit had no application to 4 of 8 that case could point to other documents or statements, not contained within the claim form. Such an approach defeats the purpose of permitting or denying amendments; it allows issues to be based on shifting sands; it ultimately denies that which clear-headed justice most needs, which is focus. It is an enemy of identifying, and in the light of the identification resolving, the central issues in dispute.”

[19]Where a claimant avers that they have brought a complaint which is of a kind that a ‘box’ in section 8.1 of the ET1 could be ticked but the claimant has not ticked that box, that does not answer the question of whether they have brought that complaint. As Waller LJ said in Office of National Statistics v Ali

[2005] IRLR 201

, at paragraph 39: “the question whether an originating application contains a claim has to be judged by reference to the whole document”.

[20]This means both that: a) Where a box has not been ticked in section 8.1 of the ET1 to indicate that the claimant wishes to complain of, say, unfair dismissal, or disability discrimination, the fact that the box has not been ticked is not determinative of whether that complaint has been brought if the complaint is otherwise set out in the ET1 or accompanying particulars, that will suffice; and b) Ticking a box in section 8.1 is not sufficient on its own to bring such a complaint: “a general claim cries out for particulars and those are particulars to which the employer is entitled so that he knows the claim he has to meet” (Ali). Where a box has been ticked to indicate that the claimant complains of unlawful discrimination, in order for such a complaint to have been brought the ET1 or accompanying particulars would need to make clear what in fact occurred which the claimant characterises as discriminatory.

[21]Where there is a question as to whether the Claim Form raised a complaint that the respondent disputes, it is for the tribunal: “to consider, fairly and objectively, looking at the claim form as a whole, whether it contained [that] complaint… This is a question of objective construction” (Pranczk v Hampshire County Council

UKEAT/0272/19

[22]As described by Laing J in Adebowale v ISBAN UK Limited

UKEAT/0068/15

: “the construction of an ET1 is influenced by two factors: the readers for whom the ET1 is produced, and whether the drafter is legally qualified or not. The ET1, whether it is drafted by a legal representative, or by a lay person, must be readily understood, at its first reading, by the other party to the proceedings (who may or may not be legally represented), and by the EJ. The EJ is, of course, an expert, but (as this litigation shows) should not be burdened by, or expected by the parties to engage in, a disproportionately complex exercise of interpretation”. 5 of 8

[23]Cases are commonly brought by litigants-in-person in the Employment Tribunal, and as Auerbach J put it in Pranczk: “technical or formal legal language did not need to be used, and, in that regard, due allowance should be made for the fact that the Claimant was a litigant in person, and for a little infelicity of expression. The legal cause of action did not have to be named, or statutory provisions cited. But, one way or another, the essential factual elements of the putative additional claim had to have been asserted”.

[24]It can, at times, be difficult to discern what the Claim Form and Particulars of Claim raise by way legal complaints, but Auerbach J in McLeary v One Housing Group Ltd

UKEAT/0124/18

emphasised that “the starting point is a fair reading of the pleadings”, and whether the disputed allegation “[jumps] out” from those documents.

[25]Reference to “the starting point” could prompt the question of ‘what is the next thing?’ that needs to be done when that starting point has been satisfied, but the Court of Appeal in Moustache v Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

[2025] EWCA Civ 185

noted that the Employment Tribunal’s role is “arbitral not inquisitorial or investigative”, and the Tribunal “has no general duty to take pro-active steps to prompt some expansion or modification of the case advanced by a party where that might be to their advantage”.

REASONS

[26]The Claimant’s application was made in time. The holiday pay matter

[27]The Employment Judge considers that, while the ‘box’ in section 8.1 of the ET1 Form was ticked by the Claimant to indicate that he was bringing a complaint for unpaid holiday pay, in fact no articulation of that complaint was set out in the Claim Form. This is not simply a case of the value of the holiday pay not being specified, the Claimant failed to refer at all to any holiday pay being owed to him, save for ‘ticking the box’. That is not enough, as is clear from the case of Office of National Statistics v Ali, referred to in the Law section above.

[28]A fair and objective reading of the Claim Form as a whole (there were no separate particulars) does not lead me to conclude that the Claimant raised a complaint that there had been a failure to pay him holiday pay (Pranczk). This is not a complaint that relied upon a technical explanation, or which would otherwise be one that would be difficult for a lay person to express. The Claimant simply needed to say that he believed that he had not been paid the holiday pay that was owed to him during or upon the termination of his employment, and that he felt unable to calculate that, or his estimate of what he thought that might amount to. The Claimant did not do that. Nor is that a matter that “jumps out” from a fair 6 of 8 reading of the pleadings (McLeary) – on the contrary, a fair reading of the pleadings would lead an objective reader to think that the box had been ticked in error, because no reference is made to holiday pay elsewhere on the form, including in the box in which the claimant is expected to set out the remedy they are seeking. Harassment

[29]The Tribunal has no power to adjudicate standalone complaints for “harassment”. Harassment that is related to a protected characteristic is a matter within the Tribunal’s jurisdiction, but the Claimant did not appear to be raising such a complaint, as the narrative linked the harassment he says he experienced to the withholding of his salary, and no discrimination or protected characteristic box was ticked in section8.1 (which would not be determinative, but could perhaps have been linked to the harassment narrative in box

8.2 ).

[30]On a fair and objective reading of the Claim Form, the Claimant did not bring a complaint of harassment related to a protected characteristic, and therefore that does not give rise to a distinct complaint to the unauthorised deductions from wages complaint EJ Wright determined. The correct respondent

[31]EJ Ramsden considers there is some ambiguity in the judgment issued on 16 January 2025. While the judgment identifies two respondents – Medicines Online Limited (who all parties agree employed the Claimant) and Mr P J Brennan (who was a director of the First Respondent, and was the human person the Claimant holds responsible for the wrongs he complains of to the Tribunal) – determination in the judgment is that “The respondent made unauthorized deductions from the claimant’s wages”, and “The respondent must pay the claimant £2,669.80 in total”. This is ambiguous as to which respondent made the deductions, and which respondent is ordered to make a payment to the Claimant.

[32]As the parties agree that it was the First Respondent who employed the Claimant, only the First Respondent can be liable for wages owed to him for that work. The only appropriate respondent to a complaint of unauthorised deductions from wages is therefore the First Respondent.

[33]This was discussed with the Parties in the hearing held on 21 January 2026, and the Claimant’s representative at that hearing, Mr Vignesh, agreed with the Employment Judge.

[34]By this judgment, EJ Ramsden corrects that part of the 16 January 2025 judgment, and removes Mr Brennan as a respondent to case number 2307520/2024, having regard to Rule 35(2) of the ET Rules. EJ Ramsden considers that the inclusion of the Second Respondent as a respondent to the Claim, and therefore a respondent to the judgment, was a clerical error, which may be corrected pursuant to Rule 67. Alternatively, it is a point which is 7 of 8 appropriate for reconsideration pursuant to Rule 68(1) (being “necessary in the interests of justice” to ensure that only a person who could be liable for wages is liable for unauthorised deductions from those wages). This is a matter which was discussed with the parties in a hearing of today’s date.

[35]For the reasons set out above, the Claimant’s application for reconsideration fails and that decision is confirmed, save that the Second Respondent is removed from that judgment, so that references to “the respondent” should rightly be read as references to the First Respondent, being Medicines Online Limited. Approved by: Employment Judge Ramsden Date: 21 January 2026